my workout and what motivates me

I just got done with an excellent first-day-back workout!  I squatted 100 pounds...yippee!  My legs are toast.

I was thinking a little about motivation...

I know you will all get tired of my little antidotes from my experiences with Kaegan and his autism, but here comes another one of "those" posts:

Using the son-rise teaching method with Kaegan has taught me so much about myself, God, and life in general.  This is sort of about some things I've learned about myself.  When I work one-on-one with Kaegan in his playroom, I use his motivations to help inspire him.  I know that doesn't sound all that astounding...that's just a good way to teach...if someone is interested in animals, you teach grammar and math and history as an animal unit....  But I'm not just talking about the obvious.  He is interested in trains, for example, but that doesn't mean that I make lessons about trains for him.  What I'm talking about is more subtle than that.  I watch him closely.  If you know or have ever known anyone with autism, you know that they can just completely close themselves off from our world and enter into their own little worlds of jumping, running back and forth, waving or flapping their hands, giggling incessantly for an hour for no reason that you can see.  I watch Kaegan.  I take his hand flapping as what motivates him, what thrills him, in this moment in time, and I participate.  You have never seen a crazier looking family than ours.  We jump, we flap, we giggle.  And we inspire Kaegan to find us attractive as we accept and enjoy his love for his little far-away place he has created in his mind.  We bring him closer to us by moving ourselves closer into his world.  We find his less obvious motivation.  In doing this, I have learned to watch even myself.  I look for my own deeper motivations and I find surprising things that are deep within me that can propel me forward.  Here is one example:  I was finding myself being grumpy and moody with my kids over household messes.  I asked myself some questions about why keeping the house orderly was so important that I felt the way I did.  It seems obvious enough...sanitation, you know.  But really when I really looked further, it was love for my family.  I wanted the house just right for them.  It was for THEM that I was being a grumpy, difficult person to live with!  Ironic, but true.  So, since I figured that all out about myself, I could turn it around.  I took the very motivation that grumpified me and used it to NOT be grumpy because I love my family and want what's best.  If I'd only looked as far as the obvious, I'd still be ranting and raving which didn't change anything anyway!!  another example is that I spent my life afraid of water and so I never learned how to swim.  I finally realized that my motivation for never learning could become my motivation for learning.  Now, I can swim.  Motivation...funny thing.  All that to say, that I've been thinking about what motivates me NOT to work out some days.  I know you were thinking that I was going to list things that motivate me to work out...but interestingly, it's the same answer.  It's because of what I want for myself.  So, if you boil it all down, you end up with a workout.  Tomorrow is cardio!!