Birthday Wishes: Triple H's Gift to Me (Updated Article)

I posted this article two years ago, but thought it would be fitting to re-post since today I am celebrating my 29th birthday - and remembering the turning point in my life - that lead me to believe I could make my dreams reality.

The Athletic Training Room documented my story and I am reminded of it everyday!

It was Sunday, January 24th, the eve of my 25th birthday and I was feeling lost with life.  As I entered the Cheesecake Factory for my Sunday morning serving shift, I continued to question the purpose of my life. I knew I was a smart girl, I went to Wake Forest, had been accepted to Naturopathic Medical school, accepted to the Peace Corps, and was applying to medical schools.  However, none of these made me light up. I knew in my heart my passion lied within fitness and nutrition. But I was paralyzed, paralyzed by fear of taking a chance.

As the Sunday dragged on, my manager asked me to do him a favor and work a double - meaning close the restaurant.  So here it was the night before my golden birthday and I am serving up some more dessert making America obese.  But the next events that happened changed my life indefinitely.

It was 9:45 p.m. and I was beginning to do the closing clean up duties, or "outs" in restaurant terminology, when I heard the host tell me I had been sat.  Tired and worn out from the 12 hour shift, I mustered up a smile and walked out to greet the guests.  Surprised to see how massive these two men were, I smiled bigger and thought to myself, 'maybe they are bodybuilders'. The gentlemen began by ordering three iced teas, 'a joiner' I thought to myself.  When I returned with the drinks, the 'joiner' had joined and was wearing a black shirt with a small WWE logo.  A light bulb lit up in my head, and I remembered that Monday Night Raw was in Columbus on my birthday.  

After setting down the drinks, I began my usual introduction, but then took a seat next to this man who had long dirty blond hair and a calm voice. I kept thinking to myself, this guy looks familiar.  But my rational mind kicked in and there was no way I would know him, I was turning 25 and the last time I had watched wrestling was thirteen years prior.  So as conversation starts, I learned that these three men were in town for Monday Night Raw.  I spilled my childhood memories to them about practicing finishing moves with my dad and brother, ordering the pay per views, and making wrestling t-shirts in grade school.  One of the gentlemen asked me who my favorite wrestler was, and immediately I said, "My favorite was Triple H."  As the words came out of my mouth, the nice man with the dirty blond hair put his arm around me and said, "Well, thank you Kelley, for making me feel old!"  I felt my heart stop, I slowly turned and looked over my left shoulder and found myself looking at my childhood hero, Triple H.

I was like a kid in a candy shop, or cheesecake factory ;)!

The rest of the evening was a blast.  The four of us talked about wrestling and I felt like a twelve year old again, without a care in the world. I had completely forgotten how stressed I was about figuring out my life.  Before the men left, they had me write down my number and invited me to the show. As I drove home that evening, I had the biggest smile.  I started to reflect on life, and its purpose.  Here is this man, in his early forties now who is living out his dream. I thought to myself, 'I bet when he was in his early 20's and said he wanted to be a professional wrestler, people doubted him.  But that didn't stop him. And now he is one of the most well known entertainers in the world."

Triple H (Paul) living out his dream for spectators around the world!

My 25th birthday will always be remembered.  Not only was I at Monday Night Raw, but it was a pivotal point in my life.  I saw the power of following your passion and I started to follow mine. Within the next week I applied to The George Washington University to complete a degree in Exercise Science and left the conventional steps of medical school behind me.

I will never forget this day!

And here I am two plus years later wrapping up my masters in Exercise Science and about to embark on another journey in the world of health policy, continuing to live out my passion for fitness and nutrition.  

This past Monday I met up with the three "massive men"to go to Monday Night Raw here in DC. By the way, Terry, Jim, & Paul (Triple H) are some of the nicest men I have ever met despite their intimidating physiques.  After the event, I had the chance to talk to Paul for a little bit.  We caught up on life, family, friends, training, and goals.  I made sure to let him know how he changed my life.  Jokingly he said, "Why? Because I ate a bad meal and you thought to yourself I don't want to be like this guy." But on a more serious note, we continued to talk about following dreams no matter how unconventional they may be, and he said something to the effect of, "You just gotta do it."

So whatever your dream, make it your reality. There is no better time than now. So many people are afraid of failure or afraid of success. At the end of  the day, the only difference between Triple H and the guy stuck in the office is Triple H did it whereas the office guy thought it.  Triple H didn't wait for the perfect time, perfect opportunity, or perfect scenario: he created it for himself. 

My lovely coworkers placed this picture above my desk.  Although it makes me laugh, it is a constant reminder that I can do anything I set my mind to!  Thank you Triple H!

Thank you Triple H for changing my life & for giving me the best birthday present: igniting my drive to make my passion my reality! 

It's been four years since I started pursuing my passion for fitness and health. It's just the beginning. Triple H didn't become the COO of an international company in four years, but he's stayed persistent and true to his purpose. You and I both can both do the same! Now, lets go make our dreams reality!  Have an #amazing day!

I love hearing from you @kelleyvargo

The Two Choices For Attaining A Fit Life

The number of choices we make throughout a single day is pretty amazing, I mean think about. Did you hit the snooze button or wake up for your morning workout? Did you pack your lunch or plan on eating out? Did you watch your TV after work or read a good book? So many choices! Between juggling day-to-day commitments and decisions, it can seem daunting to choose when get in a workout, and how to prepare healthy meals.

1. First things first, we have to have the right mindset. We can all choose to spend our time working out, but is this what we want to do? Take for example a dear friend of mine. She works a 9-6 job and has a daily hour and a half commute. She has been trying to lose a few pounds and get more active. Typically when she gets off work she is tired and does not feel like going to the gym.  If it is not too late, she enjoys walking, but sometimes it is not always feasible. In my mind I am like duh, just wake up 45 minutes earlier. But I realize that’s not fair, not everyone is a crazy morning person like me :).

Her and I sat down and started talking about how to work around this. I started probing a bit and found out she enjoyed taking group fitness classes offered at work. So why not start there? She decided on packing her clothes the night before so that way immediately after work she could go to the class.

Switching up her mindset to not make working out seem like a drag helped her get in workouts without dreading it!  Case in point: choose what is best for you! 

2. Choosing how you spend your time. You have the power to choose how you spend your time. And when it comes to exercise, it all adds up. Whether it is 20-40 or 60 minutes, it all counts. We all have 1440 minutes in a day, surely we can spend at least 20 on exercise. For some people 60 minutes of exercise a day seems overwhelming and impossible. I have been through some of the most brutal workouts and they have been done in 20 minutes! Think about it, the time you spend fumbling around in the morning, you could have crushed a 20-minute workout. 

I constantly remind myself that it all counts.  Being a gym rat over the years, I am used to having a minimum 90 minutes (45 for my lift and 45 for my cardio) in the gym. These days, juggling graduate school full time, working, and traveling with my boyfriend, I can spend more time in classrooms and airports than in a gym. There are days where I cannot get to the gym for a solid hour. However, knowing that I can train efficiently in 20 minutes makes fitness on the road and in school doable.

Health comes down to two choices: mind-set and time. What are you going to choose?

Let’s give everyone the tools to a great exercise mindset; tweet me your mindset mantra today @kelleyvargo #kvmindset

Until tomorrow,

Kel

5 Beliefs to Build Your Best

I apologize I’ve been on an Internet hiatus the past 5 months but am thrilled to be back and beginning a new career. I hope you all had an amazing summer! I think it’s fair to say we are all living life striving to be our best. I’ll spare you the details of my summer but I wanted to share some things I learned over the past few months, and hopefully one or two will resonate with you, on how to captivate your best life.

1.     Choices are for oneself; decisions are for others.

“Kelley, you are a decision maker. Decisions take into account what others think. Choices take into account what you think.” - Dr. Jade Teta. I have struggled my entire life with approval. Everyone who knows me, knows I love to talk to people, I absolutely love it! But those that know me well know that I consistently have to ask others for their opinion, advice, or guidance on important choices for my life. I’m 27 now, and I still struggle with it despite moving around the country, going to various schools, and changing careers. When Jade said this to me, I felt empowered, inspired, and relieved!  My challenge to myself and to you if you choose to accept, is to make a choice today! Start with one choice for yourself and keep going onto the next. Choose how your think, choose how you respond, choose what you do with your time! I will be a choicemaker for myself and will save my decision making for the policy world when I complete the Public Health Policy degree.

2.     Quitting is OKAY, in fact it's GREAT!

Think about it for a minute. I never thought I would find myself saying this! But out of everything I have learned over summer, quitting might be the most valuable lesson.  I was in a job about a month ago where I wasn’t happy. I would cry after work every night, dread getting up every morning, hardly worked out, lost my social life, and almost cost me some of my closest relationships. However, the job was paying for my degree. Money can make us do some crazy things! I kept using self talk to tell myself to “tough it out”, “suck it up”, “it’s only two years,” “ I love the people I work with.” I would tell myself anything to avoid the “scary” thing. And then it happened. A close friend saw me at work and could not recognize me for who I was. I lost myself. I was no longer smiling, talking, doing much of anything but getting by. I wasn’t going to get better as a person and I certainly wasn’t helping others, I couldn’t even help my self. But how could I quit? And just give up tuition, a stipend, and a lot of money that I don’t have. Scared to death and not sure of the future (that’s that whole uncertainty thing we tend to fear) I made the CHOICE to quit. It was not easy by any means but I knew that alternative was a million times worse, or as Jill told me:

"Nothing is ever irreversible. There's never going to be something you can't handle. NOT taking risks is scarier!" - Jill Coleman.

3.     Expectations kill joy.

Oh my little sister, Krissy and Dr. Jillian Sarno are genius! Growing up, Krissy has always had special quality about her that is able to see things from a different perspective, a much more deep and meaningful one. Anyways, she says this saying to me a lot. I normally don’t dwell on it. But lately I have. We set ourselves up with such high expectations: to loose 10 pounds, start a business, do laundry, dinner, raise the kids, exercise, eat perfect, blah blah blah – you know what I am talking about. But then when we fail to meet these expectations we spend just as much time and energy on self-loathing and self-deprecation. For what? And then we place expectations on other people. And what happens to us when those expectations aren’t met? Same negative thought process, but it only really affects our own happiness, not anyone else’s. So be easy on yourself. We are human, and we’re fortunate to be where we are. Next time you let you down or are let down by someone else: check yourself! Was it because you expected otherwise? Was it a fair expectation? Can you change your perspective?

4.     Pain is the catalyst for growth.

After attending a conference this weekend I saw an image that looked something like this - clearly I am not a graphic designer! (Reference: The Tools by Phil Stutz & Barry Michels)  Pain is good thing! If we didn’t feel pain we would be living in our comfort zone constantly.  Pain isn’t fun; in fact, it sucks. But, in reality when we push through the pain, we grow and get closer to becoming our best self. We become better in our workouts, better in our eating habits, better in our career, better in our relationships, better in our lives. If we avoid pain, we are never going to progress. I had the opportunity to sit down with a dear friend last night and she revealed to me her battle with breast cancer. Her story was astounding, “The cancer made me better” She endured pain and has entirely new outlook on life. This brought me back to my reality. No matter what our pain maybe: a workout, a relationship, a health complication, it can teach us to grow, to become our best selves, if we choose to let it.

5.     Happiness is not an option: it is a must.

I know this blog is usually focuses on workouts, food, and a busy schedule, but I felt like we all need a mind workout from time to time. And honestly, the best way to achieve optimal health, I believe, is through happiness. The mind is such an amazing and powerful gift we have, but unfortunately, most of us don’t even know this, and if we do know it, we don’t cultivate it. The secret here is that happiness comes from within you. You can’t find it from a partner, kids, a job, money, amazing body, food, etc. When we are happy we are much likely to succeed: in our work, in our relationships, in our exercise and diet programs, and in life. When were you happiest? What were you doing? How did you feel? How was your health? Make happiness your state of being instead of the place you want to be.

In closing,

·      CHOOSE what is best for you, don’t always decide

·      QUIT what you are doing if you aren’t happy

·      LET GO of expectations and believe in yourself

·      ENDURE pain and great things are waiting

·      BE HAPPY and live your best life!

Thanks for coming back! I look forward to staying in touch with you all!