At the end of last year and beginning of the year I wrote out a bjj bucket list of things I had hoped to accomplish, and I was going to push hard to check all those boxes.  The list wasn't big and I broke it down into two groups, personal goals and competition goals.  The personal side included, becoming a better instructor and teammate, try to get in a few more road trips to different gyms in the area, and work hard to improve my Jiu-Jitsu.  The competition side included seeing some progress in competing (a podium finish), and compete in another country.  Of all these items on my bucket list, the personal goals are works in progress while the others, due to adulting, injury, and the Montreal Police, never came about.  

My pectoral injury really got me thinking about a few of these things.  I joke around sometimes by saying that I am "old" or an "old man", although I don't and didn't really look at myself in that regard in-spite of my jests.  I take care of myself as best as I can in terms of eating right, jiu-jitsu training, and lifting.  Age is relative, clearly, I am not "old" but I am also not twenty years old anymore.  It's been a hard concept for me to grasp...No, it's been more then hard, it's been a struggle for me.  Up until now I still felt invincible and that I could continue to hang with the younger guys in terms of athletic ability and recovery time.  My prior sprains and strains seemed to heal relatively quickly in comparison to this.

But If you think I'm throwing in the towel and calling it a day, you are sadly mistaken.  My life hasn't been all dandelions and roses where I would let something like this hold me back or wither in the face of adversity.  I still plan on checking those boxes on my list, I'm just going to carry the unchecked items on the list over to next year and be happy with the items I can check off.  It's time for one more push to see what I can do in this new year.

Any goal you set, keep after it, don't give up, just shift the goal a bit further down the road if it isn't attainable right away.  Any opportunity you get, grab a hold of, because things change in an instant and who knows if another opportunity gets thrown your way.