Long live meatspace!

Most mornings, when I am enduring the tram ride to work, I notice that the vast majority of my fellow commuters* are somehow 'tuned out' of what is going on around them.  Either they are tickling their smartphones, their ears are plugged into some music device or they are lost in an e-reader.

Somehow, as a people, we seem to have lost the desire or ability to connect to the environment immediately around us.  Preferring instead to talk to someone miles away who isn't even a good enough friend to be with them in person.  Personally, I would prefer to witness and react appropriately to what is going on around me.  The driver's announcement being a convenient case in point this morning.  The line was down for a while.  Not that most of my fellow passengers would realise, as it was back up again fairly soon.

This doesn't just happen in the mornings, either.  At any time of day, the number of people around me either literally or figuratively 'plugged in' to some electronic device, draining their attention, is considerable.

I read something on a lifting site that said, "If you've got time to Facebook, then you've got time to train...".  This paraphrasing my earlier sentiments that I would now rather train than watch something I don't particularly like on tv.

What do each of us actually get from spending more time online?  The illusion of a social life?  How social are you if you hardly ever actually see your friends?  If I train, it might not be very rock and roll, repeating the same action again and again ad nauseam.  But I do get something at the end of it all - eventually.

That's why I'm shifting more and more of my endeavours into 'meatspace' (and why I'm posting on here less and less - sorry!)

These are the times when it's hard to attend class

Now that my daughter has started nursery, that is a bill of around £175 a week that needs to be paid from somewhere.  The place it is being paid from in our case is a load of overtime that I am doing in the callcentre at work.  I do an extra shift of 9am - 1pm every Saturday, and an extra two hours, 5.30pm - 7.30pm on a Wednesday evening, after my normal working shift.  I may well end up doing more, but even as it is, that all tallies up to quite a bit of time I spend away from home.  Away from my daughter and fiancee.

Last night, Manchester Metrolink was kind enough to fail and cause me to get home about 90 minutes later than usual.  That pretty much puts a stop to what little interaction I do get with my daughter of an evening.  Now, tonight is bagua class.  While this is something I do for myself and my own enjoyment - and I do enjoy it a great deal - when I am missing my time at home, another night where I don't get in until around 9.30pm is not something to which I'm looking forward.

But at the moment I am noticing more and more the benefits I am reaping from what little training I am able to do.  My balance is seemingly infinitely better.  My stamina is much improved, I even run for the tram now and then (when they are working!) and this is something I never did before.  Add to that the exercises I had difficulty with a year ago being much easier (or less difficult, might be a better way to put it!) and I see that, long term, attending my bagua class (at least) once a week is a sacrifice well worth making.

My daughter is 8 months old and will soon be running around.  Being fit enough to play with her and keep up will pay its own dividends soon enough.

In it to win it

Though I am carrying a lot of 'holiday weight', to put it in the most abstractly polite way possible, I still can see the rewards of my bagua practice.  I am carrying considerably more muscle mass than at perhaps any other time of my life.  Add to that my improved balance, cardiovascular stamina and general attitude, I can see that even the relatively small amount of work I've put in thus far has been worthwhile.

I do wish I could arrange more free time, so that I could train formally, rather than having to fit in the odd exercise in amongst my working day and home life.  Still, that will have to wait until I win the lottery.

...Which, in turn, will have to wait until I start playing the lottery.