I swim about a mile everyday. The first few hundred yards tend to be a little rough – I might be shivering from the cold water, my shoulders are often stiff, my stroke is choppy and I’m thinking about how many laps I have to go before I’m finished.
Once I’ve completed 24 laps or so, my shoulders are loosened up, my stroke is smooth and my breathing is strong and steady. I start slicing through the water like a streamlined canoe.
Many times, I glide along so smoothly that it feels like I am swimming downhill with gravity actually assisting to propel me forward.
It’s a fantastic feeling that I’m sure has something to do with being warmed up, getting my wind, breathing deeply and steadily and also the anticipation that my session is more than halfway over.
I get the same feeling when I do my pull-up workout in the morning. I do pyramid sets of pull-ups up and down for a total of 110 reps across 20 sets. By the time I hit my fifth or sixth set, I’m usually breathing hard but feeling strong and loose that makes the reps somewhat effortless.
When I walk the dog, I often hit my stride about half way in where suddenly everything feels right in the world – my legs are strong, nothing aches, I’m breathing deeply and my thoughts become really clear.
In all of these cases, I start to feel as if the world is slowing down but I am speeding up.
It’s a strange kind of Zen like high. I think it has to do with breathing, moving, my diet, being in ketosis and also being hyper focused on the present moment.
I suspect that the caffeine from the big glass of ice tea I drink beroe working out also has an effect.
What I’ve noticed is that this swimming downhill feeling often continues far beyond whatever activity started it.
I can ride that wave of energy and enthusiasm for hours afterward doing chores, drumming, taking care of problems and more.
So what’s the point of all this?
One takeaway is that two years ago after my wife died, I wasn’t sure I’d ever fell OK again, much less feel great.
Another is that for most of my life, including long before Ellen getting sick and even before I met her, I only occasionally felt this way,
In fact, I distinctly remember having days where I’d wake up energized, enthusiastic and almost euphoric in the morning and I’d think, “It’s all going downhill from here.”
Strangely enough, many of those days, I’d get a debilitating migraine a few hours later. The “euphoria” was some sort of precursor to the migraine.
I almost never get migraine headaches anymore.
I rarely wake up wishing I was dead.
On the rare occasions when I wake up miserable because of the weather, stomach upset, bad dreams or poor sleep, I know that if I just get moving I’ll feel better soon.
So I get out of bed, walk the dog, start my workout and hit the pool.
Usually within a few minutes, I feel like I am swimming downhill once again.