NON, JE NE REGRETTE RIEN: Regret Nothing

We are less than a month away from the pinnacle of my favorite spectator sport; Le Tour du France. On July 2, 2011 198 riders will approach the starting line at Passage du Gois on a journey to traverse 3,471 km over 23 days.  I was reminded of impending commencement of the 2011 Tour de France by a commercial during the Stanley Cup Finals between the Boston Bruins and the Vancouver Canucks.  
The motto of the commercial is 'non, je ne regrette rien' translated 'Regret Nothing'. My passion for the Tour is multilevel:
1) It is man vs. himself as he battles his own will to pull himself over seemingly impossible summits, across over 2000 miles of terrain and at speeds, down mountain hairpins, exceeding 60 mph.

2) The Tour is the ultimate man vs. man grueling, lactic acid building, heart rate over-driving, adrenaline firing competition. As exemplified during last year's final mountain stage at the Col du Tourmalet. Andy Schleck's only chance to win the tour against Alberto Contador was to attack on this most grueling mountain stage. Andy attacked and Contador hung on for dear life for over an hour. Both riders left everything on the course - Regret Nothing.

3)The tour is also one of the most strategic sports as it pits team vs. team embarking on a chess match between teams possessing top contenders for the maillot jaune (the coveted yellow jersey). The team works together to set pace, attack rivals and lead out victory.

4) Finally, it displays the most beautiful symbiotic relationship of a man and his machine as the rider strikes an effortless cadences on the pedals of the bicycle even up some of the steepest inclines.  


It is what these professional riders symbolize; leaving it all out there and regretting nothing.  It is this symbol to achieving life's goals through victory, obstacles and defeat.  Not saving anything for another day or next year because you need it today.  No matter how heavy their legs are, or how raw and fiery their saddle sores are they are back at in the next day.  Like life it is having the will power to over come these challenges, no matter how many times we failed or how weak we feel.   


Not only do a few of my life goals relate to cycling (one of them is following the tour through the Pyrenees or the Alps) but the summation of this is living life regretting nothing eagerly and tenaciously pursuing my passion, leaving it all out there.....To living life and regret nothing.  Non, je ne regrette rien!

Let the Journey begin

Cube burglar – The blog name derived from the location where the blog is being crafted and the name bestowed upon the cyclists who pedaled ahead of 1800s bicycle clubs to warn the pack of obstacles to come so riders didn’t crash from atop their high seats.  My cube, a sterile space among a sea of similar three quarter walled cages.  These containment centers litter corporate America. 

I learned about burglars after reading a book I recently discovered on a trip out to the heartland of American bicycling, Portland, Or.  An insightful and inspiring read the author Penn unravels the history of the bicycle in pursuit of his dream bike.   

My current containment center resides in balmy, cicada infested St. Louis, MO.  This makes St. Louie sound like an awful place and I don’t mean to imply that at all because I am confined to a suburb called Creve Coeur and I have had little time to explore St. Louis. 

Back to the purpose, mission and reason for the blog; my life seems to follow a similar pattern and my the phase in this cycle switch from ingesting literature and the provocation of future images to articulating ideas and concepts on paper to mobilizing and realizing these ideas.  To be more concise terms; the thinking phase, the planning phase, and in the consulting world, the implementation or deployment phase.  Currently, I am in the thinking phase, after reading It’s All About the Bicycle: The Pursuit of Happiness on Two Wheels by Rob Penn I have been inspired to invest more time reading literature that most often serves as a catalyst to inspired thinking.

I found my next inspiration and I board a plan from Detroit to St. Louis with my Kindle recharged, loaded and packed away.  The newest inspiration is an ebook titled the Art of Non-Conformity by Chris Guillebeau, more on this to come.  I hope that this blog will be my platform to take me through the decision process and journey of the next phase of life.  I hope it will be my channel to vent, find support and celebrate the journey.   

  

I have been in a rut, not feeling fulfilled with my job, my life, my legacy, the culture surrounding me and just a lack of understanding of what I should be doing.  I have always had a philosophy that pursuing ones passion is happiness and happiness and this is the realization of success.  It is my passion that I pursue and it is that passion that ebbs and flows depending on my current course.

Since returning from Kenya, Africa I have definitely simplified my life in that I am living out of one suitcase, this is also due to the fact that work requires me to travel on a plane ever week.  Fly in on Monday and out on Thursday.  If this doesn’t make one feel like a cog in the machine then I don’t know what will.  Simplifying life has become liberating, self-assessing and focal in the journey that lies ahead.  The final and maybe mid-term trimming that still needs to occur is the elimination of all my debt (student loans and a mortgage).  There is no doubt I still have a ways to go to completely eliminate debt and become more sustainable but I am working on this.  I could use some pointers????

This pruning process has definitely helped me reevaluate everything in life.  My intrigue and desire for something different has been catapulted by the ebook residing on my Kindle.  Non-conformity this is what initial attracted me to the book.  The word itself made me thing of everything my life is not and excites me.  Chris Guillebeau details the first step to non-conformity is sculpting your perfect day and then setting life goals.  This is done and was done within hours of reading the first couple of chapter with easy.  I now have a bucket list of things I want to grasp, but not before I die, but to embark on now.  I may share this list but this is part of the fear I have, that people will perceive me as crazy maybe even selfish.   The other fear is financial.  How will I support myself?  What will I do with my mortgage and house in Baltimore, MD? I closed on a mortgage valued at $215K over 6 years ago and have had several neighbors on my block offload their properties as short sales for less than $130K.  Ouch that is about a 40% decline in value.  Currently, I am renting it out but my neighborhood has taken a turn for the worse, my tenant does not feel safe and wants to move out.  How long can I keep up this stressful process worrying about the safety of my tenants and whether or not they will be run off by the drugs, crime and violence of the neighborhood? How long will I be able to cover most of my mortgage by a willing tenant? 

Fear and comfort are the two very influential factors holding me back.  I work for a large consulting firm that pays me well, I have a large amount of debt (Mortgage and Student loan) and it is likely society, including my parents, will think I am crazy……

So let the journey begin and please help me through this process, encourage me on the leap of faith and explore with me wonderful adventure that awaits those who embark beyond the confines that are placed on us by society.  God Speed on this journey to success.