220, 221. Whatever It Takes
T
oday is the two hundred twenty-first day of 2006. For anyone who has ever clicked on the "pushup-o-meter" on the sidebar of my blog, you know that means I did 221 pushups and crunches today as part of my New Year's Resolution. The total so far this year is nearly 25,000 (on my way to 66,795).My colleagues John, Robert, and Nathan are all still on board, as well—I'm not sure about Kim, but I do know she wore her skinny pants to Fresno today!
So, nearly 2/3 of the way through the year, am I happy with the resolution? I love it. I'd recommend it to everyone. I feel great, and I think all of us are looking better than we did eight months ago. I've also started riding my bike the 4 miles to work whenever possible, and that feels great, too.
It's simple. One pushup and one crunch on January 1st. Add one each day of the year. On December 31st, do 365 and be the envy of all of your friends. There are no other rules—split them into as many sets as you like. Right now, I'm doing 4 sets of pushups and 3 sets of crunches (and I do a variety of types of crunches). I've had friends chide me on my pushup form, and I've been working on it, but I'm not even a stickler about that: if you're getting down on the floor and doing 200 pushups, you can do them however you please!
As I said in January, I'm learning what I can accomplish by dedication, tenacity, and an incremental increase in effort. As a member of a startup, those are important lessons. My colleagues and I are all dedicated, we're all tenacious, and we're each putting in tons and tons of effort. I believe it shows in our product and in our company--and it shows when someone walks in the conference room and finds a bunch of people doing pushups!
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