Trading the Channel of Worry for High High Hopes

As I was driving place to place today, errand after errand, my head was spinning with the multiple lists of things that I need to complete before leaving for the Chicago Super in a couple days. There were work loose ends to tie up following a major scheduling snafu, that unless I was to clone myself tomorrow, had no easy answer, children who needed clean laundry and lunch makings for school, as well as quality time with me before I go out of town, business related daily tasks to complete and then, and I'm going to rat myself out here, try to fight against the ape shit freak out that comes before any event I host.  First, there are the multiple details regarding logistics, hotels, cars, planes.....  The arrival of 7 people from four states to a location, although my childhood home, is truly not home to any of us.  The classic ape shit freak out as I refer to it, occurs every time.  Will everyone make it?  Will everyone enjoy the experience?  Some of these people have never met face to face, will everyone get along and have a good time?  oh wait.  There's more.  I have a 5-8 mile race in a few days (Spartan never truly gives you the distance), that last year ended up being 9 miles in four inches of mud and in places standing water.  Well hell.  Looked at the weather.  It's raining in Illinois.  It's been raining for days.  My childhood friends have backyard pools courtesy of Mother Nature this week..... and so it goes, the merry go round of worry.  I suppose you could say that I am a professional worrier.  Mother of five, grandmother to one, full time job, two businesses, book writing and a crazy race schedule.  There is always something to worry about.

Had to have high, high hopes for a living,

Shooting for the stars when I couldn't make a killing

Didn't have a dime but I always had a vision,

Thank you Sirius Radio for the rah rah musings of Panic! at the Disco's "High Hopes." High hopes is certainly something my spiral of worry has been robbed of in the past few days.  I decided earlier today, to lean into the worry and allow my inner sanctum into my ape shit freak out.  I shared all of my concerns over the upcoming weekend and was met with exactly what I expected.  Laughter.  Yes, they laughed at me.  They reminded me at the end of the day we have done many of these events.  We will race.  We will laugh and we will all fulfill the visions we have set for ourselves when it comes to this weekend. There was the obligatory exchange of colorful gifs at my expense, also as expected.  Side note, everyone needs this caliber of friend.  In the end, their good natured ribbing set my worry aside for a few moments, and I did enjoy the break, however, the merry go round started spinning again.

Mama said,

Fulfill the prophecy,

Be something greater,

Go make a legacy

Mom.  As if on cue this comes on.  Honestly, it would be times like these in my life, I would have called her.  She would have said,"Aim, this is all piddly shit." She, of course would have been right. She was well aware of my propensity to overthink things and get lost in the details.   She would then ask me to spell out my vision of exactly what it was I was trying to do.  I would have told her helping my race team to discover the things that hold them back and see the greatness that lives inside all of us, none of which has anything to do with managing the logistics of a trip for some pre-race carb loading deep dish.  It makes me wonder how often, as the saying goes, we let a very small trickle of worry erode a  deep channel in which all other thoughts are drained, and our whole vision and high hopes are lost in a sea of piddly shit.  

Mama said,

Burn your biographies,

Rewrite your history,

Light up your wildest dreams

Suddenly, as if in some sort of movie propelled flashback, I saw our history, Mom's and mine.  Our decades of obesity as I attended Weight Watchers for the first time with her at the age of 13.  Years and years of hopeless dieting, and she died before truly seeing my success.  Maybe the real message is to find those high hopes to be something better than we started out being.  Not repeating our history of failures, instead acting on clear vision that lights our fire.

Stay up on that rise,

Stay up on that rise and never come down,

Mama said, don't give up it's a little complicated

With a renewed spirit, courtesy of Panic! at the Disco, I think I have decided Saturday, I will be up on that rise.  Fifteen feet up on an A frame to be exact, working toward once again conquering my horrible fear of heights.  At the same time, I will have four new Spartan Super racers who are giving me a front row seat to taking on their own fears and winning, which will likely make all the complicated details leading in irrelevant.  So, maybe it is time for me to put my traditional ape shit freak out to bed and instead shoot for the stars and have high high hopes that the best is yet to come.