The last 4-5 years have been, without a doubt, the most rewarding years of my adult life.  

I love my family with all my heart - I have a wonderful wife and two adorable little boys.  My parents are alive and healthy and I have an extended family tribe that I am very close with.  I am even fortunate enough to love (most of) my in-laws!

I love my job - I had been searching for a community that would value me and I have found such a great school that I literally cannot imagine somehow finding a job that would make me happier.  I am almost 100% sure that unless my wife is offered a promotion with a staggeringly enormous pay increase to move that this is the last employer I will ever seek.

I'm pretty much in the best shape of my life.  I could still stand to lose 30-40 lbs but I am stronger, more flexible, and have greater endurance than I ever had.  

There is no element of my life that is unsatisfying.  

I think part of what will maintain that general satisfaction is the ever-increasing pursuit of higher standards.  I am working to get stronger rather than accepting that I am a middle aged man.  I am working to increase my knowledge and skills even though I have a secure job that doesn't require me to learn anything new.  In short I am continuing to upgrade myself and plan to do so until the day I die.

So long as I have a goal I think I will find motivation.  It is very easy for me to go into total sloth mode - I would be more than happy to sit on the couch for 3-4 days and not do anything more strenuous than pop another cold beer and reheat some pizza.  Even as I'm writing and picturing myself doing that I am saying "man... that sounds like the best/worst weekend of my life".  

It would be the best weekend because I would love every single moment of the lack of responsibility and pursuit of immediate gratification.  It would light up every part of my monkey brain that simply seeks pleasure.  

But it would be the worst weekend because I would have to pay the price for being a middle-aged man who was eating like he was still in his 20s.  The guilt and disgust that my prefrontal cortex would signal would castigate me for such a long time that it almost wouldn't be worth doing.  

All of this rambling is just to say that the reason I am trying blogging out is to learn a new skill and to share with anyone that might be remotely interested what I'm up to.  

I can't imagine anyone actually makes money from blogging (although I will probably try to do the affiliate links for book reviews down the road) but the main goal is to give my prefrontal cortex a tool in the never-ending fight against my pleasure-seeking monkey mind.  

I'll write about my forays into calisthenics and gymnastics strength training so that I can achieve my goal of never needing help to get off the toilet.

I'll explore figuring out how I'm working to become a not terrible writer.

I'll show projects I develop as I learn to code and work with educational technology.

I'll share my thoughts on books I read and stuff  I think is worth seeing and doing.  

Happy if anyone wants to keep me posted on the things they are doing or has any feedback as we go ahead and get older.