3. Some Thoughts on P90X Graduation

About 20 minutes ago I finished my final workout and became a P90X Classic Graduate. And at the moment everything feels very quiet. Very much like the day I left active duty after four years in the Marine Corps. It took about a month for me to get my mind around being free from the confines of military life. But on my last day I do remember feeling quiet and thankful for my new freedom.

And something like this is going on for me right now. But it's not freedom from the daily demands of doing P90X that I'm grateful for--it's the deeper sense of freedom that the accomplishment itself has given me--and the freedom to continue my life along this path. After a short break, I'll be starting P90X Plus.

And just now as I'm writing this, some things are coming to me more clearly about what P90X has meant to me. First of all, it brought me very quickly to the realization that I had been letting myself grow old--even though I've preached against accepting this all my life.

And that's always the problem, isn't it?
     I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done,
    than to be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.
                                                                                          Shakespeare

So those "before" photos and the P90X Fitness Test were indeed a very rude awakening for me on a couple of fronts. There was the obvious evidence of how old I had let myself get physically. But there was also the unexpected gift of being faced with my own hypocrisy. And it seems to me this might be where real freedom begins.

So, whoever you are now reading these words, if you haven't done so recently, I encourage you to take on a big ongoing challenge like P90X in your life--what it will teach you about yourself could be its greatest gift to you. . . .

Namaste.