Life advice, from unlikely sources.

[MossRoad]

"Help those that are willing to help themselves" was taught to me from a great instructor I had when I was a teenager. There are MANY times when I see people that are just looking for "free" stuff, but have ZERO desire to improve their own situation.

My older brother ran that point home when I was a teenager. A very fat person was running and I must have said something inappropriate. He said, "That person is trying to improve their situation."

I keep this principal in mind when I choose which charities to give to. Is the charity helping people improve their situation or are they helping to sustain a situation.

That's a very good point... there used to be a pretty large guy that jogged very slowly in the area. At first, we'd snicker a bit, but then you'd see him sweating a way an hour later and still going. How many of us can do heavy exertion for an hour?

 

[NorTracNY]

That's a very good point... there used to be a pretty large guy that jogged very slowly in the area. At first, we'd snicker a bit, but then you'd see him sweating a way an hour later and still going. How many of us can do heavy exertion for an hour?

As a former marathoner, that's easy. What I now believe is that it's actually not necessarily good for us. I pushed myself too hard at times. If you're post-workout Googling something to find out if you should go the the emergency room after using the bathroom, you've pushed yourself too hard.

Now that I'm a coach, I'm always stressing the process and not the immediate outcome. My players must be comfortable failing to get to success.

 

[tradosaurus]

I have received life advice from many different people from my teenage years to my early seventies. Most of the gems came from various uncles. For example that are printable:

From my Uncle Murphy when I was a teenager, "Marry a woman with two or three kids. That will save you a lot of hard work!"

From my same Uncle Murphy when he was in his eighties and I was in my fifties. This one was after we were visiting him and saw a stack of empty prune juice bottles. "The secret to a long life is to stay a little bit constipated and drink plenty of prune juice."

From my Uncle Brian when I was a teenager leaving for a date with about a dozen Aunts and Uncles sitting around the room. My dad had just told me to be home and in bed by 11:00 because we had a lot of work to do tomorrow. "He11 yeah boy, if'n you're not in bed by 11:00 just come on home."

Anyway, I thought some of you might have other bits of wisdom to pass on from older relatives.

RSKY

The more up to date and realistic opposite to that statement is:
"Never raise another man's kids. You will always come last."

 

[Fuddyduddy1952]

The nuns said if you do "that" you'll go blind.

My advice would be to stop when you need glasses.

Some need glasses just to find "that".

 

[MossRoad]

As a former marathoner, that's easy. What I now believe is that it's actually not necessarily good for us. I pushed myself too hard at times. If you're post-workout Googling something to find out if you should go the the emergency room after using the bathroom, you've pushed yourself too hard.

Now that I'm a coach, I'm always stressing the process and not the immediate outcome. My players must be comfortable failing to get to success.

When I was younger, I was a lifeguard. I could swim pretty hard for a couple hours if pushed. I used to swim 2 miles at lunch every day for fun. What I couldn't understand was on the high school swim teams, I knew plenty of people that swam sprints, but their coaches would make them swim lap after lap every morning. I know it was to build stamina, etc.... but if I'm gonna sprint every weekend, I'm not going to swim hard endless laps for an hour every day. Funny thing was, I could keep up with all my sprinter friends. Distance guys could beat me easily.

Similar thing happened with our kid that ran cross country. They have to run miles and miles every day but only ran 5K in the meets on weekends. Our kid had a bunch of personal and job related things come up, so had to cut practices back to only 1-2 a week. Then her times at the meets started going up. She set personal records about 6 weeks in a row. Coach asked what was up? I said I thought he was running them too much during the week, and explained the reasoning. She ended up taking 1st place JV in the city meet.

I'm sure it's different for elite athletes, which I nor my kids are not. They have that stuff down to a science at some places. But for the average person, I think it's easy to overdo it, thinking you're doing yourself some good.

 

[MossRoad]

Some need glasses just to find "that".

 

[EddieWalker]

When I was younger, I was a lifeguard. I could swim pretty hard for a couple hours if pushed. I used to swim 2 miles at lunch every day for fun. What I couldn't understand was on the high school swim teams, I knew plenty of people that swam sprints, but their coaches would make them swim lap after lap every morning. I know it was to build stamina, etc.... but if I'm gonna sprint every weekend, I'm not going to swim hard endless laps for an hour every day. Funny thing was, I could keep up with all my sprinter friends. Distance guys could beat me easily.

Similar thing happened with our kid that ran cross country. They have to run miles and miles every day but only ran 5K in the meets on weekends. Our kid had a bunch of personal and job related things come up, so had to cut practices back to only 1-2 a week. Then her times at the meets started going up. She set personal records about 6 weeks in a row. Coach asked what was up? I said I thought he was running them too much during the week, and explained the reasoning. She ended up taking 1st place JV in the city meet.

I'm sure it's different for elite athletes, which I nor my kids are not. They have that stuff down to a science at some places. But for the average person, I think it's easy to overdo it, thinking you're doing yourself some good.

When I was at Camp Pendleton, there was a Marine named Tate. I don't remember is first name, nobody used them. He never trained or exercised. He was naturally thin, hyper and ate what he wanted.

A perfect score for the 3-mile run was 18 minutes. That gave you 100 points which was combined with pushups and pullups for a perfect score of 300, which was used toward promotion.

He ran it in less than 17 minutes, and the last time I saw him, he had stopped and picked up a stick that he swung at weeds along the course to entertain himself while running. I think he said that he had done it in under 16 minutes, but I can't say that for sure. He just sort of floated along as he ran.

I ran several times a week and my best time was 21 minutes flat, but I only did that once. Usually, I was a minute or two slower.

 

[MossRoad]

When I was at Camp Pendleton, there was a Marine named Tate. I don't remember is first name, nobody used them. He never trained or exercised. He was naturally thin, hyper and ate what he wanted.

A perfect score for the 3-mile run was 18 minutes. That gave you 100 points which was combined with pushups and pullups for a perfect score of 300, which was used toward promotion.

He ran it in less than 17 minutes, and the last time I saw him, he had stopped and picked up a stick that he swung at weeds along the course to entertain himself while running. I think he said that he had done it in under 16 minutes, but I can't say that for sure. He just sort of floated along as he ran.

I ran several times a week and my best time was 21 minutes flat, but I only did that once. Usually, I was a minute or two slower.

There were a lot of amazing things I could do back when I was 6' tall and 135 pounds!

I peaked physically at age 42. My brain still feels like my 30s even though I'll soon be 65.

 

[MossRoad]

I ran summer track in 5-8 grades in a city league. I was only 4'9" by 8th grade, I wasn't fast enough to compete in running events. So I learned to race-walk and took 2nd in the city!

Why? Because there were only 3 people in the race. No one would get caught dead doing that sport!!!!

 

[MossRoad]

One time I was with my kids, and they were talking about sports and asked if I did anything when I was young and I said I race-walked. They asked what that was, so I took off across the lawn and they started laughing so hard!!! From that point on, anytime I wanted to embarrass them in public, I'd just take off race-walking and they'd start begging me to stop. Or I'd say "don't make me start race-walking" and they'd just bust up laughing.