[ShadowLion]

Last month
Towards the end of the last challenge, I spent my 66th birthday in airports and on a plane to Asheville North Carolina for a three-day retreat put on by Mindform, a self-mastery group I belong to. I had a great time hiking, kayaking, experimenting with neurofeedback devices for brain training, and having deep discussions with a bunch of cool people I had previously only interacted with virtually. Wonderful time!

 

I came back to a mad scramble to kick off the fall session of my basic AI course and complete my nature journaling educator curriculum and practicum, before launching into a new marketing initiative for my drone-based wildfire risk management startup. 

 

This month, I'll be giving a talk on navigating our AI future, participating in a number of events with the Flagstaff Festival of Science–from doing a demo of how drones are used in the environmental sciences to putting my new nature journal educator training to use at the "Science in the Park" event. And, keeping up with my "day job" business doing web development to keep food on the table. With all of that going on, I'm only about halfway done moving into my office space at the business incubator.  Things have been at a higher level of craziness than usual!

 

OBJECTIVES

Challenge 7: September 9th - October 13th, 2024

• Get outside and enjoy the fall weather; do some sketching, take photos, and make some drone video of the fall colors!
• Focus on trails with hills, of a moderate or higher level of difficulty, to continue building lung capacity, endurance, and leg strength for longer, more strenuous hikes to come
• Do at least 2 day hikes (6 - 10 miles) on portions of the AZT or other trails on the Coconino and Kaibab National Forests during the challenge to start increasing mileage 
• Keep doing strength, endurance, balance and flexibility training
• Keep decluttering and downsizing household stuff
• Keep the plates spinning on my business. Finish moving into the office.
• Go big on Festival of Science events, AI initiatives, and fire agency networking. That's where I seem to be picking up some momentum. 

 

I've identified a number of long range objectives and goals (listed at the bottom of this post so as to not clutter up the main portion of my challenge) that informed the above goals and will help me in planning challenge goals through the end of this year. Chief among them is to start preparing now for spring section hikes of the Arizona Trail (an 800 mile trail that runs north/south along the length of Arizona).

 

GOALS

1. Keep on Hikin'...

My feet are doing well and I'm building some leg muscle! My endurance is improving. My hiking buddy has been giving me grief that I'm walking faster and going up hills better, making it harder to keep up...yeah, right. This from the person who takes a 10 - 12 mile solo hike once a week, beyond the hiking we've already been doing together.

 

 

 

• Hike more challenging trails in the area, whether in the Flagstaff Urban Trails System, Forest Service trails, or small portions of the Arizona Trail, 3 - 4 x per week, 2 - 4 miles per hike
• Increase about 20% over last challenge's mileage to around 50 miles total, and increase difficulty level on all hikes to at least moderate, working in difficult trails for about 10-15% of hikes. 
• Add in a light pack (keep it under 12 pounds for now) on familiar, moderate hikes.

 

 

2. Condition with the Future in Mind

Staying steady with the schedule, but changing up the weight. Moving to heavy weights, low reps. I experimented with that the last week and a half and it's working better for me:

• Strength: 2x per week (full body, body weight exercises and light heavy weights, high low reps)
• Endurance: 2x per week on exercise bike, easy to moderate, for non-hike recovery days
• Flexibility and Balance: 6-7x per week (foot rolling, massage, flex and strengthening for feet; stretching for feet, legs, hips; stretching and strengthening for torso, neck and arms; posture work)

 

 

 

3. Cut the Clutter and Disorganization

I'm doing a big push to finish up my home organization and house cleaning by the 21st. I have friends coming up from Phoenix to help me with the Science in the Park booth my company is sponsoring and that gives me a real deadline to have the place presentable.

 

After that, I'll move on to culling stuff from my 8 x 10 storage unit to reduce excess stuff and organize. I have way too many interests, hobbies, and business ventures going on to live in a 400 sq. ft. apartment.    Thank goodness for 140 sq. feet of office space - just getting half the drones and other equipment in there has helped a lot already!

 

• Finish the office move by the middle of next week
• This week and next: Keep to my minimum of 30 minutes a day on the household, though with visitors coming, it likely will be more realistic to do an hour or two per day, so I don't go crazy at the last minute cleaning for company
• Rest of the challenge: Shift to at least 2x per week working on the storage unit for a 90 minutes to 2 hours at a time, while MAINTAINING the apartment

 

 

 

4. Create the Future I Want to See

I finished my Nature Journaling Educator workshop and practicum on September 7 - woohoo! I'll be applying that at the Science in the Park event, where my friends and I will be doing environmental science and fire prevention education for the kids and families that will be attending. Really looking forward to that!

 

• Do first five weeks of the 90 day Mindform Growth Accelerator challenge
• Do Science in the Park education event (Flagstaff Festival of Science)
• Present Drones in Environmental Science Demo (Flagstaff Festival of Science)
• Give my talk on navigating our AI future
• Wrap up teaching the AI intro course that ends during the challenge bye week
• Have everything ready to start teaching my new course–"Advancing Your AI Skills"–that starts the first week of the next challenge
• Post more frequently–updating my own challenge regularly, and comment on and support other people's challenges

 

 

 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I've listed my long range objectives below so as to not clutter up the main portion of my challenge. They're nearly all hiking related right now. Having those set will help me in choosing challenge goals through the end of this year.

Spoiler

Chief among them is to start preparing now for spring section hikes on the Arizona Trail (an 800 mile trail that runs north/south along the length of Arizona).  I also have a stretch goal to see if I can qualify for a "red card" again. That's a big stretch, but the way my hiking has been going, I think it is actually a possibility. Only way to know is to try, and I can stair step my way up to see if I hit a wall or not...

 

OBJECTIVES

Challenge 8: October 21st - November 24th, 2024

• Day hike additional portions of the Arizona Trail, gradually upping average mileage
• Hike to Cedar Ridge and back on the South Kaibab Trail in Grand Canyon National Park
• Hike a single 15 - 20 mile passage of the Arizona Trail
• Improve my conditioning to the point I can pass a Moderate level "pack test" (2-mile level walk with a 25-pound pack in 30 minutes or less) which would qualify me to do fire agency drone jobs, or fire prevention teams or support roles in fire camp. 

 

Challenge 9: December 2nd - December 22nd, 2024 (Dec 31)

• Hike another 15 - 20 mile passage of the Arizona Trail
• Increase level of shorter hikes to difficult, with more hills and more elevation gain. Hike (or snowshoe on closed forest roads) at moderate difficulty level for longer stretches at 8,000 feet and higher.

 

2025 Challenges, Q1

• Head to lower elevations and hike one or more of the longer passages of the Arizona Trail in the Sonoran Desert during the cooler months. 
• Snowshoe some long conditioning days at 8,000+ feet with a pack
• Start running to build endurance
• Prepare for arduous level pack test and S-130/S-190 training requirements in time for Wildfire Academy in mid-March - this is the big stretch goal...

[Elastigirl]

Sounds busy, but also good!

[Laghail]

This challenge certainly doesn't seem boring. Here for it. 

[ShadowLion]

22 hours ago, Elastigirl said:

Sounds busy, but also good!

 

Hi @Elastigirl! Very busy and very good–I've been struggling to get traction with my business and juggling doing a lot of side work to stay afloat, which had been pretty stressful. Now, things are starting to ease up and flow better, hiking is going well (which keeps me in good spirits when things are tough), and it feels like I'm on the right track!

 

 

21 hours ago, Laghail said:

This challenge certainly doesn't seem boring. Here for it. 

 

Hey @Laghail! I will do my best to keep it varied and interesting... 

 

[DarK_RaideR]

On 9/13/2024 at 12:06 AM, ShadowLion said:

Last month
Towards the end of the last challenge, I spent my 66th birthday in airports and on a plane to Asheville North Carolina for a three-day retreat put on by Mindform, a self-mastery group I belong to. I had a great time hiking, kayaking, experimenting with neurofeedback devices for brain training, and having deep discussions with a bunch of cool people I had previously only interacted with virtually. Wonderful time!

This is one of the most ShadowLion things I've read in a long time. Really glad to have you around, will be following and wishing you an exciting challenge!