Hello all and THANK YOU THANK YOU again for your support!
The crowdfund launch is trucking right along, although there has been a technical glitch where I have been unable to download the funder report (i.e. the emails of anyone that has contributed) for the past week!! So if you were waiting patiently for your free digital download or the 3 months access into the online community, thank you so much, those links are in the most recent email.
The glitch is not yet resolved, but at least the I Fund Women tech support team is able to access the emails now! Which is improvement - thus this email.
Over the past few days I've been a little stressed over the glitch and pondering if I should jump ship to something like kickstarter or gofundme. But I believe in the mission behind I Fund Women and, although I do not always default to truth, I believe that they are working hard to rectify the glitch. I'm always trying to support the underdog, I guess. Their ability to get me the emails was small improvement, and small improvement is still improvement. If we're going the right direction then why are we always so eager to change things up?
I come across this in coaching a lot. People are always looking how to paddle faster... faster. We're a society that values productivity and speed... above all else (I would dare say). But, if you're seeing improvement, then you should keep doing what you're doing, and make slight modifications. You shouldn't change things completely. When paddlers come to me, they want to get better in the quickest way possible. However, they don't always know what "better" is; they don't always know what "faster" is.
Step one is defining "better" or "faster" or "improvement." To quote the Cheshire Cat, "If we don't know where we're going, then it doesn't matter which road we take." How will we ever know if we're headed in the right direction? I'm not saying you should get hyper-focused on data and numbers; that is also a recipe for disaster. Somewhere along the middle way is what I'm advocating for. Where we have clearly defined goals and we work towards them systematically and know when we are improving, or when we need to change something up.
That's what the Athlete Agenda is for. It's for setting YOUR goals and writing something deeper than "get faster" or "get better" or "be on the podium" or "win race." It's about saying, I can currently paddle 4.5mph for a 5k and I want to go 5mph. It's about saying, I currently fall in 3-5 times on an ocean run, and I want to fall in 0 times. It's about knowing the podium times and conditions for your goal race and training to those paces in your training. It's about knowing how many calories you burn each week and need to refuel with to handle the training load required to win.
It's about getting to know yourself better. It's about intention. It's about getting very clear on what you want... and why.
Although I love training, competition, and coaching; I'm also really enjoying this new venture of "Athlepreneur." It's a fun and interesting learning experience. What I sincerely hope is that each and every one of you use the Athlete Agenda and let me know what you think. It's not fixed, and I'm sure there will be many versions until it becomes a tool that humans everywhere can use to develop deeper training intuition and discover the Athlete that lives inside of them. I hope you'll use the digital download, and the hard copy planner when it arrives, then share with me some improvements or suggestions.
Truth be told, I'm already planning version two!! With larger spaces for workout descriptions and reflections and a "journal" section for those that want to write out at least a full page each day... Those might not be popular editions, but I won't know unless you tell me :-) What parts have you found most useful, and what spaces would you like to see in future versions? I'm all ears, I want to make something people enjoy using and is intuitive itself.
Please consider sharing this campaign with your friends, clubs, paddle family, or just on social media. It may not seem like much to you, but it would mean a lot to me.