The times they are a-changin' in Life as I know it...

As some of you might know, my girlfriend and I broke up recently due to her going to further her studies at the University of Pretoria, which is about a 3 hour flight away from Cape Town. It was primarily her decision, as I was prepared to take on a long-distance relationship, but she wasn't. I was completely heartbroken and really struggled for the first week or 2, but then something strange happened, well, even before that, something strange happened.

Quitting smoking has never been a difficult thing for me to do. I've stopped before for 2 years and another time for 1 year and once or twice for about 6 months without having much difficulty. The day after we broke up, I quit smoking. This was very strange to me as it wasn't something I had thought about doing recently. I also started eating very healthily (not that I was eating poorly before), but really concentrating on what I was putting in my body. I was actually quite concerned about this at first, as I was worried that I was slowly but surely going to be sucked back into the hardcore bodybuilding, eating and obsessing about it that I lived for so many years, but destroyed me physically and emotionally. Ever since I stopped the weightlifting and bodybuilding about a year/year and a half ago, I have been very anxious around any type of exercise, for fear that I might spiral back into that lifestyle. I was also too anxious to return to the gym, because I didn't look the way I used to anymore and I felt inferior and as though people would think I am pathetic. I haven't returned to a gym since.

I would just do normal calisthenics in the privacy of my own home and take my dogs for walks as exercise, but even this would spiral into an obsessive routine sometimes and I needed to find some type of alternative, some middle path to this black and white thinking. I had known about DDP Yoga, a form of Yoga that was created by a retired professional wrestler named Diamond Dallas Page who decided to combine his post-op rehabilitation exercises with yoga, and I have seen how it has not only prolonged and renewed the careers of semi-retired, older professional wrestlers (most notably Goldust who is tearing it up these days like nobody's business), but also changed the lives of normal people, most notably a disabled war-veteran named Arthur. His videos are up on youtube, go check it out if you want to.

I have done a little bit of yoga before during my personal training course (seems like a lifetime ago), but I was more obsessed with getting bigger and more ripped the entire time. I decided to give DDP Yoga a go, as it was something I had never done before and I had a good feeling that it wouldn't make me become so obsessed, because I had no previous marking stick to measure my performance by (plus it was as far from the weights room that I could get).

Back to the story at hand, I got the DDP Yoga DVD and started doing the program the day after the break-up. Why did I all of a sudden decide to make all these positive changes not even 24 hours after the break up? Was it that I was trying to distract myself? Was I subconsciously telling myself that I deserve more? Was I trying to prove something to her? I don't know, but I am feeling great. The aches and pains I woke up with every morning and the creaks and cracks of my neck and back that sound like gunshots going off are almost gone. I have lost some weight, I am feeling healthy and I feel energized and alive. I can move more easily, I walk more easily and even some of the side effects of my different medications have been reduced. It's amazing. 4 Weeks down the line and you would never have guessed that I recently broke up with my girlfriend, and it wasn't like we weren't serious, we were. We had plans for the future. Now with my new amazing job starting within the next week or two as soon as the place opens, life is better than it has been in a looooong time, even though it seems a bit wrong. Shouldn't I be sad?

One explanation I think might have to do with the extremely rough break-up I went through about 2 years ago. I think that somehow made me a lot stronger, coming out of that alive (barely). I am happy and I have no desire to be in a relationship right now. As confused, shocked and surprised as I am at this reaction I had after the break up, I am very happy that it happened. What was stopping me from doing this while I was in a relationship? Maybe I knew that once the hole that she filled was empty again, I needed something to fill it up with. Something positive. Was the affection and love that I received from her holding me back, because I had no reason to improve myself and my way of life? I already had the girl that I wanted and she loved me and I loved her (and I still do), so there was no reason for me to make these positive changes. Did this relationship cause me to become complacent? I think I have to keep an eye on this if and when a future relationship starts to form.

Don't get me wrong, it's not like I'm completely healed. I still want to sink into the ground when walking down the street and I still feel this massive weight of inadequacy and judgement from others, but I think the load might have lightened and I know that once I can get back to work again, a new place of work, not the toxic old place where I was working myself to death and having my passion sucked away from me on a daily basis. I've been doing so much recipe testing and creating things and I love my new employers. I've been in contact with them the entire time and they love what I've been doing and I'm going to have a certain amount of creative freedom. I look forward to continuing my work and my passion. Being a pastry chef. That's all I ever wanted to be...

Things are looking good and I am happy, but I must still keep an eye out for any potential bumps in the road. I'm not where I want to be yet, not by a long shot.

Have a lovely day AD