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GOIN' FOR THE GOLD GROUND ZERO by Jeremy Boyd

Yet another Olympics are behind us now. I don't know about you, but I didn't really follow them. To me it's not a matter of which country has the best athletes, but rather which company has the best chemists. I'm told that Canada didn't fare so well while the "super powers", USA and Russia, not surprisingly did very well. From the internet I got these interesting stats: the USA claimed 39 gold, 25 silver and 32 bronze to place first among the competitors and Russia came second with 32, 27, and 29. Despite having a population of more than one billion (a third of the entire world's population!), the financially struggling India was only able to pick up a single bronze medal.

Which brought me to thinking about the athletes themselves. Imagine how wonderful it would be to win a gold medal. All those years of pushing yourself to the edge time and time again. Sweating your butt off. Eating what and when you're told to eat. Taking dozens of pills and painful GH injections. Having your blood drained from your body and then having oxygen rich blood pumped back in. Ahhhh. Then to compete with the best in the world with all eyes focused on you during your event. And then - to win.

Ever been on a really great vacation? Y'know one you've planned for months? The anticipation is almost enough to drive you crazy. You wake up every morning thinking about it and go to bed every night imagining the sand between yer toes and the warm sun beaming down on your face. Then, you're there and everything's just as you had hoped. The hours and days pass by too quickly, a cruel trick of Father Time, and before you know it you're sitting at your desk again staring at the mounds of paperwork that piled up while you were down south playing "hide the androsol bottle" with Ms. May '99. Depressing ain't it?

Imagine that low multiplied by one million! Imagine for a moment that your vacation had been planned not for mere months but for the greater part of your life. And it didn't last for weeks, but for about an hour (or in some cases less than 10 seconds).

So am I saying that it'd be better to eat a broken bottle of MD6 than win a gold medal? No way! Winning Olympic gold is akin to climbing Mt. Everest or sailing a one-man vessel around the world. My point is that if you let yourself become tunnel-visioned, if you allow one facet of your life to over-shadow the others, you will set yourself for a great fall when you do meet your goals.

What to do? Remember that life is more than a gold medal, more than working out at the gym, more than practicing your air hockey skills. If you can do this you will realize that your goals become easier to achieve (yes easier!) as life becomes an enjoyable endeavor onto itself. Stay focused, but not blinded. Visualize yourself as already having met your objective. What now? What else do you have? Life will continue after your plane leaves the beach-laden islands. Know this and have other things to concentrate on and the 'just got back from Cancun blues' won't smuck you nearly as hard.

I'm off to apply for citizenship in India. Hey, just because I don't follow the Olympics doesn't mean I don't want to compete!

Jeremy Boyd
jboyd@renegadenutrition.com

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