You might be wondering why Star Wars is on my brain.  On Friday afternoon I hosted my son's Star Wars birthday party.  My children are huge Star Wars fans and it all started when my husband decided to gently introduce them to each movie in sequence.  Yes, there's a little aggression in the movies, but perhaps it's the Yoda principles throughout that balance the "dark side".   

 

It was therefore hardly coincidental this week when I received an email from a woman who had this Yoda quote as her signature, "Do or do not...there is no try."   Time to put down my light saber and think for a while about how often I use the word try.

 

Isn't it okay to try, even though the word sounds pretty passive and it really is just a way of being wishy-washy and not getting something done?  My brain began to wander as I thought of our time together.  

 

You know in class when I ask (or bellow), "Are you giving me 100%"?  I'm really asking if you have done a little thinking before class and decided on your "do" for that hour.  The fact that you are in an outdoor class means you've gone way past the "try" and the "do not".   There's not a warm bench to rest your tired tush and there's not a stretching area summoning you when you've decided that 5 minutes on the elliptical is enough.  Your 100% won't be the same each class and so it's instead about setting some conscious and realistic parameters for what your do is going to look like (not like when I say I'm going to try to wash and fold each piece of laundry in one day and always fail).  Maybe it means deciding that you will break away from your buddy every 5 minutes to do a speed burst, maybe it means chatting with that new person who you can sense a connection with, maybe it means deciding that you're going to get through that difficult lunge sequence without stopping this week, or deciding that you're going to answer Lisa loudly and honestly when she asks, "how are you feeling?"  Have a think guys cause I've been thinking all week about it...in so many different ways.