Baby Steps/The New New Normal

Yesterday was my first day back at the gym. It wasn’t easy - after 8 months off, I wasn’t surprised. But it was better than expected. No personal bests or anything (see above re: 8 months) but I booked a time easily, started on what I knew I could do, in front of 7 or 8 other people - a couple of which were big jacked dudes lifting at least my bodyweight.
This felt good. It’s not obvious to those that know me, but I deal with some self confidence issues when it comes to my physical appearance. I’m not here to deep dive where that stems from, but I’m here to say that after almost a year off I wasn’t scared away by my first time back. Sure, it was a little clunky trying to remember my routine, but I used up my entire hour of time instead of calling it early. (And more than once, my body screamed “DUDE! Why are we doing this? Go eat ice cream!”)
This may not be much to some. It just needed to be said. There’s no need to impress someone on your first try. Not doing something is so much easier than doing something. But doing something gets the ball an inch closer to the net than if you hadn’t tried at all.