Open Thread!

Hey guys,

Hope everyone is doing well!  Today I've been thinking about how easy it can be for us to get stuck in our ways.  Certainly, sometimes we need to have our unwavering convictions, but I think we also need to take a step back once and a while and look at life through other peoples eyes.  Given that this is a blog concerning functional fitness relating to functional life I was hoping everyone could post some feedback as to what they value in fitness and/or in life in general. Thanks in advance!

Bringing Back the Competition

Does anyone remember competition?  In this day and age it seems as though the concept of winners and losers is a taboo subject.  People teach their kids that they're all winners as long as everyone has fun. Great concept if it were true, but sadly it's not.

The essence of life thrives upon competition. Robbing these children of the thrill of a win or the agony of defeat is only sheltering them from the harsh reality that is the world.

I'd like to call for competition to be back in schools and most importantly back in life.

We shouldn't get an easy win to make us feel good.  It's hard work and perseverance that are the finest expressions of the human spirit. Nor should we be demoralized because of a loss.  Loss is the driving factor that gives us the strength and strong will to stand back up and try to win again.

The only way to know where we are in life is to measure our strengths and weaknesses against others'.

Embrace competition and strive to better yourself everyday.

Mobility: The Necessary Evil

Whatever we do in life we need to have mobility, yet how many of us neglect the complex machine that is our bodies?  When talking about fitness especially we need to do some work to enhance our mobility and decrease our risk of injury. Stretching is clearly not the most enjoyable activity which is why I refer to it as a necessary evil, but it can certainly enhance our lives. The best site that I've found to really help with all kinds of nasty mobility problems is www.mobilityWOD.com

Check that out and start getting flexible you'll benefit from it in the long run.

Thought of the day- What's the first thing that cats and dogs do when they wake up from a nap? Stretch. If they were in the wild they'd be depending upon their mobility to aid in ensuring their survival. They get it. We should too.

As Kelly Starrett from MobilityWOD say's "Don't wait til' you need a new knee, pony up."

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog for WRH 205!  For those of you who do not know me my name is Bill Keast and I'm currently and undergrad student at West Chester University majoring in English with a concentration in writing.  Reading, writing, and working take up quite a significant portion of my time and it is often overwhelming.

Recently I've discovered a fitness program that focuses on constantly varied functional movements.  This has been a huge eye opener for me and has introduced to the world around me in a more functionally oriented way.  Through this blog I plan to look at all aspects of life through my new found functional lens. Hope you all enjoy!

Technology Narrative

            Writing has always been very important to me and has undergone many changes in my own lifetime with the introduction of faster more efficient computers and the Internet.  I can still remember from a very young age writing short fiction stories on my mothers old typewriter and being thrilled at how easy it seemed.  It was nice to have a machine that could help you readily put your thoughts to paper and it seemed as though this was the only way to get serious writing accomplished.  Now that I am older however I have mixed feelings about technology especially in regards to the writing process.

            Technology has certainly enabled us to work at a much faster rate of production but I’m not so sure that this is always a good thing.  For instance if composing a short fiction story I sometimes feel much more connected to the story and characters if I take the extra time to handwrite each line. The advancement in technology is great for getting your thoughts out immediately and efficiently but I think we sometimes lose a certain degree of quality when we overuse the computers ability.  There is something more personal and meaningful to take the time to make sure that each line you handwrite is really what you want to place on the page. 

            I am not personally very familiar with many programs outside of the basics like Microsoft office.  I have worked with a program called VB designer to learn a little bit about programming code but that was rather short lived, as it was only one semester of training.

            I see a great importance in the familiarization of writing with the aid of computers.  In an age where information is available on a second to second basis it is impossible to escape the fact that we will all need to be as skilled as possible with writing at the computer in order to stay viable in whatever field we work in whether it be writing, business, etc. 

            My only fear with this age of rapid technology is that we will lose some of the quality that once came along with being forced to sit and handwrite a story or work with a typewriter.  I often think of some of the great writers from many years ago and how painstaking it must have been to sit and handwrite a 300 page novel, yet they felt so passionate about it that they had to do it whether it was easy or not.  I hope with the right mindset and discipline we will use our technology to our advantage and retain the quality that ought to go with it.