Whew. I feel so much better today. As much as I love being busy with fun things over the weekend, I always suffer the first day back to normal routine. The emotional side effects of Sunday night made it all harder too. Thank you all, though, for your support and kind words. Knowing there are people like each of you out there showing me love truly brightens my day. I adore the blogging community. For the friendship it provides, but also for the motivation. More on that in a moment.

Last night I was able to wind down by watching a train wreck in a relationship outside my father’s and mine. That would be Jake & Vienna’s breakup interview that was aired on The Bachelorette.

Highly entertaining. And surprising. I never liked Vienna but I believe her over him after viewing his actions and attitude. Why do I care? I don’t. I just care to have some amusing background noise while I try to finish up my Jodi Picoult book. Book & TV at the same time? I’m a mom of a 20 month old. I am a queen of multi-tasking.

This morning I awoke refreshed and ready to hit up Power for a workout. The class was phenomenal because one of my favorite instructors was there unexpectedly. The instructor totally makes the class, wouldn’t you agree? During the class she also said something that got my wheels turning. She said we are not here to compete with anyone else in that room. That the class is not a competition, even a friendly one. It is to do our best and motivate each other to do so as well.

Have you ever been in competition with someone and claimed that it was a friendly competition? I honestly don’t believe that friendly competition exists. What a huge oxymoron anyways. Webster describes competition as a rivalry between competitors to earn or gain something over the opponent. I’ve had friendships where there is a sense of competition in the relationship. It is a never ending cycle of trying to one-up the other, ending in frustration with the other person instead of support and care. I’ve been a member of fitness forums where everyone is always trying to outdo the other members. It almost got to the point of a “who can be more disordered with their eating issues and exercise habits” game. I’ve been proud and had an attitude over people I crossed paths with because they weren’t as “healthy, fit, dedicated, ________” as me. People who didn’t even recognize I was in competition with them.

After removing myself as much as possible from relationships which I constantly felt the need to prove myself and joining the blogging community, among other things, I realized friendly competition was for the birds. Instead, I adopted a mentality of doing things to be my best, happiest, and most balanced self and helping those I care about achieve the same. It is much more rewarding to be in companionship with another than in competition. How do you do that? Here’s what I think…

1. Recognize and stop competitive behaviors. Comparing yourself to someone else and a) thinking you’re not doing enough or b) pitying the other person for not being as wonderful as you are. Becoming overly proud or incessantly bragging to prove your worth to another person. Pushing yourself to achieve something you are not comfortable with, mentally or physically, for the sake of proving yourself to someone. When situations like these happen, consider how we are all different and have different goals and abilities.

2. Provide encouragement to others when they compliment you, ask how you are successful with something, or show frustration with their lack of progress. Always find a way to build someone up and offer help with their questions. You can even point out a strength of theirs.

3. Accept support and positive statements from others. If you receive a compliment, don’t push it away. Being happy with yourself will help decrease the need to validate yourself in competitions.

4. Use the strengths you admire in other people to motivate you, but not as a yardstick to measure up to. If you read blogs about fabulous athletes running many miles a day or completing intense workouts, you can channel their energy (and advice) for your own workouts. Don’t let the fact you might not be running 5 or more miles at a time right now get you down. Remember we all have to start somewhere. Give yourself time to consistently work hard at your goals and don’t forget that they are YOUR goals. They must suit you. Not what you think they should be based on someone else’s abilities.

5. Have fun! If you make your goals in life fun and fulfilling you don’t have to get caught up in the rat race because you are enjoying the journey. You will want others to feel that same happiness and will share it with them.

There will always be competition in certain situations and in some instances it is a good thing. For example, during a race you will inevitably face competition and you can use it to push you for that run. The difference, in my mind, is the competition we place on ourselves on a regular basis and with those we know personally and even care for. That is when support replacing competition can benefit us all.

• What ways do you multitask? Is it hard or easy for you?
• Do you believe friendly competition is useful or detrimental? What ways are you competitive?

Now I'm off for a lady's night with my mom and sister! I'm super excited for it. Any guesses??? 😀

How do weekends go by so fast? I don’t fully understand it.  I hope some of you out there are enjoying an extra day off. Technically, I should be too since Peter is off work. Sadly, though, he is having to work on his car at his brother’s the entire day. I could use his help around here today. I need some rest after the busy weekend we had. I shared my fun from Friday & Saturday already and the actual 4th was loaded as well.

Sunday morning we woke up and had a red, white, and blue breakfast. It consisted of homemade blueberry pancakes and a strawberry smoothie.

The pancakes are a really basic recipe that we adapted from www.allrecipes.com and always use for our once in a blue moon pancake mornings.

Ingredients

• 1.5 C flour (all-purpose or mix of all-purpose & wheat)
• 3.5 tsp baking powder
• 2T sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 1/4 C milk (I like using vanilla almond milk)
• 1 egg
• 3T melted butter
• 4 large handfuls fresh blueberries

Mix the dry ingredients first (flour through salt) and create a well in the center. Pour the wet ingredients (milk, egg, butter) into the well and blend until batter is smooth. Fold in blueberries. Cook on a griddle or pan like any other pancakes. 😀

After breakfast, we headed to church for an excellent service. It was all about the freedoms we have, not only within the country we live but also in our faith. Our pastor discussed how we need to really consider what we are free from and be grateful because none of that freedom came free. All of it came from huge sacrifices. From the many men and women who have fought for the freedom of our country across centuries, but also for the one man who sacrificed himself for each of us to be truly free and the countless others who across time made sacrifices to keep his word and truth flowing to others. The message brought people to their feet at the end and there were many sniffles heard among my fellow church friends.

Later that afternoon we headed to my parents’ place for some July 4th fun. The plan was to hang out for awhile and then gather up a picnic dinner to eat and games to play while waiting for Atlanta’s Lenox Fireworks show. There was a little bit of a glitch in that plan thanks to a “moment” between my father and I. Our relationship has had its fair share of strain and typically we can handle each other for the times we do see each other. Yesterday he was somehow set off and I had to face that look of pure hatred in his eyes and the anger that can come from his lips again. The evening evolved into a much rougher time than I expected and I fought the darkness I could quickly sink into from him the remainder of the night.

However, we persevered and gathered our forces to delight in our time together. My brother would leave in the morning to return to his home in Arizona, so we packed the cars and ate our picnic dinner or Publix chicken with potato chips & salad. We donned our happy faces to laugh and be goofy.

We played some Apples to Apples and adored the darling Makenzie.

And we also dove headfirst into a fabulous dessert – S’mores Brownies. Somehow Jess always gets it right. Always.

Then I viewed the fireworks through Makenzie’s eyes yet again. Believed in the magic of fireworks, instead of the realities of pain that can still infiltrate even after you thought them to be resolved. Now, it is today. A new day. A day where I can sweat out some tension in a spin class; spend time laughing with my daughter; and with any luck have a husband who comes home at a reasonable enough time to give me a break. I have a feeling there will be some prayer in my future on finding a way to let it all go and find a way to forgive (even with no apology present)…again.

I wish you all the best of days! Now, tell me…how was your weekend?