How did I get here?

The return back to social media. Its been just over 5 years since my last post on a now Deleted Facebook Fan Page (I am seeing if it can be restored). 

Why all of this. I was driving back to work and listening to a podcast by Peter Voogd it left me thinking about how in 2020 we all need to be posting on social media. This thought then led me to have a conversation with a good friend of mine. In order for me to make it to that next level and to achieve one of my goals for 2020, I will need to hop back on the social media train.  

For the next few minutes, I took the time to think and meditate on how I feel about getting back on this ride. This is an all too familiar ride. One that I promised-ish to never get back on. 

Why I disconnected?

A little back story from 2010-2014ish my number one life goal was to be known as The Best Fitness Model Athlete & Powerlifter. The goal was to compete in both Fitness Model/Bodybuilding competitions, compete in powerlifting meets (the official term for the competitions), and to grace the cover of magazines worldwide. Although I did not make it to the cover of Men’s Health I did manage to make it into 2 issues of Fitness Quebec Magazine. Which my mom still holds copy of to this day.  

I will save all this for a future My Story post. The year was 2014, from the eyes of a fan I was on the up and up. I started to place higher in Fitness competitions, got the Provincial record for Powerlifting, had photos in a fitness magazine, had hundreds of active followers on Facebook with a community, was a sponsored athlete, Youtube views started to increase. It was all sunshine, roses, and gumdrops ahead.

Then one day I went to Facebook deleted my fan page wit hundreds of posts. I went to Youtube made all my videos private. Changed my Twitter account from public to private. Deleted a new and on the rise app Instagram. For context here In 2014 Facebook was king, people read magazines, Netflix & Chill wasn’t a thing, most content online was long-form. 

The day I shut it all down was when I did a daily reflection and realized I didn’t live to live, I lived to post. Almost every decision I made was with the thought of how can I get more views, followers, comments, and likes. This went as far as when I decided to post one of my failed deadlift attempts to youtube I wanted to thumbnail and caption it “I just couldn’t Get It Up” with the Viagra logo as I thought it was funny. My at the time girlfriend gave me a look and advise against me doing it. I no longer wanted to live a life I thought others would find interesting and started to live a life for myself.

Thinking about all this now I realize why for the past 6 years I had a could care less attitude for social media posts. so that like someone who has been sober for many years I did not want to relapse. Every now and again I would try it out and find myself getting an uncomfortable feeling inside and stop. 

Why come back?

Its been 6+ years of soul searching, figuring out a purpose, and getting to know my self. I understand this is a search that never ends. The life I live out now versus then has drastically changed, Some may say that I have grown wiser.

The main reason for the return is for me to work on expressing myself. I am a very private person and keep my personal and work life separate. This will give me a chance to share many different things about myself.

The First step I took was to reopened my Youtube Channel https://www.youtube.com/user/CLTraining On reopening it I made all my videos public. Some have had thousands of views and I simply put them on private.