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[builtbybeeker-blog]

1st Post!

January 16th, 2017

I want to be clear. This blog isn’t meant for you. Well it is, if you get anything from it. If not, don’t read it. This is the first time I’ve ever “blogged” or put something personal out in the airwaves for other people to consume at will. My close friends and family most likely would call me a private person. I consider myself one. My last two instagrams were two separate posts, a year apart from one another, as a dedication to my fiance on her birthday... if that gives you any idea of my social media presence. Basically put, I don’t do this very well, so if you have a criticism of this, keep that negative energy to yourself, because frankly... I don’t give a shit about your opinion. It won’t change my day-to-day life one bit, so why try to bring me down?  

I find social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, whatever the hell else the kids are using these days) almost completely useless. Apart from connecting with those people who you’ve lost touch with over the years, reading an interesting news article, keeping up-to-date with current events (politics/sports), building your brand or business, or getting injury updates for my fantasy team... what the hell else could you possibly use it for? 

With that being said, I try to stay off social media because of “the feed.” Today social media is used by +1 uppers for +1 uppers. The unwritten rule of social media goes like this: How can I make my life seem way cooler than it actually is?I need to do this so all of my followers will feel jealous about my life, thus in turn making me feel confidence by the number of likes/comments I receive. Listen I’m a millennial, I get how looking cool makes you feel. Good. It makes you feel good. But at what cost? Everything has a filter. Every girl wears make up. Every girl changes the angle. I mean shit, there are photo editing apps now that you can make your waist look skinnier and your ass look bigger. I feel pity for those that use these to make themselves feel better. You have an insecurity issue. 

If I could offer one piece of advice, even if you don’t take it, free yourself from that daily time waster. Imagine for just 30 seconds... if you took even half the time you spend on a daily basis on social media... and redirected that time/energy towards doing something positive for yourself (reading a book, advancing your career, looking for your next step in life, hitting the gym, getting off your ass, doing those things you’ve been putting off forever) how much better off you’d be... rather than knowing that Suzy Fucking B. was just in Turks & Caicos and her boyfriend kinda got fat... like who the fuck cares? Nobody!!

So why am I doing this? Simply put, I’m doing this for me. This tumblr will serve as a daily/weekly (I haven’t decided this just yet) accountability tool for me. I decided that this year was going to be “my year” just as I have said to myself in years past, as I’m sure we all have. The difference is this year, I’m actually going to follow through with a year’s worth of body transformation. You see, I’ve been a hockey player my entire life up until three years ago when my career was cut short... by my inability to make it past the NCAA Division I level. You thought I was going to say a career ending injury, didn’t you? Well, you were wrong. I wasn’t good enough to make the NHL. I convinced myself that if I didn’t secure one of those 600 jobs that millions of players shoot for, that I was a failure. Obviously now I realize that this is a ridiculous standard to set for myself and that I should be happy with the career I had, but at the time... I did. I felt like a complete failure. I’ll share a little bit about my upbringing, so you can see how I would arrive at a conclusion like this. 

Imagine for two minutes if you will, that your father was a legend, a hall of famer, bumped shoulders with the greats, Gretzky, Messier, Jagr.. the list goes on. My old man played 20 years in the NHL, will be in the hall of fame someday, and was given the nickname “the little ball of hate.” He’s the only player in NHL history (still to this day) with over 500 goals and 2,900 penalty minutes. After his career was over he transitioned into scouting and now acts as the Asst Gm and Director of Player Development for an NHL franchise... so I basically what I’m getting at is: he’s kind of a big deal. My dad’s brothers all played professional hockey. One in Europe, One in the minors, and another one played NCAA Division I as well. My cousins play in the Ontario Hockey League with hopes of getting drafted in the next year. This section isn’t meant to make me seem like a braggart, rather to give you an idea of the standards I’ve had to live up to. In fact, I am the oldest and only son of my parents. I have four younger sisters. So all of my father’s hopes and dreams for me to make the NHL and follow in his footsteps was on display with how involved he was in my hockey career. I basically grew up in the rink and gym. When I was 13 years old, I started training as a hockey player with my dad and my uncle Tim, who at the time was playing professional hockey. I started skating as soon as I could walk and my mother was up at 4:45am everyday to take me to practice at 5:45am, because that’s the only time we could schedule practice.

I will spare you most of the details, but my hockey career took me different places. When I was 15, I was playing against 20 year olds and attending one of Detroit’s premiere prep schools, where EVERY single year, there was a kid who scored perfect on the ACT and SAT’s. Most of my classmates are going to be titans of industry, if they’re not already. Yes, I was privileged to be afforded all of these opportunities, but this curriculum in combination with my time in the gym, my time on the ice, and the 1.5 hour commute from High School to a different country (Canada) every single day, it made it kind of tough to get good grades or really be focused on anything but hockey. Between that experience and junior hockey where I lived with a surrogate family in Nebraska, Springfield, IL, Youngstown, OH, and other places, I was busier than most 15-20 year olds. I missed most of my high school dances for hockey etc. 

Why am I telling you all of this? You need to understand the type of pressure I put on myself to be the best player I could and to be in the best shape possible. Once my career was over, I was probably in the best shape of my life, and was like “Oh my God... I don’t have to workout!” I can relax, hang out, drink beer, go to parties, do whatever the hell I wanted to basically. I’ll never forget, when I was in college, we would do year-end fitness testing so that we’d have a baseline for the following fall when we came back to school and training camp. Everyone hated testing. My senior year when the underclassmen and next year’s seniors were doing their testing, some of the other seniors’ and I bought a 30-rack of natty light (classy) a pack of cigarettes and chain smoked drinking beer watching these poor bastards run until they puked, laughing the whole time. Now... I’m not laughing. Why?

I’m 28 years old. I’m 219lbs. I’m probably 20% body fat. I haven’t touched a weight in a year. The thought of going to the gym scares me. Not because I’m unfamiliar with what to do, but I’m dreading getting back into it. I have psoriasis patches that itch like hell on my scalp (probably from leaky gut), and I hate myself when I look in the mirror. My playing weight was between 187-193lbs with 8% body fat. I was in pretty good shape. It’s time for a change. The joke or nightmare is over. 

2016, however, ended on the best note humanly possible. I proposed to my fiance, surprised her with all of our family and friends, and I made a 6 figure salary for the first time in my life, ever. Since I’m getting married (still feels surreal to say), I promised my fiance that on our wedding day, I’d be in the best damn shape of my life and I’d be the best possible version of myself on that day (a theme I’m going to try and stick to over the course of this journey). So, this is an introduction to me, my life, this journey I’m embarking on as a normal human being, with no filters, no fluff, no bullshit, just the journey. So if you follow this journey and I inspire you in some way to go on a journey for yourself, don’t wait, just start. In 2017, I will transform my body into something I will be proud to call my own. After all, you only get one of these. So, cheers to the year, Cheers to this journey I’m starting, Cheers to the body I want. Nobody can stop me. I’ll bend, but never break. This body will be #builtbybeeker. 

- Beeker