How long do you stick with something when you know it's not working?

I was hit with some upsetting news this week.

I haven't talked about it a lot on these emails, but I've been rather 'quietly' training for 100 mile race.

And for those that don't know me as well.

I'm not a runner by nature.

Prior to this past August, the furthest I had ever run was 5 miles.

And that was in my teenage years, well over half my lifetime ago.

Yet here I am from 5k to 100 miler 'ready' in 3 months time.

But as of 4 months ago, this was never on my radar.

I wouldn't have said I'd ever run 100 mile race.

Let alone in the next 3 years.

Certainly not in the next 3 months.

It all started when a friend of mine decided to rally up a big group of people to run 100 miles with him.

He had tried it last year, and he made it an impressive 70 miles.

But he was dedicated to trying it again this year.

He had asked me a while back - and I easily said no thanks.

Another friend of mine approached me in August and asked if I would be up for doing 100 miler this December.

I didn't hesitate to say no.

I didn't have the time to train for it.

I didn't have the desire to train for it.

Nothing about it sounded fun to me.

Yet another friend approached me and asked.

He took a different angle, but his goal of getting me to sign up was the same.

He asked if I wanted to ride with him to go to the race.

I think he knows me well enough to know that there was very little chance I would go with everyone but not actually do the race.

But to my surprise, I held my ground and said no again.

So what gave?

I took a walk, just me and God, to try and make some peace about the situation.

To be honest I was wrestling with the thoughts of not doing the race.

And in full transparency it had nothing to do with guilt of saying no or the pressure of feeling like I should because other people were.

I think most of my unrest about my decision had to do with our family core values we had recently redefined.

Relationships had been added to our family values.

And a bunch of people I loved were doing the race, both locally and throughout the country.

What better way to build relationships than doing something that sucks

Something that requires sacrifice

Something that we all hate..or at the very least strongly dislike

So here I am on a walk, expecting to hear from God on how bad of an idea this race is.

I don't have nearly enough time to train for it given the 3 month timeline.

I don't have much time in my already crammed schedule to fit in extra time to go for runs.

I've never done anything like it.

It's selfish and would get in the way of my family and more important things.

While I never heard a clear yes, I still felt a lot of unrest and a lack of peace over not doing it.

And while I can't put my finger on it, I know Holy Spirit well enough to know that I shouldn't ignore those feelings.

So I went to my wife with it.

She's got an amazing head on her shoulders, hears from God, and talks me out of a lot of the stupid stuff I want to do.

Her voice is second only to God's in my life.

And I assumed she would talk me out of it.

But to my surprise, she told me "I think you should do it"

Now I really got myself in trouble, because it wasn't really something I wanted to do back when this all started.

Yet fast forward through 3 months of training and here I am ready to do my best at running 100 miles.

Not just ready, but actually excited to do it.

I didn't have the perfect plan.

But I had a plan, I felt good about the plan, and I followed the plan.

^There's a word you might need to hear that can apply to any area of your life.

Too many people wait around for a perfect plan instead of just getting started on a plan they feel pretty good about.

And I'll spare you all the details of the training plan in this email (I'll share more in a future post)

But the upsetting news I just got - 5 days before the race was set to kickoff - was that the race was postponed.

Instead of running this weekend like I had planned - the race got pushed back to January - just like that.

The past 3 months of my life had been largely dedicated towards training for this race, and intentionally getting my body and my mind ready for this exact date.

It was a lot of sacrifice, so to say I was disappointed is an understatement.

And I had a choice to make:

1) Do I wait until January to run the race?

2) Do I call it quits on the race altogether and be proud of my efforts along the way?

3) Do I say screw it and still run this weekend, even if it's not an official race?

Spoiler alert: I'm still planning on running 100 miles this weekend.

But the question that drove the decision was the one I started with at the beginning of the email:

How long do you stick with something when you know it's not working?

You would think hitting the gym 3x/week, running 30-40 miles a week, maintaining a squat >350 lbs for reps, and being ready to run 100 mile race is working.

However there's a lot more that goes into how well something is working:

Does it align with your values?

Does it take away from other more important things in your life?

Is it the best thing for you physically/mentally/emotionally/spiritually?

How sustainable is it?

There are several other questions that can fit in here, but for me it just hasn't really been working.

And to be honest, I was just talking with my wife Lindsey about it, I kind of regret saying yes to it.

I feel further from the health and fitness goals that are most important to me despite what I've been able to accomplish

I've been able to hold onto some strength, but I've without question lost strength and muscle mass

I thought I would be leaner, but my body composition has been negatively impacted and my weight hasn't really changed (which only confirms why I really don't believe cardio and running is a great way to lose weight and look better)

I've been as close as I've ever been to being able to 'eat whatever I want and still get away with it' - but I find myself hungry all the time, thinking about food more than I have, and with an upset stomach due to the foods and amount I've been eating.

I miss having slow mornings with my family, getting more quiet time to journal and pray, or getting to push forward some of the business ideas I have.

So while on the outside it may look like it's working, it certainly doesn't feel like it on the inside.

Even though delaying the race ~5 weeks doesn't seem like much on the scheme of things, I just can't justify keeping at this unsustainable and unfulfilling pace I've been on.

I've learned a lot through this process, with most of it only being a confirmation of what I don't want to be doing long-term.

Hopefully talking through my thought process can help you determine how long you need to stick with something when it's not working.

Don't be afraid to try new things.

I had a feeling going into this that it would setback some of my other goals quite a bit.

I was rolling in the weight room before I started running - and I can tell I lost a lot.

Setting myself back another 5 weeks just to do an official race doesn't seem wise to me.

I'm not doing this for a belt buckle, a finisher t-shirt, or anything like that.

Make sure you know why you're doing what you're doing, and it will make your decision to stick with it (or change directions) much more clear.

Some people simply do nothing for way too long because they're afraid to get started, pick the wrong thing, or just go for it.

Other people stay with something way too long because they think it's what they 'have to do', or they get way too attached to the process and lose sight of the outcome.

Don't be afraid to zoom out and adjust the plan.

If you want to follow along this weekend to see what comes of this new 100 mile 'race', follow along with me here on IG.

I'm coming out of social media retirement to share some of the experiences and the journey.

Say a prayer for me if you think of me this weekend - I'm sure I'll have plenty more to share on other lessons learned through all this...

Which makes it worth it already.