Author: Doug Graham

Today there was NO training. We delivered our daughter to Heber, Utah where she and her little family joined her husband’s extended family to ride the “HEBER CREEPER”. This is an old train that takes tourists on a relatively slow excursion through the mountainous countryside just below Park City by about 15 miles.

Next, we dashed back into Provo, Utah where we watched the annual 4th of July Parade on University Avenue just down from Brigham Young University. Here, my wife caught up with her old College Roommate and her family. So, they talked while I cooked in the sun and played with my cell phone. They reconnected rather easily.

After the parade we came home for a couple of hours. We cooked Granola, ate more than we should have, took a very nice nap, took a shower upon arising around 2:15 PM.

At 3:45 PM we picked up Christine’s mother’s 90 year old boy friend, and took them with us to Matt King’s house where his son Ben King had organized a BBQ for the family. Once again, we ate more than we should have and then we returned Christine’s mother and her boy friend Max to their nursing home as soon as the BBQ began to flicker.

We then went out to do some errands, more propane, and grocery items, and a wedding congratulations card for a couple who are to be married tomorrow.

In order to “grow” as a bodybuilder you have to work fiercely hard and then rest. Today’s activity did not include training because I work way too hard and I compromise my size. Learning to do what’s expected of you is harder than going it alone.

A time to be human is not a failure or curse. In fact, it has been a marvelous time to reconnect with my wife, rejuvenate my energy cells, and most of all get ready to start my quest to capture a national title.

My belly is “full of want to” and I’m ready to go. If you and I take time to be human we will come out of these down times with a chip on our shoulders and a conquest to execute.

This is our time! Train, Rest, Train, Rest,……Win!!!

Let the games begin, once we have given ourselves permission to give it all we got because what we got is all we have, Build in regular intervals of Rest to love your wife and your family. The rest is up to God!

Douglas E. Graham

Tomorrow we celebrate, not just the 4th of July but the Declaration of Independence. This little country of Patriots 238 years ago said, No! to the tyrannical government and the King of England. Our Declaration does NOT guarantee happiness. It guarantees that our citizens will be free to PURSUE happiness among other things.

Life and the Declaration of Independence cannot guarantee outcomes nor should it even try. But, in this great country we can go after the things that burn in our heart to possess or pursue. As our country “threw down the gauntlet” between itself and England, we as individuals now have the right to also throw down our own personal gauntlets to pursue the passions that drive us and that enhance our lives.

After meeting with my new coach yesterday it became obvious that this pursuit of excellence (like anything worth having in life) will cost me everything. It will cost me my time, my physical labor, my money, my ego, my freedom of choice regarding diet options, and most painful will be the opportunities to spend priceless time with my wife Christine.

But, like the Patriots who decided that living free was worth the struggle and the ultimate sacrifices, we too will have to “throw down the gauntlet” against anyone and anything that would keep us from pursuing our passions.

Howard Hendricks, Past President of Dallas Theological Seminary once said, “You have to learn to say no. In order to say yes to something you have to say no to something else. In fact, you ought to say no to something everyday—-Just to stay in practice.”

I and all of you have and will “throw down the gauntlet” against`all obstacles that stand in the way of attaining our goals, dreams, passions, or hopes. We must say no to giving up. :Throwing Down the Gauntlet” is the ONLY way forward. This is our time! We had best be about our Father’s business.

Douglas E. Graham

Today is the first day of July and it is my little sister’s birthday.  Our family used to be loaded with “we  the kids” but not so anymore.  “We the kids” are now aging gracefully

and whole new chapters to our lives are being written.

Tomorrow marks a new beginning as I meet with a new coach.  I am very excited and I have new and higher goals established for the next year.

1.)  Beginning tomorrow, I will no longer be going it alone.

2.)  I will submit my will to another human being to help me accomplish my goals

3.)  A brand new set of training skills and regimens will be imposed on me for my good

4.)  The bar has been set even higher

5.)  My personal “VECTOR” will change

6.)  I will no longer train twice per day — The new Sheriff demands obedience to his whip and that I “bend the knee” as a partner in this effort

7.)  Like Steven Covey said, “Begin with the end in mind”

As is often the case, New Beginnings are the things dreams and hopes and plans are made of.

These items are mine and mine alone.  We all must understand that each new activity or challenge is a “New Beginning.”  If you analyze the thing that is a new and challenging and take it apart.  You will find that each component will have a “New Beginning”.

In the latter days of our lives, we must keep looking for new things that will help us to help others stay alive longer and in as good health as possible.  Don’t just get up and move.  Get up and live!”  Get a “New Beginning!”

As we considered getting up this morning and stepping solidly onto our “VECTOR” my wife and I decided against the early arising (it’s Saturday, afterall), turned over, and went back to sleep.  We made it to the gym @ 0800.  Christine took on the eliptical machine for 6 miles while I pounded my abs with 400 crunches on an acute incline board.  My quads with multiple ascending leg extensions.  Calves with ascending each set by 10 lbs doing sets of 12-20 —-Then I began my workout doing benches, long rows, and v Bar Close Grip Chin ups.

We then packed our small gas grill, cooler, and a sack of diet soft drinks and off we went to a local park to grill chicken thighs, eat salad, munch on some high calorie chips etc.  We then fell asleep on a blanket, belly up for about an hour, awakened only by the invasion of ants who tried to eat us alive.  What a glorious nap!  After sitting at the picnic table talking for about 20 minutes, we packed our stuff and drove to Park City, Utah and witnessed a team competition of a long distance relay that was winding up.  Oh yeah!  We ate those chips and soft drinks like there was no tomorrow.  Lastly, we stopped at an “IKEA” to pick up some sheets for our guest bedroom.  No more junk food was had the remainder of the day…But, our sanity had been restored and our intimacy as a couple had “tuned up” a bit.  It was one of the best days together we had had in awhile.

Moral to “A Day of Decadence” —- In order to win at anything you have to “plan” a time to rest and return to the land of the living. Besides, the people who love you want a big piece of you.  Give it to them enthusiastically.  This is a maxim I have learned far too late in life.

—Douglas E. Graham