The Art of War - Brian Style

Dear Rut -

This is war.

Signed,

Brian (and Charlie)

My main man, Sun Tzu says, "Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles without disaster."

Luckily, I can know both my enemy and myself at the same time, because he is me.....or I am him......uhm, we are one in the same.......I'm the enemy. To defeat me I have devised a three tiered plan. I will never see me coming. Clearly, I don't stand a chance against myself.

Sun Tzu: "Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win."

One: I haven't been eating well or exercising much as of late. I'm pretty active, at least I always seem to find the time to crash my bike or have some other debacle, but I'm not getting in the fat burning cardio and weightlifting I need to shrink my Mii down to size. Starting today that's changing. Back to getting up in the morning to run the tubby dog and taking a few lunch hours down at the fitness center. I'm just better all around when I'm doing this stuff.

Two: Work is stressful; it has been for a long time. There are things that need to be done to fix it, but for various reasons I haven't done them. Now, I am going to fix it. How's that for specific? Sun Tzu: "Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of the opponent's fate." Oooooo scary.

I also need to be better about enjoying the victories. Recently I had a big one. A major research grant I worked on over two years has been awarded to a multi-agency collaboration I was instrumental in developing. The National Children's Study will be the largest longitudinal study ever undertaken. It will follow over 100,000 children from birth through 21 years of age, looking at biological and environmental determinants of health. Researchers postulate the data from this study will be able to answer important questions about diseases such as asthma, diabetes, autism and others. Polk County will contribute around 1,000 kids to the project over the next 5 years. I'm proud to say I was a big part of bringing this project to Polk County. See, I can do more than just fall off bikes.

Three: Speaking of falling off bikes....it hurts. It hurts when they blow off your bike rack too, but no one was seriously injured and bikes can be replaced. So, tier three is all about perspective.

Sun Tzu: "The art of war teaches us to rely not on the likelihood of the enemy's not coming, but on our own readiness to receive him; not on the chance of his not attacking, but rather on the fact that we have made our position unassailable."

I need to do a better job of recognizing what is and is not important. My friend Joe is helping me do just that by arranging for me to volunteer as an "official" for Miracle League games. This is a great program for physically and mentally disabled kids to play ball on a realistic baseball field, with real announcers, bleachers, infield, the whole enchelada. Joe's non-profit organization, the Sports Official Youth Alliance ,is providing the "refs". Its tee-ball rules, everyone hits, everyone scores. I will just be there to assist at the plate, provide encouragement and whatever else is needed. I'm pretty excited. I have a feeling helping out some very deserving kids is gonna provide an exceptional dose of perspective.



P.S. - Rut, your days are numbered.