Cycling Over Sixty

The Risk of Challenging Myself

• Tom Butler • Season 2 • Episode 59

Share episode

For this last podcast of season two, host Tom Butler has to deal with the biggest disappointment of his journey to get and stay fit.  Instead of the triumphant episode that he planned to end the season, Tom gives details on how his attempt to ride across Washington failed so quickly.  Tom acknowledges how painful it was to stop the ride after only two day. But he also seeks to find a way to not let the disappointment derail his future progress.  

To dive deeper into overcoming disappointment, Tom is joined by Zach Goulding, a psychotherapist and the person behind the "Ride This Out" podcast.  They have an open conversation about the fact that disappointment is a risk when you set out to challenge yourself.  Zach shares what his experience has taught him about helping people move forward beyond the disappointment. Listen in for an episode that explore a painful experience and also hope for the future.

Thanks for Joining Me! Follow and comment on Cycling Over Sixty on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cyclingoversixty/

Consider becoming a member of the Cycling Over Sixty Strava Club! www.strava.com/clubs/CyclingOverSixty

Please send comments, questions and especially content suggestions to me at tom.butler@teleiomedia.com

Show music is "Come On Out" by Dan Lebowitz. Find him here : lebomusic.com

Tom Butler:

This is the Cycling Over 60 podcast, season two, episode 59,. The risk of challenging myself and I'm your host, tom Butler here I am for another week and another interview, as I share conversations with people who are helping me understand how to use cycling to get and stay fit later in life. First, here is a depressing update on my journey. For over a year I've been planning to ride from Anacortes, washington, across the state to Newport, washington, so last Monday I dipped my wheel in the water in Anacortes and headed out. The reality is, my attempt to do this ride ended at only about 60 miles in. About 40 miles in, I started to experience some pain in my left knee. This has happened before, but I also experienced it working itself out On this ride. However, it progressively got worse and by 60 miles in I was really uncomfortable. The pain on every pedal stroke of my left leg caused me to put more strain on my right leg for the remaining 28 miles of the route. That day I felt like I didn't really have a choice but to keep going and then try to heal my left knee overnight to continue the next day, monday night. It was very painful just to walk and I knew that it was going to be hard to keep going. When I woke up on Tuesday I felt more optimism because my knee felt dramatically better, even though I knew it was going to be painful. I was hoping that I could heal up enough each night to keep going for the rest of the trip, but 20 miles in that day, I knew that wasn't going to happen. At that point my entire focus was just getting through that second day without quitting. Not only was my left knee hurting, but I must have also messed up my right knee from how I was pedaling the day before, so both my knees were really hurting. Every mile made it more and more clear that I was going to fail to make it past the second day. I was truly heartbroken.

Tom Butler:

I had been so excited on Monday morning when I started because it looked like incredible weather had moved in for the week, and that meant that the threat of wildfire smoke was being cleared out and the temperatures for the week looked fantastic. I even saw my experience of dipping my tire in the water at Anacortes as a good omen. We drove to the ferry dock in Anacortes and found that the water wasn't accessible from the spot that I had planned to leave from. However, my wife Kelly's persistence, with the help of some ferry workers, led us to a nice area where we got some great pictures of the start and I was in cycling heaven.

Tom Butler:

For the beginning of the journey, I was riding along the waterfront in Anacortes on an awesome trail. As I left the urban area of western Washington, I started moving towards the wilderness of the North Cascades National Park. It is such a beautiful part of the country and I was just soaking in being on the bike experiencing the nature around me. It was such a difficult moment as I transitioned into disappointment, seeing my goal of riding across Washington look more and more like an impossibility. On day two there was even more amazing landscapes. Climbing over 6,900 feet of elevation took me over two passes, with the North Cascade mountain range all around me. It is stunning. The emotional pain of knowing it was going to be the last day of the trip was somewhat mediated by the fact that I was cycling in such a beautiful place.

Tom Butler:

The first pass you go over is Rainy Pass. It was around nine miles from that pass when Kelly met up with me at a pullout and we talked about how I was doing. I actually quit. At that point I pulled my water bottles out of the cages and started to get the bike ready to load on the car. One factor was that the painful riding was making me so slow that I didn't think I'd be able to finish before dark. But Kelly made a comment just before I loaded up the bike that she thought I had time and that sundown wouldn't be a problem. For some reason that gave me a bit of a boost. I decided to just ride a little further to get the most I could get in before dark. I was so happy when just around the corner the road flattened out and even included some downhill sections. For a couple of miles I got to coast some and it gave my knees just a little break. From there I just tufted out up to the top of the highest point of the route, which is Washington Pass. I still had 30 miles to go to get to Winthrop, but it was almost all downhill or flat. I don't think I pedaled for over 10 miles as I dropped down the other side of Washington Pass.

Tom Butler:

I have to admit that descent was scary for me. The one thing that made it okay was that for some reason there was very little traffic. So for most of the descent. I had the whole road to myself. I don't know just how fast I could have gone, because I was braking a lot during that descent. I felt like I was on the edge of how fast I could go with my bike handling skills. Riding for that long by myself, I had plenty of time to think about what went wrong. I'd definitely done more miles without knee problems before that ride. In fact, knee issues went away for me when I got the Specialized Roubaix and got it fitted to me professionally.

Tom Butler:

The conclusion that I came up with is that my preparation was most likely a mistake. I had implemented a plan that I thought would make sure that my legs were fully healed before the trip while still maintaining my fitness level. I think that plan failed miserably. It's still really hard for me to avoid beating myself up for such a seemingly dumb mistake. By the time I arrived in Winthrop, I was convinced that if I kept going, I risked doing some damage that would keep me off the bike for a long time. I definitely wanted to avoid that, so I decided to stop the ride. Kelly and I decided to drive what would have been the next two days of the route before heading home. Loading the bike on the car to head out the third morning was really difficult for me. The weather was amazing and I knew the route took me through a totally different type of scenery. I paused a moment to let go of the challenge and load my bike on the car rack, and my attempt ended with heartache.

Tom Butler:

This episode ends season two. I thought it was going to be a triumphant finale, but instead it ended with a thud. I will be back next week and start planning for how to challenge myself for a new season. One thing that didn't happen with this disappointment is any reduction in my commitment to cycling my way to more health and fitness. No doubt about it, I was very disappointed in my attempt to ride across Washington the way I did. However, I guess this is the risk of challenging myself If I am pushing myself, I will fail at times. It's important that I find a way to bounce back from disappointment if I'm going to keep achieving new goals. I think this is a common experience for people who challenge themselves. I wanted to get a professional opinion on bouncing back, so I asked Zach Golding, a psychotherapist and the person behind the Ride this Out podcast, to join me for a discussion about dealing with disappointment. Here is that conversation. I am joined once again by Zach Golding from the Ride this Out podcast. It's good to have you back.

Zach Goulding:

Tom, thanks for having me again. It's great to see you.

Tom Butler:

Yeah, good to see you. If you want to learn more about Zach and Ride this out, pull up the January 26th episode. We kind of go into more detail there, but I invited Zach for a particular conversation based on current events. But I'd like to start out. Can you share a recent cycling experience that illustrates the role of cycling in your life? Yeah, cycling is definitely your life.

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, cycling is definitely my life. In general, I ride my bike every day. I commute to work on my bike, I ride during my work, I ride on my way home from work, I ride with my family, but just today, that's one thing I'm really excited about. We do our bike buses on Fridays and we're recording this on a Friday, and so I have some young kids and we've started a bike bus. We've been definitely inspired by seeing all the different videos online.

Zach Goulding:

Sam Balto you know up in Oregon and I've become pretty good friends with him and talking with him, and so it's really inspired us to do our bike bus and so we've got that going. And today we had our biggest turnout. We were super excited. We had the principal come out and ride with us. So basically, I mean, if you don't, if your listeners don't know what a bike bus is, it's just a group ride, a bunch of kids going to school and just trying to help motivate and get more kids out on bikes and get them riding to and from school. So it's been super fun. I'm really excited about that, what we've been doing with it.

Tom Butler:

To me, there couldn't be like a better way to start a school day Get the blood moving, get the oxygen flowing and just like start your day off in a really fun way. So it's really cool. I have not checked out if there's a bike bus in my area, but I like to get out and cheer them on. Sometimes you see people on the side of the road cheering people on and I'd like to be one of those people.

Zach Goulding:

Go out there and ride with them. Tom, I'm telling you, we, we love having our volunteers out. We love having other people, even if they don't have kids, they want to come and ride with us and some of them will help us. You know, cork the intersections and hold cars and some of them are just ride with us and it really. There's so much energy. There's so much energy. They're the funnest rides I've been on. It's a blast. So yeah, find one or start one up on your own.

Tom Butler:

Maybe, maybe. Well, you're jumping on with me on short notice and I'm really grateful for that. I thought this week's podcast was going to be very different than what it turned out to be. I thought it was going to be a celebration and it's not really a celebration for me, and my hope in having you join me this week is to try and make the most out of what seems to me to be a terrible situation. I set out at the beginning of the week with the goal to spend five days riding across Washington and I made it two, and it was rough making it too, and that was just so disappointing to me and I'll get into that a little bit as we talk. But I don't want the disappointment to sidetrack my progress, so I thought it would be helpful to talk with you about it. I'm going to start out not really close to this, but in a related way. Could you talk a bit about goal setting? How do you conceptualize goal setting?

Zach Goulding:

In my day-to-day job. I'm a therapist. I'm a mental health therapist. I work a lot with people on just things that are going on in their life that they want to change essentially, or, you know, they want to just discuss. And one of the things that I always ask them on is where are you at right now? And you know what do you want to improve on, what are those areas you want to improve on? And you know it could be a slight improvement here. There, little adjustments could be a major improvement. A lot of times it's a change in behavior, a change in habit, the idea of a goal.

Zach Goulding:

For some people it actually scares them and they say I don't, I don't want to work on anything out of fear of disappointment, cause I know that I tried to do something and I don't meet that then, I'm going to be even more disappointed, and that just kind of proves to myself, adds another brick in the wall, if you will, of see I I can't do this type of thing, and so it all my approach.

Zach Goulding:

It all depends on the person and where they're at. Some people are really gung-ho and they have amazing goals and they meet them right, and other people it's really hard to discuss that. So there's a lot of different forms of methods of you know goals. You know there's smart goals there's. You know, short-term, long-term, internal, external, like all these different types of goals that we can have. But at the end of the day, yeah, just that self-improvement and that improvement with our relationships or anything else. And so goal setting, I love it. It's definitely one thing that I try to use a lot of in my life, but helping other people reach those goals, it's powerful, it's a really cool experience.

Tom Butler:

I know that I could always set safe goals, but it seems like that isn't as valuable as having some goals that are really challenging. One of the things that I was one of the hashtags I was using for my posts, or I plan to use all week for my posts was challenge yourself. How do you see this as far as setting some goals that are really a stretch?

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, I'm all for it. I love the stretch of goals because that's when we grow, is when we're outside of our comfort zone. Now the thing that you have to be a little bit aware of is again what kind of person are you? Are you the kind of person that, if you stretch yourself, knowing this might not work out, how is going to be my reaction to it? Has there been progress in this journey, and I can be satisfied with that? Are you the type of person that's I didn't meet this end goal? Therefore I have failed, right.

Zach Goulding:

And you kind of have to ask yourself that question when you're at, when you're approaching these more challenging goals and, um, really look at that introspective, like okay, what's my thought process through this? But absolutely, yeah, I mean challenging ourselves with, um, tough goals. Like I said, that's that's when the growth happens, when we have to step outside of our comfort zone and have to push ourselves a little bit. So safe goals are wonderful as well. They can kind of help build that momentum and build that confidence. For that challenging goals it's super important, absolutely, tom.

Tom Butler:

And it seems like a consequence of doing challenging things is that sometimes you fail. At one time I spent a little time downhill skiing. It's not my thing, but it was like okay, if you're going to get better, then you're going to fall sometimes and it's like you know the old saying it's not how many times you fall, it's how many times you pick yourself up. Do you think that perspective is really valuable, or have you experienced that that perspective is really valuable, that it's about picking yourself up after a fall.

Zach Goulding:

Oh yeah, I mean, if you look at a lot of, you know our sayings and our culture. If you look at a lot of different, you know superheroes or you know movies that we experience, that we go through. It's all about how that person bounces back and how they come out of some kind of hardship and out of some kind of failure and what do they do with that failure. So the value is definitely immense and so the value comes from that perspective of recognizing and understanding. Okay, there's a disappointment here. What can I do to learn from this? What can I do to make progress and continue forward, instead of letting it just eat away at me and end up in a kind of downward spiral and just kind of self-loathing and feeling stuck? So, yes, all the time you know I'm talking with people about this and and they recognize that like hey, I've, I've messed up in this area or I'm really struggling in this area, that area, and helping them recognize that it's not just all about you know the failures, but like what are what are the other times when you have seen success? And kind of building on those again, those smaller successes, and building that momentum and helping them recognize that, hey, because you've accomplished these other things. Like you can bounce back from this failure. You might have to adjust some things, you might have to be flexible, but the value absolutely comes from that bounce back and from learning everything.

Zach Goulding:

And you look up, you know, if you just Google quotes about failure, right, I mean thousands of them come up and there's so many just wonderful ones. I mean Thomas Edison, right, when inventing the light bulb, I didn't fail however many times I figured out how many times not to make a light bulb right, like just that perspective of I learned through this struggle, I learned through this process of what not to do and what to do, and then it helped guide that course. So, yeah, absolutely. And, like I said, in our culture there's so much value that we can learn from other people's failures and bouncing back from that, so I love it.

Tom Butler:

I think most people. When you hear someone say, man, I'm really disappointed about this, I think that most people have a picture in their mind about what that means or they can relate to that by feeling the same. I'm wondering, as a psychotherapist how do you think about disappointment? Is there kind of a psychological element of that that you would bring out?

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, it all kind of depends on what we are disappointed in, right? Disappointment in its purest form. I mean, you think of a kid at the store and maybe he, you know, maybe like a two-year-old right, and they ask their mom for a piece of candy and their mom will say no, sorry, buddy, we're not going to get candy today. And they are hit with disappointment in its rawest form. And when they are disappointed, how do they respond? How do they react Depends on the kid, but I would, uh, I would bet that, you know, nine times out of 10, that kid might yell, he might throw a temper tantrum, like you know, roll on the ground and just really freak out. Maybe I'm just, you know, thinking of my own kids and their reactions to things, but but when they? But the reason why they do that is because that disappointment is everything to them, that candy is everything to them. It's the world to them They've, that's all that they see. They don't really see long-term of. You know, okay, I'm not going to get candy today, but I might get some tomorrow, I might get some next time we come. You know, but I might get some tomorrow, I might get some next time we come. You know they have that as we kind of grow our, our brains develop the ability to see a little bit more long-term, so we can keep that disappointment in perspective. And so when we feel that disappointment it's okay and in fact it actually we can use it as a, as a teaching moment of why am I disappointed right now? What is it about this that is so valuable to me or that's so important to me? You know, as a kid it's that candy. As an adult it's a job or it's a relationship, and so that disappointment it's a signal, it's teaching us something about what our values are and what we really appreciate and what we really want. So yeah, again, that disappointment it's a real thing.

Zach Goulding:

And in some people that disappointment it might come out as anger, right. It might come out as yelling or lashing out, and other people might come out as anxiety. You know, they just feel really worried about something or pacing around. And other people might come out as depression, just really sad and like kind of emotional and just really hits them. But it's raw and it's real and we're all human and we all experience disappointment on some level or another. And you know, if we don't, then we're not really living right, like it's okay to be disappointed about stuff and it's okay to recognize that and monitor our responses to that disappointment Because, yeah, we experience it, like I said, even at an early age, through our whole life. And just recognizing our responses to that disappointment.

Tom Butler:

There is obviously different levels of disappointment. There is obviously different levels of disappointment. I mean I've gone into you know an ice cream shop and been disappointed that they were all out of. You know mocha almond, you know fudge ice cream, you know, and that's a. That's a level of disappointment, but you know pretty easily finding another flavor to eat. So that disappointment's you know kind of short-lived. And then there's other disappointment that's just deep, you know, and it seems like that deep disappointment is related to grief. Would you say that's true?

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, absolutely. And grief is so complicated with what we experience. You know, we've all heard like the state ages of grief, right, you know there's denial, like, hey, this isn't happening. There's an anger about it. Right, we get angry. There's bargaining, we try to like, oh, you know, if only this can happen, then then maybe this might happen. Um, and there's, you know, that depression or like sadness that sits in with it as well, and then you know, finally there's the acceptance, right, so like that, those are kind of like the main things that kind of make up grief.

Zach Goulding:

And you know, some people say, oh, I'm in a grieving process. You know, of course, if we've lost a loved one or something really traumatic has happened in our life and it just doesn't go in steps, it's, it can be, you know, go in a cycle. We can feel one thing one day, we can feel another thing another day and can kind of bounce around, and that grief can hit us in different moments. And so, absolutely, disappointment is definitely connected with that grieving process and that grieving cycle. And so many times I work with a lot of people that have experienced a lot of trauma. Specifically, I work a lot with people that have been in some kind of car crash right, where they have some kind of trauma and they experience this disappointment of like, oh, I'm injured, I'm not able to do what I once did, or I'm not able to get in my car and drive like I once did. I'm so disappointed, I'm so mad, I'm so sad, I'm so, like, just angry about everything.

Zach Goulding:

And so when that, as that process, happens and it's you know, they kind of discuss it, that acceptance. It's a hard thing, but it's kind of interesting when that acceptance happens, that's when change can happen, right, and it doesn't mean that, you know, those other emotions aren't going to come or go, but that's really when that's like, okay, I'm accepting that I'm disappointed. Now, what am I going to do about it? Now, what's the next thing? Again, am I going to sit in it, or can this help motivate me for whatever else is that I want to try to accomplish, or whatever goals I want to set in my life?

Tom Butler:

This failure seemed like a really big deal to me. It's because I put over a year of planning into the trip. You know, like layer and layer and layer of planning and sharing with everybody. But then I also think about an Olympic athlete that trains a lifetime and then like misses the Olympic team and then like misses the Olympic team. And so you know, when I think about it in that perspective, it doesn't seem like such a long term goal or such a big goal. But it's also, I think, important for people to be able to be acknowledged for the disappointment they feel, if that makes sense what I'm saying and not just to say to someone oh look, that's no big deal, you shouldn't be disappointed about that. It's not like you're an Olympic athlete that's been training your whole life. So it seems like in some ways there's a concept of being okay with being disappointed.

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, I love the way you phrase that. There's definitely perspectives of disappointment and levels to it. And so, yes, for that Olympic athlete that they've been training their whole entire life, like you said, and that is their life. But this has been your life, tom right, the whole last year that you've been training for this, this has been everything. This is your candy bar at the store that you're asking your mother for. This is everything that you wanted, right, and that's that's a real aspect of it. And so being able to validate that for ourselves and and if we see that in other people, you know, validating and listening to and this was a big deal, right, this, this was a hard thing and using that again, that awareness and that validation as acceptance and as a moment of of growth and a moment of this is how I'm feeling and, like you said, being okay with being disappointed. You know there's there's so much value of learning.

Zach Goulding:

We call it distress, tolerance. You know, within the therapeutic world of just being able to sit with something that's uncomfortable and be able to sit with it, and sometimes we have to just hey, welcome on in disappointment, have a seat. You're riding with me today. You know we're, we're here, we're along for the ride. Uh, it doesn't mean I am disappointed, it's just you're here with me and and I I need to kind of tolerate you for today. Um, and so when we sit with that distress, it teaches us that skill. And again, where that distress and that growth, that's when that really can happen and really teach our mind and emotions those beautiful lessons that can be learned in those situations.

Tom Butler:

So one thing that I do struggle with. I do sometimes, maybe in a way, set with disappointment too much, you know. So maybe there's like a healthy way of setting with disappointment, because I often ruminate on failures. I don't know if that's really a clinical term, but can you talk about the impact of continually replaying negative events in your mind?

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, rumination, absolutely. It's a clinical term. We use that a lot when you ruminate on a thought. Generally it means there's a negative thought that's happening and you're just kind of stuck in the cycle. This rumination is just going over and over and over again. There can be a value in ruminating just for a time where you pull out some of that value. But there's also a term that a lot of people that I talk with they use this term and it's come up so many times. They call it a downward spiral, this spiral that they just feel like this thought leads to this, one leads to this one, and you just start going down this loop and this cycle and so at that point, absolutely Like that's not beneficial.

Zach Goulding:

So it's good to recognize hey, where am I at?

Zach Goulding:

What in our brain is we have different neurological networks going on and in one network a lot of similar things are happening.

Zach Goulding:

And so when we start to recognize, hey, I'm kind of ruminating on some negative thoughts, I don't really want to hang out in this network for for too much longer. I kind of want to, okay, how do I bridge this gap? And I kind of phrase it also like if you're, if you're on a highway if you're going to different, you know areas on a map or different neighborhoods, you know like, ah, this, this one doesn't really feel too well, I kind of want to get over to this other area. Well, how am I going to do that, that bridge or that path? It starts with, again, the recognition and then thinking, a positive cognition, a positive thought of addressing it and saying, hey, I'm disappointed and I'm okay, I'm disappointed and I'm okay, you know, I'm disappointed and I've learned from this. And so then that can kind of hopefully again fork off the road and kind of go over to this other area, this other uh neurological network in your brain, where, instead of it becomes a downward spiral, it becomes a, uh, a growth aspect.

Zach Goulding:

A moment of of learning and and um, within just that thought process. So, rumination, it's, it's completely normal, that happens all the time, absolutely, but it's, it can definitely lead to very hard, and I don't want to say negative, but I mean just just a negative overall experience of just kind of feeling really down on yourself and so, um, a lot of times also it leads to a sense of shame. You know, we, we attach, I didn't accomplish this thing, I'm a failure. I'm a failure. So then this must happen, so then the this must be true, and that's for that downward spiral, because it happened, but catching yourself in that moment and separating your, your thoughts for just a half of a second and just again bridging that gap and going over to a new network and kind of like changing the channel or, you know, flipping on the TV or doing something different, where you are actually creating that space to go to a new area, a new positive type of thinking. So yeah, that rumination, we get caught in it. It's very normal, it's very natural.

Zach Goulding:

Just try not to hang out there too long Bridge, that gap, find another area and when we start to experience that shame, test that out and just say you know what I'm disappointed in this aspect. That doesn't mean all these other what I'm disappointed in this aspect, that doesn't mean all these other things. I'm disappointed, but I'm strong. I was able to work through this and having other kind of affirmation, mantra, type of statements, positive quotes, whatever it is that can help pull us out of that cycle, into a new direction, into a new direction.

Tom Butler:

And I'm just going to say that I'm sure you agree with this that if someone finds themselves stuck there, you know and part of it could be that a disappointment is built on other disappointments or self-concepts that someone has in, that rumination is really not just that moment but kind of a culmination of a lot of moments in life, and it seems like that's a perfect opportunity to reach out to a psychotherapist and say man, I am just not getting over this, and to have a conversation about some strategies and also maybe get into. You know, what is this built on? Is there some past traumas? There's some past things going on that that need to be uncovered?

Zach Goulding:

A hundred percent. I totally agree with you, and one of the things that a lot of people talk about when they experience some kind of disappointment or traumatic event, like recently, a term that they'll say is it kind of unlocked, all these other things that I thought I, you know, I'm good with, but all of a sudden they're coming back up and that's normal and that's okay and that's absolutely to have a third party or have someone else to just really talk with these things through. And then you know you don't have to worry about how is this going to go back to my boss, is this going to go back to, you know, my family member, but just really put words to some of those thoughts. And when you do that, there's an element of healing that can happen. And you know, you know whether you journal about it, where you talk about it, whether you, you know, just again, create that space for those to be, you know, in a sense, kind of aired out and just kind of work through Absolutely, it's uh, it's really cool, it's a really awesome way to see it, and so you know, I've talked about this before on your show, that's that's one thing that I do a lot with my clients is sometimes I'll go on a walk or a bike ride with them, because there's this top down approach, like where we try to think it through in our mind, but there's also a bottom up approach where we, where we need to move our body, as we're kind of processing these things, and as we do that, that energy can be released and it can be kind of like in a physical sense we work through that and so, like yoga, with distress tolerance, you learn to sit with those things and you learn to just hold it, you learn to breathe.

Zach Goulding:

Cycling is the same way. So many people that cycle. They talk to me about that Like a benefit that helps them just kind of process their mind and work through some of that stuff. So, um, yeah, it's a, it's a fascinating aspect of it, but letting our body from that bottom upper coach heal as well is super important.

Tom Butler:

When it became evident that I wouldn't continue to ride, my wife Kelly and I decided to continue the trip. She had the whole week off and we had places reserved to stay in and everything, and you know, just enjoy some time together and see a part of the state of Washington that we've never seen before but I can be grumpy never seen before, but I can be grumpy and I knew that I had to like park that disappointment.

Tom Butler:

You know that it's like, okay, the disappointment is going to be there after the trip, but I need to kind of park it so that I'm just not a miserable traveling partner, you know, the whole time and and just be emotional about it. So we came out of the hotel room and the last thing I did was low load my bike up on the bike rack and so I took a moment at that time and just, you know, said, okay, I'm going to, I'm going to let this go and I'm getting emotional talking about it right now. Yeah, um, you know I got emotional then. I mean, I mean I cried. You know, being emotional about it is a pretty safe way to say it, but I like cried at that time, which I think is a little bit of a funny picture. If somebody was in that parking lot and seen this man crying as he puts his bike on the bike rack, they might not have understand what was going on, you know, but I I really felt it.

Zach Goulding:

So I'm wondering if you have some thoughts on a on a moment like that tom, thank you for sharing honestly uh, to open up about that and put yourself in that position, right, vulnerable, and just discussing that, um, that's, it's hard and it's heavy, and that that shows. That shows that how much this meant to you, right? I mean, you've been planning everything. So I'm curious, though when you had that release, when you had that emotion, did it help I love the verbiage you use that park it. You know you park that disappointment Did it help with that process, being able to park it, having that moment of just emotion, and then going on with this trip with your wife?

Tom Butler:

well, that is a great therapist question to ask. I would have to say, you know, but you know it, it did and it wasn't perfect, you know. So there were times, there were a couple things that happened. One was that you know, we'd be going someplace and I would just, you know, it just hit me like, oh man, I, you know, I didn't make this, you know, this would, this was day three, you know, I didn't even make it to day three, you know.

Tom Butler:

So it'd come up and then it I'd be kind of like remind myself, okay, I'm not, I'm parking that, you know, I'm not, I'm not going to get in that. And then there were other times, you know, we're just in beautiful country and it's like, oh man, I wish I was enjoying this riding a bike. And that was a little different energy, you know, than the disappointment. It was a, you know, it was a thing of appreciating, like how great it would have been to experience this environment on a, on a pace of a bike. But it wasn't the same kind of, you know, like gut, you know, punch kind of thing.

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, yeah.

Zach Goulding:

And again, great awareness on your end of, like, recognizing how disappointment affects you and affects could potentially affect your relationship, right, because sometimes, uh, yeah, people myself included when we get disappointed and that grumpiness can just take over, right, and all of a sudden it's that's who we are for the next week or two weeks, and you know that doesn't really help anybody in their relationship, right.

Zach Goulding:

So, but it's again a healing process the awareness, recognizing it, parking it and just saying I will, I will deal with this grief or this disappointment, um, now, but I will also deal with it later, like I don't need to let it just take over, and yeah. So there's a concept as well that you know where we this idea of you put something in a container, right, so, or or park it, right. I love this like kind of bike analogy, where I'm just going to park my bike over here, you know, and I think of sometimes I get a flat tire or something and I just get so frustrated by this, right, and I'm like, ah, I just got to leave it, I just got to leave it right there. I'm going to deal with that later when I come home or another, another day or another time or some kind of repair. But that that um ideology of just hey, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna park it.

Zach Goulding:

I'm just gonna let that sit and we'll, we'll. We'll come back to that when I am in a better head space, feeling a little bit more stable, um, but yeah, just being able to that awareness and being able to just say you know what, uh, I don't have to just sit in the hotel room or I don't have to just sit in a car and be miserable, but and of course you're going to have those thoughts of, and this would be so much better by bike, but hey, at least I'm here. Right, and that's another skill or another strategy that we can use is that phrase at least you know, at least you know and the sounds kind of silly, but you know, thinking possible worst case scenarios. Right, at least I'm alive.

Zach Goulding:

Right, at least I'm still moving, at least I have the ability to be out here, at least I have this car that I can ride At least I have this nature right Helps us appreciate that gratitude and that grateful and that's another form of again bridging that gap, of going to a new neurological network is the gratitude and just the mindfulness and just being in those moments.

Tom Butler:

It's interesting, as you're talking, like there's thoughts that are coming up in my head and one of those is that I I almost felt guilty, you know, like I had. You know again, I transitioned out of okay, I'm not, I'm not doing this trip the way that I had hoped to do this trip. That I, you know that I had in my mind visioned this trip being like I'm in a car with my wife at, which was super enjoyable, you know, we one thing on the bike, I wasn't pulling off on lookouts and stuff, I was kind of focused on going. But my wife and I in the car, we had the time to pull off and you know, just see some really cool, beautiful nature. And there was, I think there's an element of almost guilt there. It's like I should be miserable right now.

Tom Butler:

I just majorly failed, that I should be miserable. I shouldn't, I shouldn't be happy. You know I don't think that ever really got in the way. But but as I think about there is that sometimes there's that thing of man I'm really enjoying myself and and that's wrong because I just blew it- no, I, uh, I hear you.

Zach Goulding:

Sometimes I mean this sounds great. I sold my car not too long ago, tom, I never drive my car, I never drove it, and so I was like I'm getting rid of this thing because I'm not paying more insurance on this thing. I bike everywhere. We still have another car, we're just a one car family now. But every time I sit in this car I'm always thinking I should be on my bike right now.

Zach Goulding:

But instead of just like, no, I'm here, I'm in the moment and let's just appreciate this moment for what it is Right. The grass is always greenest wherever you water it. You know, if we're thinking about you know another aspect of this. This would be so much better. I should be pushing myself in this way or that way. I'll just be content, be happy, be in a situation where you can just be, be and be at peace. You know, in those moments and so that is a uh, uh, an ever ending loop for sure in our minds that we want to push ourselves and we want to have this progress. But it's okay. It's okay to relax every once in a while too. It's okay to just appreciate and, uh, just kind of be there as well.

Tom Butler:

Yeah, you know, and again, I, I, you know looking back at it, it was really a healthy thing for me to do is to is to have positive experiences. You know, part of what made it so hard you know, still makes it so hard is that I feel, in a way, I let a whole community down. I talked about this almost weekly on the podcast for you know, a year and I, you know, I really had a desire to demonstrate that someone in their 60s could do something this hard, you know, and I felt really like that's an important message. You know that you can do hard things like this later on in life. And then I feel like I did just the opposite. It's like I showed, like how bad you crashed when you're in your sixties, you know, and how how bad you can fail in your sixties. So there's that, you know that again, that part of letting others down by by the example that I showed. And so I'm wondering if you can talk a little bit about a healthy way to look at disappointing others.

Zach Goulding:

Here's another therapy question for you, tom. Have any of your listeners or followers messaged you or called you and said I'm so disappointed that you didn't accomplish this?

Tom Butler:

No, all those disappointed people are no longer talking to me. No, I, you know, I. I think the answer to the I mean the answer to that is no, and I think there are very few people that you know are sitting back and going, wow, what a disappointment he is that you know are sitting back and going, wow, what a disappointment he is. I, uh, you know, I, I put out there in the world, you know, on Instagram hey, I'm dipping my tire in the water in Washington and, uh, nick, stop Idaho. You know, and so you know, there might be somebody out there that said, wow, that really flamed out fast, it's possible. But, yeah, they're not sharing that with me and I think that that would really be, you know, intellectually, I know that that would be a minority of people and it's actually just the opposite, you know.

Zach Goulding:

So, yeah, yeah, and again, our harshest critics are ourself. Right, and it's okay to recognize that and to just be like oh man, and sometimes we can kind of project that like oh, or think that you know, all these people are so disappointed in me and, like you said, there's probably the opposite. I would think that they're, know, just kind of like empathetic towards you. Right Of like, oh man, tom had this goal, I'm so bummed for him. Right Like, I'm bummed because he's bummed, like because that would, that would have been so cool for him.

Zach Goulding:

But yeah, that when we disappoint others, or when we feel like we disappoint others, again, like kind of fact-checking, what it is that we did, it was a disappointment. You know like, you know the parent analogy as well, right, like, ah, I'm just disappointed in you. Right, like kind of the guilt trip of like, hey, you didn't do what you were supposed to do. You know that rarely happens anymore now that you're an adult. Right Like, no one is ever going to really say, ah, I'm just really disappointed that you didn't get this done. So it's almost like this. It's programmed in a way. But again, disappointment, it's a signal, it teaches us something about stuff and if we feel like other people are disappointed in us. That's a signal that tells us something like people care about us, people are following us, people appreciate what we're doing and my goals, and so, yeah, it's again, it can tell us something a little bit more about our environment or our community, or ourselves as well.

Tom Butler:

I'm hoping that it illustrates something else you know. Again, I wanted to illustrate. At 59, I started getting on a bike and it was two. I was able to ride across Washington to 25,000 feet of elevation gain. I wasn't able to do that. I ended up doing somewhere around 7,000 feet of elevation gain in two days, most of it in the second day, which you know actually was good for me, but I hurt for most of the second day basically the whole second day.

Tom Butler:

it really hurt and I was really pushing through pain and I, you know, I felt like it was possible that I was going to do some damage that would set me off the bike for a long time. So next weekend I'm going on a backpacking trip. Which is actually a very strong message for me and might be a strong message for other people is that, you know, despite you know, right now I'm sore, you know, and I've I've been sore for the last four days, but I'm healing, you know. So the, you know even at you know 61, you know, and having done something that did hurt me, I can still heal from it. And so I might find out that in a couple days, when I throw a backpack on and kind of see how it feels and do a little bit of test of my knee, that it's not going to be healed in a week.

Zach Goulding:

But I feel really comfortable that I will be back on the bike again, that if I push myself a little bit too far, then I can heal, and I think that's a good message too yeah, knowing your limits right and knowing also I mean what it would the potential consequences of, if I push this, this is actually going to impact other areas of my life, that it's going to cause more damage, right, and so having that wisdom of knowing where's the line here, you know where. How do I want to cross this? Do I want to push it or do I actually want to enjoy, you know, this backpacking trip, going into other things? And, yeah, that that lesson of of just healing, you know we we live in a world where we just want things right away, instant. We don't really want to sit and and heal Um time.

Zach Goulding:

Time heals everything and with that time, you know, healing our body, healing our emotion, healing the trauma, healing our mental state, Like it just helps. We have to sit with it and we have to let it heal. And so great awareness on your end, though, Tom. I mean, and holy smokes, 25,000 feet, how many people are? Even how many people do that anyways? Is that a common ride?

Tom Butler:

Well, I tell you, it seemed like I was constantly meeting people that did it, and so that was. You know, that was one of the things where I'm like okay, I think I can handle this. You know, now, another part of it that's that's really hard about this situation is that I feel like I did something that, when I look back at it, was really stupid, you know. So I, you know, again, I knew it was going to be a challenge. Again, I knew it was going to be a challenge and so I wanted to.

Tom Butler:

I chose a routine in the last two weeks, thinking that it would put me in a better place, but I think it might have actually caused the failure. Instead, I probably should have stuck with like a familiar routine rather than trying something new, which seems really obvious right now. And so you know, there's this thing of you know there's a difference between a failure that's caused by something out of your control. You know, at one point there were wildfires and the wildfires if they would, if the weather would have been right, the wildfires might have shut this down. That would have been something totally out of my control. That's very different than dealing with the disappointment of something that I look back and go. Well, you did that to yourself, dummy, you know you should have known better. So you know kind of that difference in disappointment between like something I did and something out of my control. That seems like a significant factor.

Zach Goulding:

It can be absolutely. But I would also say too, our body has limits as well that we can't really control. And so, again, listening to your body in that situation and then controlling it from there, but I hear you, yeah, Like we think, oh, if I would have you know, and you always look back on stuff you always think of, oh, I should have done this, I should have done that, why did I do this? Um, and again, that it's a moment of learning from it, Absolutely, but with, uh, as you're approaching things and recognizing it, I just also want to say too that you know you were meeting so many people that had done this ride and given you this like, oh well, I can do this too.

Zach Goulding:

But I mean, again, that was your world, that was your perspective, right, when, ideally, I mean, how many people have really done it? Like such a small percentage, right. But in our minds we think, oh my gosh, we have this expectation. And then we just think, yeah, if you have a fire would have shut it down, you would have had a totally different disappointment, right, you still would have been disappointed, but it would have been a different form of disappointment. And so, again, just that recognition of okay. What is this teaching me about myself? What is the message that I'm receiving?

Zach Goulding:

And am I open to it and how will I adjust and change as I move forward?

Tom Butler:

I mean to be real. I don't think I would have learned as much about where I am physically if fire would have shut it down it would have shut it down before I summited the peak that I summited, and you know.

Tom Butler:

So I learned just a lot more about where I am physically, how do I challenge myself in the future and everything you know, by pushing to this point of physical failure for myself and you know, and that's a complicated thing, but yeah, you know, it's a factor there that you know that I can hang on to and actually it makes me think of a concept of growth mindset. I mean, you're talking a lot here about discovery and at a time of disappointment and learning things and you're hanging on to lessons, and you know, is growth mindset something?

Zach Goulding:

that you have become familiar with in your work. Absolutely, I love growth mindset something that you have become familiar with in your work as opportunities to grow from, versus failures. We can label ourselves on those things as well, right? I mean back to your other question. Sometimes we put this label on ourselves of, ah, I'm so stupid, like why did I do that. But in the growth mindset we just say okay, and just how you phrased it. I learned from this experience. I learned how much I can push myself.

Zach Goulding:

One aspect of a growth mindset that I love so much is it's called the power of yet Um, where, you know, we might say I'm not going to climb this mountain on my bike yet. Right, that that word, just yet it. It gives us a little bit of like, hey, I still might be able to do this, versus just completely shutting it down. We got to know our limits, we got to know our expectations, we got to adjust to those things. But a lot of times again, I'm working with people and they just say there's no way I can approach this, there's no way I can get this job, or there's no way I can be happy, but instead just shifting that just a little bit and just saying I'm not happy yet I don't have this job yet, opening that door of that hope and that idea of I can still attain this, I can still work for it, as long as you know realistic and but again, knowing those limits, knowing those expectations. But yes, I love the growth mindset model. It's powerful, it's a really powerful mindset.

Tom Butler:

I am curious about mindfulness and meditation practices to help individuals manage the emotional turmoil associated with disappointment. I mean, there's obviously you know ways again to get in, that you know that rumination and getting deeper, deeper into the disappointment and making it huge.

Zach Goulding:

And when you think of like preventing that or interrupting that or whatever. Do you see mindfulness and meditation practices as something that can help Absolutely, absolutely. Mindfulness, meditation, just being present in the moment, being able to recognize how you're feeling, and one of the best ways out of something is going through it. You have to feel your way through it, kind of like we're talking about with that distress tolerance and just sitting with it through it. You have to feel your way through it, kind of like we're talking about with that distress tolerance and just sitting with it. But there's also some awesome guided meditations that you can access, like self-compassion type of meditations where you're sitting and you're breathing and you're recognizing, you're just saying, um, I have gone through a hard thing, like I've been through some stress, and you know validating that for yourself and and you know, kind of either through breath or through tapping, whatever it might be of just really helping ground yourself and recognizing that I can heal from this, I can move forward from this and I can have strength in this aspect too, being able to pause and just sit with some of those emotions. Again, that acceptance gives us that strength to move forward. So, and you know again, being on a bike, being outside. Those are some of the best forms of meditation, best forms of mindfulness, but also sometimes just sitting, and you know, we want to be as efficient or as productive as we possibly can.

Zach Goulding:

I'm as guilty as this as anybody listening to as many podcasts as I can, listen to as many books every spare second of the day I'm trying to consume. Consume versus just sitting and just letting our thoughts come and go and just recognizing them for what they are. There's no good, there's no bad thoughts. They're just coming and they're going, just like clouds in the sky, and we just sit with that and it's a very Zen, like, um, you know, mindfulness approach and just recognizing where we're at. And so I would definitely encourage that, um for anybody to just take five, 10 minutes and just sit and just let your thoughts kind of go in and out and just recognize them. Don't listen to anything, don't text anybody, don't write anything down, just sit and be and just breathe. I love it.

Tom Butler:

We talked about the community a little bit and there's kind of this weird thing. There were some really just wonderful comments like really empathetic and understanding comments wonderful comments, like really empathetic and understanding comments. And there were a couple of comments like someone said hey, you know, don't let it get you down, something like that, you're still a bad-ass for what you did in the two days, you know and that, and that feels good, you know. But at the same time there's this weird thing where, like I almost want to put up a shield so that that positivity doesn't get to me Almost like I want to sit in the disappointment, like it's valuable to feel the pain or something. It seems really weird. But do you kind of know what I'm talking about?

Zach Goulding:

Absolutely. And sometimes people and maybe you fall into this category too Someone gives you a compliment, you always are not you, but you know, we, we generally will say, oh well, it's this, you know, it's because of this or it's because of this. We try to explain it versus just saying two simple words Thank you, you know, oh, I'm so impressed you did this thing. Like you, you have such a great ability to do this and instead of saying, oh well, it's because of this, it's because that, you say thank you, just accepting that, you know, and there's such a power of just being able to again accept their compliment and and then it reiterates back to them that you really are appreciative of that. You're not discounting that, and you're just saying thank you, I appreciate you noticing Right, and then it can just open up that connection, that relationship as well.

Zach Goulding:

But it's a hard thing. Absolutely, we want to, like you said, we want to shield it off. We don't want to, you know, let any of that positivity in, because then that positivity might creep back. And you know, I know I want to sit with his disappointment alone. I want to be a little bit miserable right now. I'm not, I'm not going to get over this, but, you know, allowing yourself that space and that time whenever you're ready, um and and recognizing that, hey, I do have some support here and I appreciate it like thank you guys yeah, it was really.

Tom Butler:

I was really thankful it was really fun and really talked about or really illustrated the uh, the cycling over 60 community, that that's growing and and just how cool people are. Uh, you know, I've said it before, I'm kind of partial to cyclists. It just seems like cyclists have a higher average of coolness than the general population. That's. It's probably not that uh, right thing to say, but but I, you know, I believe it.

Zach Goulding:

So and that's, yeah, what you're doing, tom, like you've kind of built that community right. You've you've connected it and you've inspired a lot of people. So that's that's amazing. That's awesome. And yeah, to speak to that point, the other day I was riding my mountain bike and I came up on this, uh, on this peak area and I'm just on this lookout and I'm just hanging out there and then these two older gentlemen came ripping through on their mountain bikes and and we just, yeah, I didn't know them, they didn't know me, but we just have the coolest conversation for you know, 10, 15 minutes talking about routes and everything. And I'm like that's what man, 30, 40 years from now, like heck, yeah, that's my goal, like to be you guys like so cool, absolutely. So I love love, I love the cycling community. It's amazing that's awesome.

Tom Butler:

That's awesome, zach. This has been like such a great conversation. I really appreciate you taking the time to do this. It was short notice and for you to clear things so that you could do this and and I think it's really helpful to get your perspective I'm wondering if you would kind of summarize this conversation about pushing yourself to the point of being disappointed and kind of dealing with that. How would you summarize those topics?

Zach Goulding:

I say this a lot in different podcasts that I do or different podcasts that I've been on. I like to just tell people like be open, be open to whatever it is that you are learning. Be open to whatever it is that hits you in that moment, in whatever aspect you know. Don't let someone dictate what you're going to do or this or that, but just be open to what you're feeling and be open to whatever idea that you might have in that situation. Now, with that said, with this appointment specifically, be cautious of labeling ourselves, being cautious of shaming ourselves, but just approaching it in a way of you know what I set out to do this thing and I didn't get. I didn't complete it, but these are the things that I learned from it.

Zach Goulding:

And these are the things that I can grow from it and you know this whole process and so you know, honestly, tom, I appreciate you know you talking about this, cause it'd be really easy to probably cross your mind right To like I don't want to talk about this at all, I don't. You know, I'm just going to pretend this didn't happen, I'm just going to shy away from this and not worry about it. But you know, I appreciate the questions that you sent to me. I am willing to bet that, as you were typing those out, that was almost a therapeutic lesson for you to just kind of release some of that and just kind of put it on paper and just to discuss it. So again, kudos to you for being able to talk about it.

Tom Butler:

That's extremely insightful. I'm sitting at this table. There's this wonderful resort Anybody, if you're looking to travel in north central Washington state, there's Wanukut Lake state, there's Wanakut Lake and we were in a cabin kind of overlooking Wanakut Lake. I'm sitting at a laptop typing out the questions and you know like very insightful it was. I was processing my thoughts about it as I was doing that and it was a healing thing. Do you have anything you want to highlight coming up, or something that you've recently done with your podcast?

Zach Goulding:

I'm just trying to stay afloat with my podcast. Man, I admire you with the diligence and the episodes you put out you have some awesome stuff, tom but I'm just trying to stay consistent with it as much as I can. I started last time I talked with you. I started my own solo practice and I've been up and running with that and it's, it's awesome and I've loved it, and I incorporate biking as much as I can, writing with some of my clients and discussing things. I do a lot of telehealth and so, as I'm talking with some of my clients, I'm super proud to say a couple of my uh, adult male clients have been commuting bike, commuting to work. You know just from some of our conversations and how much it's helped them with some. You know just their mindset and just their approaches to things. And you know there's a few teenage boys that I'll go on rides with. We have an awesome protected path, a separated paths, where we were able to ride and just have conversations. It's, it's amazing. And so, building on my practice, I'm definitely continuing that, but I I definitely with the podcast it's.

Zach Goulding:

I have some really cool guests coming on that I've just interviewed. I'm going to be dropping those soon. It's been a lot of fun. It's been a lot of awesome opportunity to connect with so many people and I think last time I talked with you I I was saying how we were going to go to New York and do a ride out there and we did that the Five Borough tour. That was amazing and I connected with a few people that I had on my podcast out there. So that's my motivation is, you know, through the wonderful world of the internet and the podcast world, you know you're able to make awesome connections with people and just still keep tabs on them. So that's been really fun, it's been really cool and I'm excited to continue on that journey.

Tom Butler:

I saw some fun images from the trip to New York, so that was really cool to see on Instagram.

Zach Goulding:

Yeah, it was a blast. The bike lanes out there, the bike paths, oh my goodness. It was the trip of a lifetime. I'm definitely planning on going back out there. Just to experience a city like New York from a bicycle was just amazing. It was so much fun.

Tom Butler:

Again, Zach, thank you so much for joining me and spending some time looking at this. I think your expert opinion is really helpful and I look forward to talking again sometime later.

Zach Goulding:

Absolutely yes. Thank you, Tom.

Tom Butler:

Yep, bye now. Since I first encountered the growth mindset concept as a parent, I have been focused on how I can have this kind of mindset, and that is what I am working on now, as I am still trying to put the disappointment behind me and look to future challenges. It really meant the world to me to get the encouraging messages from those of you who reached out after I posted that I would be stopping the ride. I really love the community that is growing with the Cycling Over 60 Strava Club. I will be back next week with more plans for the podcast and for the community. I hope that you are making the choice to challenge yourself, despite the fact that, like me, you might experience some disappointments along the way. And remember, age is just a gear change.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Tom Butler

Host