Understanding My Why: Exploring the Deeper Reasons Behind My Journey

I know many of you are here to follow my Longdrive page and golf journey, but as some may have noticed lately, due to a wrist injury, I have dived headfirst into the fitness world, even getting on stage in a men's physique competition and doing quite well, winning both my divisions in the tall class and men's over 40 class. As I mentioned in a recent social media post, I would dive headfirst into "My Why." This could offend some, enlighten others, and generally just help everyone understand why I have chosen to go down this path, aside from the obvious health reasons.

In order to fully understand why, we have to go back to my early years. I was a punk teenager who could play sports decently and committed here and there to spending time in the gym to get better at what I was doing, starting with hockey and then mostly just to stay in shape as I got older before getting involved in Longdrive/Golf/Powerlifting and now Bodybuilding. Going back to my first time in a gym, it was thanks to a childhood friend, Ryan T. He had started going and working out, and I guess he was willing to drag me along, as he did in golf as well a few years prior. I would go here and there with him, but I never really caught the bug of the gym in those younger years. I was a very skinny teenager, hence where my nickname "Boneman" came from, tall and lanky for lack of a better word. At the time, I didn't really know or understand the impact those years would have on me, as since I was generally good at sports, I just let the being a toothpick stuff roll off my back.

It wasn't until I, kind of last minute, decided I wanted to try and play Junior A hockey at 17/18 that I knew I had to gain weight (every scout said the same thing). So I did what I thought was best and ate everything. In April, after the first big scouting camp, I was 165 lbs. By the time my main training camp rolled around in the middle of August, I was 200 lbs (after two weeks straight of skating and dryland, I was 185 lbs). But that summer, I realized what it took to gain weight and actually build muscle. I was drinking four liters of milk most days, plus steak, and usually something from the restaurant next door (Grey Rocks Inn). Now, was this the healthiest way to go about things? Obviously not, but in my small town, we didn't really have nutritionists to help with things, so I just took what I could from magazines and did my best. Likely would have been much different in this day and age with the internet and access to all kinds of information available out there now.

So once hockey was over a few years later and the dream of it was all but said and done, I found myself in and out of the gym. As a guy in his early 20s, I didn't exactly have many great habits—the usual going to the bar, drinking far too often, and eating habits were quite poor. Even though I was still generally working out more days of the year than I wasn't, it didn't really add up to much progress. I look back and try to understand why this was. Was it community, peers, who I surrounded myself with, or just who was in my circle? I could never say it was just one thing, as I completely understand these were, at the end of each day, all my choices. But the nature you are in does play a factor in which your habits end up being part of. Nature vs. nurture in sociology was a very interesting topic to me and is still to this day.

My father was a big man, not just in personality but also in stature, being roughly 6ft and 300lbs. Although he was a very happy and jolly individual, you have to see it through the lens I did, where food wasn't eaten just to not be hungry; it was until the plate was empty. Obviously, being a skinny kid, I was always told to finish my dinner and make sure I had seconds if there was any. I understand we are all somewhat a piece of what came before us, and, well, my father's side of the family enjoyed their food. I was always well-fed to the point where I was a boy getting T-bone steaks and full plates of mashed potatoes while visiting my grandparents, and my grandmother's spaghetti sauce tasted way too delicious for it to have the word healthy attached to it. When I look back at this, my grandparents were just doing what they saw fit for me, but likely my dad, who was a large child, was probably eating the same, which obviously became a habitual thing for him, becoming a diabetic in his early to mid-40s and then, well, passing before his 65th birthday. Was he potentially addicted to food? I've had conversations about this with many people, and it was likely the case. He just couldn't help himself (his friends even nicknamed him the Buffet King). As I had myself been going through my 20s into my early 30s, I look back and definitely saw some of the same traits forming in myself, which, when it comes to certain things, I still very much have to pay attention to. Now, some might think it is harsh of me to speak of the realities of what my father was or wasn't, but sit back and think of who you look up to as a young man in your earliest years and how they shaped you as a person. So is it a coincidence that I developed some of the same habits and traits? Likely not. If we look at sociological norms from generation to generation, we can see habit forming through family dinners, get-togethers, and gatherings.

I had in my past followed those footsteps of my father in health far too close for my comfort level. I never saw a buffet I didn't like; all-you-can-eat sushi became a norm weekly (even multiple times a week), and my weight would balloon up and down. I believe at my heaviest I was close to 275 lbs (23/24 years old), and my lightest after his passing was close to 207 lbs, running 5 km a day coping with things during COVID, all the while still smoking cigarettes and drinking regularly (my father wasn't a drinker, but he did basically hide smoking until his death, quitting here and there). Again, I don't want to say these were habits formed directly from him, as it was very common to smoke in high school where I grew up at the time, and I wasn't exactly a model of excellence as a child either, with drinking and even drugs. I will never claim innocence in either of those things. I will say your circle does play a role in what you end up doing, even if you are of strong mind and will.

I will cap this chapter off here and leave it in my early mid-20s, as this was all prior to my pursuit in Longdrive and years before I really got involved in health and wellness. One takeaway from this part 1 is it's never too late to make a change, and the world is out there for the taking. It will never be overly simple or easy, but as time allows and you start to have more reasons than excuses as to why you want to better yourself, your circle will change, your independence will grow, and even being a potential outcast of your old circle will likely happen as you no longer enjoy the same things. I'm here to tell you that it is completely okay. Your friends will always be your friends, and they will understand fully. Some of my best friends for life aren't always the most health-conscious or the biggest gym-goers, but that will never change my opinion of them as human beings and as great people who have been and always will be a large part of my life.

Part 2 coming soon.