Open Boat.

You, misfit in your own life,
wondering if there is a place for you in this world,
knowing that you were made for something
but uncertain if that something is a place for you to land
or a role for you to wear
or if it existed in your past and you walked past it
intent on another lesser thing
and you've missed it.

Me, I wouldn't blame You God
if you let it pass me by
as I moved by it.
Not Your fault.
I have chosen wrong at times
and thought that it wouldn't kill me
or wanted to die 
and didn't care 
if everything fell to ruin.
So.

No one's watching.
Everyone's in the same space
caring about their own lack
and wanting the lottery to fall into their account.
But the cavalry's not coming.
And God is the one watching 
but only watching to see if you'll be different
and become who you are
to stand out from this forest of faded shadowy silhouettes
in color 
and in identity.

And I ask
What color?
Who? 
In this rowboat named Identity
Where I see only where I've been
and row until I tire
and think
Maybe if I set the oars down I'll feel a current.
But mostly I feel tired
and alone
and sad, again.

Why did You make me?
Why am I here?
I need a reason.
I want a thing to do that doesn't almost pay the bills
and doesn't make me say oh damn it it's Friday night and only two days until Monday again 
and Saturday and tomorrow's Sunday and almost Monday
and Sunday night and tomorrow's Monday
and it's 5:15 and almost time to leave
and we haven't done anything Together We
yet

I don't need to feel You all through me
But I want to
I don't need to change the world
but I want to
I don't need to work it all out and be neat and move with elegance and power
but I want to

But I want to
Wouldn't it be lovely
to have waaay more than enough
to step away from survival to hand away crazy 
wads of money
words of life
life
if
I had it, would I 
do it
I believe I would
I believe I would intentionally
and coincidentally
(if coincidences exist, because there are no coincidences in the You)
So,
A Structure to really make a difference in my circles
and in me
to heavenly give opportunity and opulence and openness
to those who never had a first chance to know who they could have been
if
(and here we don't insert all the hard knocks and evils because who wants to cry harder)
and A Margin to take time to really make a difference in my day
and in those
who heavenly are the one before me in this low place
where I find myself
where I would keep myself
even if the lottery were to try to float me away 
wash me away with green water
I would not be awash 
from here

So, why
or why not rather
because it would be wasted on me
because I'm alone but tied to others
who would not be able to handle more and less and depth and height
then 
how does one do this thing called God
because we all walk alone with You
and we all are naked before You
and I 
can't herd cats or lead christians 
for politicized people all want their vote and their way and everyone does what seems right to himself 
again
even those who claim Lordship claim lordship
in blindness and delusion and this-far-but-no-further
is far enough

Not far enough for me.
Not deep enough for me.
Not near enough for me.
Not sensical enough for me.
I want it all to make sense
not be sense, mind You
just to come together before it's all over here
and to know that I've played my role
as written
not to fail
  although I know I have failed
not to fuck it all up
                    although I know I have done that pretty well too
to overcome all that deficit and to leave something of a profit behind
to speak a profit
to walk something forward
to become what I was to be so
I don't lurch into bliss with blinking eyes 
and disappointment in You
for leaving me undone 
and me leaving this place unfinished

Which puts me back into the rowboat
here with oars up, looking back on the Finished Work of the Cross
and The Empty Tomb
It Is Finished, and I am dead to all that
and alive to all that
too
but 
still out here on the water
and I've rowed hard but did it even move me
or even in the right direction
there are no roadmaps here on the water
was I supposed to just rest and drift and enjoy the day
or was I supposed to hand over one oar and row Together
We are in the boat, I know, Together
with hints of wind 
to direct me

So I set my face to the sun
and I listen for breezes
Will I end like I began
Will I ever
end
or land
or will I 
will I need to stay in the boat until
until I
until the boat and lake and wind and I

I want to leave all this brokenness behind
Not broken, I know
this boat isn't sinking
feels broken
looks worse now than it did
creaky
but not leaky
afloat and capable of floating here forever
which is the problem
a motor would be nice?
a galley?
Nah, this is the brokenness
Me picturing my yacht, pulling up to rowboats and handing down motors 

My dream.
Your dream?
Me, in a rowboat with You.
Here.
Now.
No motor, no need for anyone to hand a motor down to me
or me to hand anything down to anyone
or anyone
just 
Together
We

adrift
and
moving
to 
eternity
one breath of breath
at 
a 

with all the

in the

with no provisions or ambitions or destinations or purposes
just
simply
only 
Us
in an open boat
in the open
open
and open
for whatever
nothing
more

Random Commentary Is No Tale To Tell.

I'm making a note here to remind myself - my later, older, forgetful self - that some clangin' and bangin' has been going on in the backyard box over these last long weeks. I've not logged any of it here as
• I'm not on a program or regular schedule worth tracking. This is not because I don't desire to be on one, it's a time issue
• Everything is on feel, so there's no weights/reps/benchmarks to track
• I have no fitness goals ATM
• I care less about this than I do about tracking all of what the HS is doing in my life, and I don't have enough time for that, so. Also, I'm not logging that stuff here, because, who would believe it anyway?

What I will note is that when I do get out for what seems like bi- or tri-weekly sessions, they look like this right now:

1:
Assistance antagonists (10 mins)
Hip Thruster/RDL, say
Main (14 mins)
Oly Squat, say

2:
Assistance antagonists (10 mins)
Landmine Iso Rows/Y-pulls, say
Main (14 mins)
Meadows Rows or Ring Rows

All I'm doing is pulling because I trashed my right rotator cuff bouncing OH presses off the bottom like a complete stoopidnoob, a failure for which I still punish myself, as you can see, and for which I am still paying the price of all things overhead. I am unable to static hang, and all pushing movements are right out.

Nothing's changing in terms of hypertrophy or composition. I'm doing IF just about everyday, with a noon to 6ish window.
Strength is down, but yeah, that tends to happen when you don't do anything constructive, and can't do anything but squat and ring rows.
Conditioning is baseline, if I can work in anything, work capacity will be the first addition; sprinting and MA.

So, saying that there's nothing to say. Nothing to say in a conversation with someone who only speaks infrequently, when he has time to blurt out a sentence or two, and those talking points are merely what's on his mind in the moment.

A Dream Image and Ultimate Insanity.

I'm dreaming every night, but I'm not remembering them. I not troubled by this. The usual nature of my dreaming, or what I can recall, are flights of movement and action and color and never any specifics. I remember only that some craziness happened - like the incoherent snippets of memory after getting clocked in a street fight. I know my spirit and the Holy Spirit are going on grand adventures, happy to run along without conscious-me tagging along. So conscious-me doesn't need to remember. The deepest parts of me are getting massaged and grown and stretched and pacified and purified while the rest of me is at rest. I'll take it.

Yesterday, Carl led an in-depth college-level-survey-seminar of all-things-dreams on GroupMe. He convinced me, at least, that I should pursue some divine knowledge while sleeping. So I prayed  yesterday:
God, I ask You for a dream tonight, one that provides clear direction from You.

Annnd, last night I had a dream. More like echoes of a dream, like usual. But, there among the confetti snippets of dream memory, I did hold to one very complete, razor-sharp and memorable image.
Since the dream isn't much of a story to tell, let me tell you a different story first.

Familiar with Dave's Insanity Sauce? The hot sauce that can remove driveway grease stains? I first tasted it after I came home from Thailand, when my mouth was conditioned into a spicy-food resistance that could lick a red-hot tailpipe and giggle.
We were in a hot-sauces-only store, I was going to buy a bottle of something crazy for my father in law who liked hot sauce, and I asked what was hottest. The retailer said Dave's Ultimate Insanity sauce.
I asked for a trial. The guy dipped a toothpick into the bottle and handed it over. I touched it to my tongue. I remember wondering if I had speared myself with the tip of the toothpick, because this slightest hint of Dave's had created a tiny black hole that was sucking all the loose shards of pain from all points in the universe directly into my tongue meat. 

Fast forward to after I'd gifted the bottle to my father in law, when we're making sandwiches and joking about putting some Dave's onto the sandwiches, and his mother says she wants to try the stuff.

Gram was the sweetest person in all of the Body of Christ. Jesus would shed tears at times hoping that He could have a heart of love like her someday. Never an unkind word, never any talk that didn't somehow cycle back to Godliness or a blessing or some manner of self-sacrifice. She's about 70, and slowing down physically, but still ramping up in her divine sweetness - until the world will not be worthy of it anymore and she is taken home.

Just trying to give you a mental picture if you never met her. We all know someone like her: the one upon whose prayers the entire church stands. When she dies, if someone doesn't step up their game, the church will close its doors, because all the love will have left the building.

She wants to try the hot sauce, and, not seeing too well anymore, she smacks the bottom of the bottle like ketchup and blops at least a quarter-sized ball of lava onto her sandwich.

Everyone: Whoa! Stop! Danger! Don't do that Gram! This stuff isn't like that! You're going to have a heart attack! It's going to eat a hole through you and down to China!
Gram: Oh, stop it, sweetie. Blop, blop.

This conversation goes in a circle for 5 minutes until Gram voices a grim edge to her sweetness and we all know that it's time to surrender. She is going to do this thing, and telling her not to is only hardening her resolution to add more sauce.

This was before a universal 911 phone number was instituted and people had to call emergency services by their particular phone number, so I go into the kitchen and ready her a post-tastebud-meltdown glass of milk, and check that the number for the ambulance service is magnetized to the refrigerator. I know what one toothpick tip of this stuff is capable of. She is liable to have that heart attack. 

I bring the milk back to the table in time to see her take the first bite. Gram, with grim resolve, remains immobile as she eats that whole sandwich.
  
She can't see. Her eyes cloud over into a drippy bloodshot pink. Basins of sweat pool in the folds under her eyes. She cannot speak. She will not speak, I think, even if she can, since if she might emit a squeak, the sound would be an indictment: I have misstepped and I must admit it.

This kindly elderly lady is suddenly someone monstrously grand in my eyes. A towering cliff that withstands crashing ocean waves for centuries and remains intact. A sun that burns, and is burned, for millennia and never flames out. What is her secret?

Stubbornness. And it's not hers only, this dark power. 
I look around the table, and there to my right is my little brother in law, who, at the age of 10 ordered a raw steak at a restaurant. Who knows why. Maybe being the guy who eats bloody meat sounded manly at that time to him. The plate came to the table, red and bleeding juice and still mooing as they say, and, rather than return the cut to be cooked, he mechanically chewed through the whole disgusting thing, obviously hating every second, but too stubborn to admit it.
And, on my left. There is my father in law, who I won't tell any tales on, as he is in heaven now and has the ear of the Almighty, and who, while alive, was famous for harboring no quit at all, ever, and who, like Gram, was the most loving and generous and self-denying man alive, but who was notoriously the stubborn-est of them all.

He's more stubborn than Gram, who is sweating but resolute and unmoved and upright, but only just so, holding herself together like some sort of human jellocake. If I were to touch her with my pinky finger, I think she might start to jiggle and vibrate and volcanically explode.

But she doesn't. Through sheer stubbornness she didn't. And she never admitted that the sandwich was hot. She never said anything, no matter how anyone tried to tease any commentary on the experience out of her. 

And I learned: I am married into a family with monumental resolve founded on a granite foundation of stubbornness. Stubbornness that will swallow burning pitch without flinching to avoid an admission of misjudgement. Stubbornness that can turn a Godly grandma into a stoic deathbot, incapable of acknowledging pain.
And I realized: Her stubborn blood also runs in the veins of my wife; the woman with access to my bank account and the block of knives in our kitchen.

You're making a big scary deal out of not much, you say. Stubbornness! Everybody is a donkey sometimes. This only becomes a problem during communication and conflict. It's not a spiritual issue, stubbornness, is it? It's not really an evil to beware? 

I don't know: Can anyone tell you anything? Can anyone question you on anything, or call you on anything? Do you always have to be in the driver's seat during any disagreement? Can you listen to more than a few sentences of anyone's anything before you drift or interrupt or contradict? Do you always have to be right? Can you ever say you're sorry? Can you ever be wrong? Can you ever admit that you might have misstepped into a pool of hot sauce?

Yeah, hot sauce. Which, brings me back to my dream. I have my usual dream(s) last night. I say "usual," but I don't know what the content is in my usual dreams.
What I do remember is a picture-framed dream portrait of Gram, my father in law, my wife, my brother in law - the whole surnamed family line - as static busts in a museum display. I have only that picture and the encompassing mist of dream-knowledge that all of these people are held by a spirit of Stubbornness. 

A spirit of stubborn? It's not even a thing, is it? The One talking to me via a dream says yes. And a generational, familial one that that. The Stubborns.

I woke up holding tight to this image and didn't waste any time. I prayed. I first prayed my gratitude to God, for answering my request to speak to me clearly and directly during dreaming, and then spoke to the spirit of Stubbornness down through the whole familial line, down through my kids, breaking it and replacing stubbornness with humility, receptivity, openness. Soft heartedness instead of hard headedness. Some tractability where there's been intractabilty.

That was this morning. This evening, L and H are having a disagreement, after everyone else has carted off to bed. The words were indistinct, but the tones of the voices made the messaging clear: 
I'm stubbornly stubborning your stubborn stubbornnesses, and I've stubborned enough stubbornnessing for one stubborn day!
Well, my stubborn stubborny can't take any more stubbornite from the avalanche of stubborn flying down from your stubbornstubbornstubborn stubborn range!

How do two stubborn people back down to show love when Stubbornness is a brushfire on their tongues? This will be a spiritual war that one prayer isn't going to win, I see. I'm glad that I was given a dream image to prep me for what's at stake, and to ready me a sledgehammer of Humility to smash against this long-standing red-hot iron-willed wall of Stubbornness.

Boots on the Ground.

Okay, I'm reviewing my year, and setting course for this next season. A year ago today, I got the first inkling that I should start prayer-walking to reclaim territory in downtown Bakersfield. I didn't know what that meant at the time, but I started in by prayer walking through the neighborhoods on my way to church.

I love the downtown, and I live in the tree-lined streets just bordering the concrete center of the city. The '01 is my zip code; 93301. This area encompasses the majority of Bakersfield's historic downtown, and Colonel Baker's field where everything originated in the 1800's:

I began to get serious about walking every street in the spring of this year, and got strategic about putting militant boots on the ground in early summer; stitching together a map and tracing neighborhoods, nooks, and nether regions visited in green ink. I spent some early mornings walking multiple circles around some buildings singled out by the Spirit - the abortion clinic, the Mason's hall, the Lectorium Rosicrucianum, a prominent strip club - and some places that got singled out for blessing and reclamation - defunct churches, crack hotels, residences. I faced off with crazed dogs, saw glowing sunrises, talked with broken transients, and discovered corners of my hometown that I'd never considered. 

I have only a few streets to mop up now, and I still need to do some blessing-walking around Bakersfield High School, which is closed off because the stadium is under reconstruction. My map now looks like this:

During the travels, the biggest change for me was that my mental map expanded from thinking in terms of territory to thinking in terms of inhabitants. Who lives here, both human and spirit? Who owns this space? ... And to pray, declaring, accordingly.

And now, What to do when I'm done? I don't get a gold star. Like the Golden Gate bridge, when you finish painting at one end, start over at the other. There's some streets that need a fresh coat of prayer. I'll find some cold mornings to get back out there now that the weather's changing.

Punisher No More.

As a kid, I collected some of the darker comics - I had some Spider-man and some of the frivolous ones like Richie Rich and Archie, but I got older and was drawn to the darker anti-heroes before the anti-hero became mainstream; stone-cold angels of death and judgement. My collection was filled with Conan the Barbarian, Wolverine, the Punisher. All with some commonalities: misfit he-man-woman-haters who wanted to be left to themselves to do what they were driven to do; wander, making their lone-wolf way in the world, eluding a dark past, with no connection to others, keeping secretive and solitary, and, when cornered, showing their dark sides as the goodbad guys messing up the worsebad guys. 

Conan always fell into larger schemes as the machinations of the evil ambitious sought to make use of him, and always had to end up killing some slaver or witch, taking down some repressive city-state warlord, rescuing some woman who would inevitably leave him behind, or be left behind as he continued his wandering at the story's end. He never really wanted to help out, philanthropy was ever thrust at him on a spear tip.

Wolverine - and don't get me wrong here, not the sanitized Hugh Jackman Wolverine, I'm talking about the streetclothes-Logan-in-Madripoor ogre who was physically repugnant, full of disillusionment and hatred - was always siding with and fighting for the right but only after the wrong pushed into his isolation; never knowing who he was or who he should be or should become, and never able to meld into a wider community, or to find peace with any woman or friend. I remember being bothered that Logan smoked. But I wasn't bothered that he was full of disillusionment and despair. His doom felt like home. 

And the Punisher. He became my favorite. Frank Castle, his family taken from him, a burning hatred for all things hateful. Always looking for trouble to trouble. Daredevil, his foil, ever the attorney, thought that if Punisher knew what America stood for, he'd respect due process. But the appeal with the Punisher was that in the heart of the law-abiding and law-loving, there is the desire to short-circuit the system because it fails to deliver justice; to be the one to dispense justice. There are bad people out there, and someone has to be the antidote for evil. Someone to fight darkness with darkness; judge, jury, executioner. A never-ending crusade of killing the killers sounded like righteousness to me.

These were my superheroes. All with retribution as their primary superpower. None of these characters appeal to me anymore. I'm plenty tired of harboring a darkness in my heart. I'm not a minister of vengeance. I'm a minister of reconciliation. Love doesn't seek isolation, or step aside as evil makes its way in the world. Love overcomes evil, but with good.
There's still a natural man inside of me, wired with an innate desire to find a fight for justice - and I do. I do fight for justice - against principalities now, not targeting flesh and blood enemies. No man is my enemy. No man is safe from an undeserved blessing. Mercy has triumphed over judgement.
I will act as Punisher, but not on flesh and blood - instead, I look to punish the principalities and powers. Claws pulling the puppet strings in the spiritual shadows behind the physical stage. 

I've been hearing from various prophetic sources that I'm a Wolverine. Better to be him than the Punisher, in all events. Besides wearing the chops, I don't fully get the connection though. Maybe, like Logan after a mind-wipe, we both walk not really understanding our identities; like him, my past, and my possibility and promise and potential have all been taken from me, unremembered, unrecognizable and unrecoverable. I don't know what else might be my connection to him. The one who will do the dirty job? The one who will go in and slay the ugliest with his own ugliness? The one who is unkillable but wants to die inside? The one walking joylessly wondering if there is a place of peace somewhere, but won't ever find it because wherever you go, there you are, and his discontent disrupts any peaceable place he enters?
I hope not. These things were true until very recently, but my hope is, not true for long. Not true in the tomorrow.

What do I know? Vengeance is Mine, I will repay, saith the Lord. Choosing who deserves destruction isn't my portion. I can destroy, but how does that make me Godly? God is the one who destroys evil ... but with good. Only God would bless people from darkness into light, God is the One Who would curse not. Killing and destroying is the work of the dark side. Destroying someone who is a destroyer - sounds like a good deed could be done in that, but only to the natural mind - far better to turn a destroyer into a builder, and add another to the blessing of the kingdom of light and right.
Do I make my point? When it's kill or be killed, be killed. "You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also." Jesus said it. If this sounds like weakness to you, then you have no understanding of the power of reconciliation.

I know that chivalry isn't dead. Strength is to be spent into creation rather than destruction. This sounds like a repetition of the point above, but with an extension beyond the realm of mercy into self-sacrifice. The modern-day knight not only seeks to overcome evil with good, but surrenders his rights to his own itinerary, his self-sufficiency; and, instead, sacrifices self and strength for the needful and weak. He cannot go his own way, and pick his fights only when his own way is obstructed. Confronted by injustice, he must go out of his own way to step between the oppressed and their oppressor. Who will fling himself into a sea of blows to absorb some, as a sorrow-sponge in hope of bringing calm to the waters? 

I know that the day of the loner is done. I am a married man. I am a father, with children of my own, and I am a father with adoptive spiritual charges for whom I care. My place in the world is found in community and inter-relationships. Any wistfulness for a lone-wolf life of wandering and answering to no one has been loved out of me by a caring God and a committed community. Pretending that you're too hard for fellowship is a veneer hiding a deficiency.

I know that I don't wander the world seeking to find myself, or exorcise some demons within. There is nothing to discover on the solitary road, there is no healing to be found in some self-imposed silence. The darkness within was driven out when the Light of the World took up residence inside, and now I am the light of the world. I remind myself: Stop looking for darknesses inside, or anticipating them. Move forward. Squint with the light of the truth in your eyes.

I know that all things are made new. I know enough to stop trading blows with darkness, or seeking to - there is no real fight between light and darkness. I know to share the sufferings of Christ, and like Him, intercede even if it costs all. I know to look around myself, and find my worth via investment into those with whom I am connected. I know that I was made whole for a purpose; I know to look outside my own skin and bring the reconciliation I carry. 
I know that I am a Punisher no more. There is no condemnation now for those who are in Christ Jesus; there can be no condemnation now from me, now that I am in Christ Jesus.

Front Squat RoM - 2016091721

I've had some days between these logged workouts. Some were just air squats and lunges for 6ish rounds, like on the road. I did a day of ring rows and oly squats couplet'ed, but really. I wonder why I'm logging today, except to say this: I'm not on schedule. I'm not on a goal quest. I'm just doing lifestyle work, just who I am. Getting up early for morning watch and being too burnt in the PM to do a program, that's who I am right now.

Buy in
3 rounds, no timer

Band Rotator Cuff internal/external rotations - Grey band, which is too mucho
Hip Thruster x16+ out/in
2 rounds, no timer

Adductors x12ish, doubled grey band

Finish off the 4 Hip Thrusters
12 mins.

- 1 min -

Main

5/4 rounds, HT timer
Front Squat - AtG @ 135# x6's mostly
RDL, 163# x10-x8

12 mins.

If You Can't Circuit - 20160917

5/4/3 rounds, HT timer
Ring Row x10-8
KB Swings
DB Thrusters
Ab Wheel Rollouts x10
15 mins.

Tried to rack the DBs, and my right shoulder fell apart like wet cardboard. Could clean it into place, but not hold it in place.
I'll be doing some rotator cuff work for the foreseeable. Praise the Holy Name of the Lord, I'm not feeling this shoulder the way I was last Saturday. It's weak, but it's not screaming bloody murder: The rocketship upside.

- 1 min -

Tabata Bag Work, Lefts only
Stop kicks and everything from southpaw stance. No right hands today, yah.
6 mins.

Air BSS - 20160907

4 rounds, HT timer
Step back lunges, alternating rounds
RDL x9/10 @ 163#
15 mins.

- 1 min -

3 rounds, HT timer
BSS, BW only, alternating rounds x7/8/9
6 mins.

Did these inside the rack, with hands on the pin n' pipe, just for balance. Yes, I will add weight.

- 1 min -

4/3 rounds, HT timer
Hip Thruster, double blue bands x15 - in /out
Adductors, single grey band x12
7 mins.

This turned into an assfest. Rocking the lunges and split squats back so they didn't feel like they were putting pressure on my knees made for a lot of glute work today.

32 mins total.

OH Press HT - 20160905

Buy in
4 rounds, HT timer
GtO x7ishes @113#
5 mins.

- 1 min -

5 rounds, HT timer
OH press for 5RM: 113#x5/133#x5/143#x5/145#x1/133#x5
Chins x5/4s
12 mins.

143# for 5. No comment.

3 rounds, HT timer
Meadows rows, alternating rounds x10/9 @66#
Ring dips x7ish
10 mins.

30 mins total.

Oly Squat Form 5x5 - 20160904

Buy in Assistance, no timer
Hip Thruster x15 @ 2 blue bands
RDL x10 @163#
12 mins.

- 1 min -

Oly Squat, SB timer
5x5 @ 205
15 mins.

AtG, slow and pause in the hole, just making certain we're all the way in it, then exploding out. It's not the weight, it's the depth.

30 mins total.

What Shall We Do?

The lot is cast into the lap, But its every decision is from the Lord. - Proverbs 16:33

I'm learning to walk with God in fresh ways. The Holy Spirit and I play games as He's teaching me. The best learning is fun; it's discovery, it's exploratory, and it's repetition with variation. Usually, it's learning by doing, instead of trying to learn by reading or hearing, and it's personal. Rather than learning about what someone else did, I am challenged to do something unique in partnership with God in our own unique way.

If I don't wake up with some pressing directive, I ask, "What Shall We Do?" of the Holy Spirit. Many times, He answers with something specific; write a letter to this person, read this chapter from the Bible, walk around this building and pray. Kingdom-building games of discovery by doing.

Some days, "What Shall We Do?" returns no distinct answer. On these days, if there's nothing pressing to accomplish from my end, we roll the dice, and pull randomly from a list of 25 activities.

I prompt Siri on the iPhone: "Random number from 1 to 25."
She will abruptly answer, "It's Seven," or another number. Before I used the iPhone, I would visit a random-number generating website, like this one. 

I take this number to be directly from my Holy Friend. If that sounds questionable to you, be assured that this is what the apostles did when they flipped a coin to choose between Matthias and Justus to replace Judas among the 12 at the end of Acts 1. They used their minds to narrow down the good choices (they had two to choose from, we have 25), then basically said, "God, you pick from what we think is best." 

Prior to a 25-item list, I had a list of 10, which grew to 15, then 20. I add new items to explore as they bubble up into my experience. Maybe this time next year I'll have a list of 50 activities.

It's fresh every time. Say the random number was 7, like above. Then I'll spend some time working in partnership with the Lord by praying with an eye to binding up some bad stuff and releasing God's good stuff, ala Matthew 18:18 (see below, number seven is Bind/Release, in the prayer-stuff section).

Here's my list.

1. Waste Time with God
2. Take Dictation > Listen
3. Meditate on a (Biblical) Truth

4. Craft a prayer
5. Pray a Bible passage
6. Intercede
7. Bind/Release
8. Prayer Walk

9. Write a Song
10. Sing Worship
11. Soak Worship

12. Listen to a Sermon
13. Craft a Sermon
14. Journal > Testimony

15. Bible Exploration
16. Bible Listening
17. Read your Current Study Book
18. Memorizations - Recitations
19. Promises > Inheritance Verses

20. Craft a Word of Prophecy
21. Craft a Blessing > a Letter of Encouragement
22. Craft a Declaration
23. Create/Make Art

24. Go on a Treasure Hunt
25. Give Something Away to Someone

Some of these may not make sense to you. Much of my original short list was composed of meditative and solitary activities, but I'm seeing a movement into adding items to the list that are more active and less "traditional personal quiet time." God is taking me into a place where our time together is used to meet others at their point of need.

This night, I had a little time to ask What Shall We Do?, and I rolled a 10. I got out the guitar and sang. "Be Thou My Vision," mostly, trying to play it through without weeping and having to stop to blow my nose. Good thing I can sing from the heart, because my voice and mucous membranes leave my presentation wanting.

Anyway, the question for you is: What is He doing that's new? What's on His list of things to do in partnership with you? To start, I challenge you with this one-item list:

1. Make a What Shall We Do? list of your own.
Addendum: a year and a half later, sure enough, we added items and are still adding items, and are now playing the game with a listing of 53.

Time to Assess the Not Much - 20160828

I've been doing, but not logging, some work - kinda every other day, and mostly BW stuff, quick and dirty. Nothing to write (home) about. So I haven't been. Did some lunges and air squats yesterday, and today I'm sore. So yeah, not writing about how little I'm doing and how low my tolerance is.

Today was some basic shoulder ROM HT.

4 rounds, HT timer
Meadows row, alternated, one per round x10
Dynamic push up x6/6

14 mins.

4 rounds, HT timer
Bent over row x10 @ 1233
OH press x7ish @ 123#
7 min.

For the final quarter of the year, I'm going with a really simple set up:

1. Heavy squatting and isolateral stepping - 2 and 2x/week

     Breaks down as: Oly Squat/BB Step up/Front Squat/LSD step thoughs (w/ assistance)

2. HT and explosive hinging - 3x/week

     Break down: Hpull/Hpull iso/Vpress; Hpull/Vpull/Vpush; Vpull/Hpush/Vpress

3. MA and conditioning - 2x/week

     Mostly Hill sprints and bag work, you know the drill.

Prioritized in that order. ... yes, that looks like it's 9 sessions a week, but I'm treating it like 9 blocks a week. So I may be only sessioning 4x/week (that's minimum possible, I know, 3x/week looks like it's in range, and I might just do that if I cycle the squatting/stepping down one notch). 

I will be doing IF and, until Boots on the Ground is complete, walking easy in the AMs.

Don't know if I'm going to be religious about logging here. Some of this is going to feel like it's not work-worthy-of-mentioning, still. Stay tuned. I'm logging, but it's all the deep spiritual stuff that people really don't want to hear about, so that's getting my reflective attention, elsewhere.

Painful Squats n' Circuit - 20160824

4 ugly rounds, ST timer
Oly Squat x3/4/3 - intense left knee pain/4 @ 205#
8 mins.

4 rounds, HT timer
Meadows row, alternated on rounds x12/10
KB swing x12 @ 53#

Ring Row x10ish

OH press x whatever @ 123#
20 min.

Was going to squat from 3 up to whatever, like 9? But that third set was agony. Got to stabilize, mobilize, then strengthenize. Back to the drawing board - which is, pretty much, what I'm going to be doing after a 3 week layoff.

Press HT - 20160804

6/5 rounds, HT timer
Meadows Row x 15/12/10 (singles, alternating for 3 each)OH Press x8-7 @ 133#
13 mins.

4/3 rounds, HT timer
Ez-out/in curl x8s

Ring Dip x8
8 min.

Just staying loose. Too tired to go hard, but going hard on press isn't really work.

6.5 + 2 hours - 2130/0400. 21 minutes total, PE: 6. 36 hours.

Squat Pyramid - 20160803

Buy in
4/3 rounds, no timer
Hip Thruster x14+ out/in

Adductors x12ish, doubled grey band
9 mins.

- 1 min -

Main
Oly Squat - AtG, SB timer

205# x10/215 x8/225 x6/235 x4/245 x2/lsf 205 x8

15 mins.

- 1 min -

5/4 rounds, loose 1 min RI
RDL, 163# x10/183 x8////

Standing Calf single/double 12+12 @ DB+35# belt

19 mins.

Still kinda recovering from Yosemite Falls, 4th day after. Except for the Bako heat, this one felt good though. I like the pyramid down, 30+8 rep count with decent weight, all good form.

6.5 hours - 2100/0330. 47 minutes total, PE: 8. 24 hours.

Yosemite Falls Day Hike - 20160730

Yosemite Falls. Got up at 5, Boogie waking me up for once, and we got on the road early. Made it through the park gate just before it was manned with Rangers, and left the park after 8, so we didn't have to pay the park fee. A cheap date!

We parked across from Camp 4, and already felt that the day was getting warm. 86 degrees was the high, but as we made the first switchbacks up and over Captiol dome, the air was thick and hot. Hot, sweaty, steep, muscle tired, out of breath, steep, overweight, and steep. This section didn't seem so bad in the morning, maybe because we were thinking ahead to the difficulty of the switchbacks going up the side of the falls, but on the way down, this last section of switchbacks in the trees seemed like purgatory - the same trail cut with the same slick rocks on indefinite repeat. It hurt coming down the hill.
I could do some more endurance training and I could lose eight or 10 pounds of fat. Some of it can come off if I do fasted cardio by walking in the mornings – walking the ZIP Code; boots on the ground.

The going from the top of the lower falls to the very top was rough. The heat made a difference. We had been leapfrogging a few groups on the trail thoughout the morning, and a couple of them turned around at the 3/4 point. We tried to talk them out of it, but they just weren't up to it. We didn't feel great, but no way were we going to just quit. We did a lot of stopping and cooling down, but I had a worrisome deep quad cramp in my left leg at the top, which, when I tried to stretch out, countered with a hamstring cramp. Rested and drank and it didn't recur. Like old marathon times! In fact, I'd compare this effort to a 3/4 marathon today - even though the total miles were only 9ish.

At the top, we worked our way up the stream to find our own pool to swim in. Most folks took pictures from the falls overlook (not even a view of Half Dome from there) and then swam in the first pools in the river. We got to the first, but furthest pool from all the yahoos upriver - quieter there and no way was I drinking water after people had piled into it.

Going the extra mile (literally) to Yosemite Point made the day. We traversed right up the rock and got up on the highest point; a tower of rock off the edge of the point of the dome, and felt the vertiginous exposure - pulling, yawning, drawing the guts into a desire to fall out and into all that air. I felt small on the way up the switchbacks, underneath the Capitol dome rock wall, but on top I felt large - like I could fly, like I should fly, like I was meant to just cross that space in a single thought.

Lots of people climbing up as we were coming down - smart to do so in the shade, instead of the sun, but late in the day with no time to enjoy the top. A helicopter was rescuing a hiker who'd come down with heat stroke at the top of the lower falls when we were climbing down - just that toasty of a day up there.

PullPush 444 HTstuff - 20160727

4 rounds, HT timer
Ring Row x max reps (10ish)
Ring dip x6-7s
10 mins.

4 rounds, 30 sec RI between exercises
Meadows rows, x8/10/// @ 56#
OH Press x10-8 @ 113#
10 mins.

4 rounds, HT timer
Plyo push ups x5-6 doubles
4x87 Ez-in curl
10 min.

7 hours - 2230/0530. 32 minutes total, PE: 6. 24 hours.

Journeyman Squat Day - 20160726

Assistance
5/4 rounds, loose 1 min RI

RDL x10 @ 163#/183#////
Hip Thruster x12+ in/out
15 mins.

- 1 min -

Main
Oly Squat, SB timer
x10 135/ x5 205/225///, fsl 205 x6? 8? Who remembers?
16 mins.

Didn't do any cash out anything because even after 7pm, it was hot AF outside. Squats feel solid, and, while the numbers aren't impressive (to anyone hack squatting, as folks are wont to do) form and depth are finally there for me. I'm hitting 50# more at 50% more depth than I was 5 years ago.

6 hours - 2200/0400. 32 minutes total, PE: 7. 60 hours.

Sunday Morning Hinging - 20160724

Buy in

Boots on the Ground walking - 45 mins-ish

4/3 rounds, HT timer
Chins x max reps (6ish, still, ever)
GtO x6-7s @113#
10 mins.

4 rounds, HT timer
KB swings x12 @ 70#
Ez-in Curl x7-8
10 mins.

On the way outta town, no time for any Bag work. Missed it.

6.5 hours - 2230/0500. 21 minutes total, PE: 8. 60 hours.

Front Squat Stuff - 20160721

Buy in
4/3 rounds, no timer
Hip Thruster x13 in/out

Adductors x12ish, doubled grey band
12 mins.

Main
Front Squat, 1 Min RI

x6 135/145/155/165/175/185, fsl 135 x8

22 mins.

Form fell apart a bit at 185. Hot and muggy outside, even after 1900 (and will be worse still next week); this was a mental struggle thoughout. But, as it goes, satisfying afterward.

Assistance
5/4 rounds, 1 min RI

RDL x8/9/10/11/12 @ 163#
Standing Calf singles x12/doubles x10 w/ 35# belt & 39# DB

18 mins.

8 - 1 + 2.5 hours - 2230/0500. 54 minutes total, PE: 7. 24 hours.

PullPush Antagonists in Da Heet - 20160720

Death by Chins

6 rounds + 2 ... didn't really sell out - didn't want to tear, and this is just a buy in today (I say that because I couldn't do anymore after 6, bleh). Taking it a little easy today; it's only 92 out, but still, draining me.

7 mins.

4/3 rounds, HT timer

Ring Row x max reps (10ish, still, ever)

Ring dip x6-7s

8 mins.

3 rounds, 1 min RI

Meadows rows, x10/11/12 @ 56#

Plyo push ups x5-6 doubles

7 mins.

Cash out, HT timer 

4x7 Ez-out curl

5 min.

... last two PMs have been occupied with events. Didn't need a 3 days off, but life is what it is. Schedule is still loose, training is still by feel, and I'm not too worried about pounding some square peg of schedule into the organic round hole of my time just now.

6.5 hours - 2130/0400. 28 minutes total, PE: 7. 72 hours.

Squat Sunday - 20160717

4/3 rounds, no timer
Hip Thruster x13 in/out

Adductors x12ish, doubled grey band
9 mins.

Oly Squat - AtG

SB timer

165# x5/205 x5/225 x5////205 x5

18 mins.

4x5 was the heart of this workout. Big gulp, all the way down and pause, controlled up keeping everything square and solid. These sets across were a win for me.

RDL, 1 min RI

4x8 @ 163#

8 mins.

8 hours - 2230/0630. 36 minutes total, PE: 7. 24 hours.