This weekend I have quite a few things going on. It is a double edged sword when your life is so full of activity that you aren’t sure that you can fit it all in. There are so many aspects of my life that I love end derive joy from, however sometimes all of those things collide in a short time frame and can create a significant amount of stress. This weekend my photography life and my running life are colliding hard core. I am currently training for a 50k trail race and simultaneously trying to expand my photography business as well as maintain services I have provided in the past.

For my race training I need to run 20 miles on Saturday and I need to run at least 10 miles Sunday. On Saturday morning I have the privileged of photographing an important community event, Walk A Mile In My Shoes. This is a suicide awareness event that is held in my home town of Elmira, NY. This is a very well done event and it receives a ton of support from the community. I have photographed this event in the past and it is always a rewarding experience. Also, on Saturday evening I have scheduled a nature photography workshop. Holding photography workshops is something I am beginning to do new this year. I really wanted to have an early spring workshop and this seemed like a good time to have it. I have a busy early half of the year and this was the only weekend that would relay allow it to happen at all. In between those two events I will somehow squeeze in a 20 mile run, and I am not particularly fast so it is quite time consuming.

On Sunday I will be at Southern Tier Running Club’s Trail Fest at Grist Iron Brewing. I will start the day at 7:30 AM volunteering for the club during bib pick up for all of the runners attending to run the race. Then I will transition into photography mode and photograph the event which consists of three separate races. There is a 1 mile race, a 5k race, and a 10k race. I expect this will take most of the day. Then after finishing that up I will need to run 10 miles as part of my training plan for my 50k training. It is going to be a long but fulfilling day and weekend.

All of this activity even though it is generated for things I love it is bound to be stressful. Stress is a real thing. It can be good but it can also be detrimental to both our physical and mental health. Stress can overwhelm us. We might think that all of the things we are doing is because we love it and we want to but everything takes its physical and mental toll on us. Even the things we love and enjoy. Maybe especially those things because those are the things we care most about. We all need to evaluate what things we say yes to and what things we say no to. No one can do everything even if they are all things they love. There is not enough time, energy, or mental capacity. We are all human and we can only take on so much of a load. There is no shame in this. We all have to chose and prioritize those things that mean the most and say no to other things.

As I have been going through the process of training for a 50k, I knew it was going to be a time commitment, but I really had no idea what I was getting into. I love the idea of running this type of run, but the commitment needed to train may be more than I can fit into my life these days. I will reevaluate after my race and decide if/when I will ever be able to do it again. As it is I would never be able to do it without my wife picking up the slack at home while I am out grinding away the miles.

This weekend will also be something I evaluate after the fact. Once I get through it I will look back on it and see what went well and what didn’t. Then I will know if I will ever plan to pack so much into one weekend again. This also fits into my evaluation of how training for a really long race goes. This would not be a problem if I wasn’t in the midst of training for a long race. Can I do both? Can I run long races and be a successful photographer in addition to other parts of my life I need to keep intact.

Husband, Photographer, Dog Lover, Writer, Runner, Nature Lover, Analyst. Is it all too much? How do I balance it all? These are the questions we all must ask and find a way to live the life we find most meaningful.