Fitting It All In

A 3am alarm, a bowl of ramen, and the choices in between

The alarm went at 3am this morning. There’s a particular moment in the dark, somewhere in the first ninety seconds, where the whole thing is still negotiable: kit on and out the door, or roll over and nobody would ever know or even care. I’ve lost that negotiation plenty of times, but despite questioning and thinking about the fun I may have missed the night before, I didn’t this morning. Why, I’d love to say discipline, but that's probably a far too simple answer, really?

More than one reason comes to mind, but then you arrive to the starting point and your people are there. Those other crazies who consider this a “Normal” thing to do. You may only be together for the first ten minutes of the warm-up before the set starts, but that 10 minutes can mean more than you can imagine. The questions disappear, and your mind settles. That ten minutes isn't really about the bike; it's the end of a decision made much earlier, in a handful of small moments that didn't feel like much at the time.

This is something that's been on my mind all week: “Fitting it all in”, or rather, the slow realisation that you can't, and trying to do so will most likely not end well!! Written down, that looks obvious, but it's easy to behave as if it isn't true. We behave as if the right routine, the right diary, the right amount of discipline will let us hold everything at once. It won't. If there is too much going on, something will inevitably fall, or fail, or break. The only real question is whether you picked which one, or whether it got picked for you while you were looking the other way.

Funnily enough, this came up constantly in the research I did for my master's. Many of the participants I spoke to had realised, one way or another, that something had to give. The difference was that some had decided in advance what it would be, and some hadn't. The ones who hadn't still lost things; they just lost them by accident, and ultimately had no control over them. 

So how do you manage such choices? I won't lie, it's not easy, but you have to look at what you value as a person. It’s not as clear-cut as people often make it out to be; sometimes it's seen as a “good vs bad” choice, but it’s not that simple. Often both options will seem great at the time, but you have to look at who you are as a person and who you want to be. Are you a great friend, an elite athlete or a good parent? Do you want to be a model of discipline, live life to the fullest or simply feel healthy. Each of these values can swing the best choice one way or the other. 

The decision can get even harder if you are having a hard time. Emotions can take over, and cheap dopamine can feel like an amazing option when you just want to release the valve a bit. A few beers with some colleagues could be harmless, and in many ways should be, but does that decision change all the other small moments that follow, do you get up for that training session at 3am, are you fully aware and present throughout the day or are you just battling to get through it. 

It’s hard to say no. But by doing so you leave room to fill your cup with other things. Maybe more boring to many, but to me, listening to one of my best friends tell me stories about their recent race over a bowl of ramen might as well have been a night out at the biggest party in Ibiza for someone else. While both a night out and a catch-up with a friend over lunch would let me enjoy time with friends, the latter fits with the other elements I value, but at the time you have to remember emotions are not neutral advisors. They're loud, immediate, and they always argue for whatever is available right now. 

It’s World Mental Health Day today, which feels like the right week to admit I don’t have this balanced. I get it wrong regularly. Some weeks I’ve said yes to everything and arrived at Saturday with nothing left for the things I actually care about. But as I prepare to start the day, play some golf and fully caffeinate myself, I’m happy with my decisions…. THIS week! Fitting it all in was never the goal. Working out what’s worth fitting in is a much better question, and I’m still answering it.