The Plan: Get out of my head and into my body!

This morning I decided that it was important to take a step back, reflect and get out of my head and into my body so I took a hike through the beautiful Hennops hiking trail.

The plan was simple: Hike the 5km route, find a nice spot and journal.?

??????“Just a bit of background, I have an autoimmune disease and the COVID vaccine triggered the response in both instances so I have not done any exercise for the last two weeks because of it.” I’ve also suffered a tibial plateau fracture in a motor cycle accident and my left leg struggles to support my body weight and sometimes just forgets to work like it's supposed to…”

But when I got to the venue this morning, my brain somehow convinced my body that the 10km, slightly technical route can’t be that bad and whilst we’re here we might as well complete it.

The route starts of pretty scenic walking next to the river and just under an hour I was at??the 2.5km mark reading a WARNING sign:

“This is the crocodile route, if you found the experience over the last 2.5km difficult, or you are unfit, you should not attempt this route, take the escape route to your right”

If I am honest, I was quite out of breath, and my Garmin registered a 180bpm heart beat somewhere leading up to this point, but I decided that a quarter of the route was completed in under an hour so how bad could it get? And continued on the route. 500m into the second quarter I regretted my decision with quite a technical climb, I told myself to HTFU and before I knew it, I was at the 5km mark facing a similar WARNING sign but this time they added: The next part of the crocodile route is even more technical than the previous 5km and should not be attempted if you regretted the second quarter of the route. In all honesty, this sign was very persuasive, but again I found myself continuing on the route... -The start of the third quarter was so deceiving, a beautiful, nicely cut highway where I could pick up the pace, and then shit got real: A very technical downhill which took me for ever to complete because my left leg couldn’t handle my weight and slipped on the lose rocks quite a few times, each slip was obviously followed by "fuck that was close..."?

At the 7km marker the route became flat and I suddenly felt completely in control. I started thinking about how this route resembles business, and confidently concluded:

You should always stay the course, follow and execute the plan. There were several little routes that looked so welcoming just of the track, one to a “cave” another to a lookout and every time I tried these routes they weren’t as exciting as I imagined, and it wasted quite a bit of my energy and time getting back on the planned route. Same thing in business, I proudly announced: distractions are everywhere and can easily waste time and energy... I concluded that although my decent was extremely slow down the technical route, I was still moving forward towards the goal and this was much better than giving up. I also realized that taking a break to enjoy a sip of water every now and again was very energizing and that I should remember this when things at the office get tough.

Unfortunately for me, I reached the 8km mark and was faced with some more technical descends, the only problem being that I was not expecting it this time and and was now tired, and struggling to bend my left knee, long story short, the last 2km was a bloody nightmare and not enjoyable at all!

My final conclusion: I have no idea WTF I’m doing and will probably spend the weekend taking anti inflammatory and stacking ice packs…