Observations From the Spectrum

2020 has been the year of the curveball. For me, it’s been another year to switch gears and reinvent myself and switch tracks.

After ten years succeeding with middle schoolers in the classroom, I wanted a change. However, after a year, I miss teaching others how to use some life tools that I was gifted early. Adaptation, reinvention, positivity and self love.

If you have found yourself in need of a push in the right direction or just a better understanding of what directions are open to you, I would love to help. I can coach you with life, health, sport, nutrition and fitness goals.

Click here to schedule a sessionlemonadecoaching.org

The beginning of my life was lemonade but like many boys, I let I didn’t tend to the fruit and it went to waste.

For all extensive purposes, my life should have been a bit smoother.  It has been a bumpy road thus far.  I used to get frustrated with the constant motion and chattering, but now I just accept it as part of the journey.  After all, the journey is the reward.

Now, I do not think I am a guru or a know it all.  What I know is that for ten years I was a master middle school teacher who the kids revered and a guide and resource for my friends and family.  Somewhere among the bumps in the road I have gathered some wisdom and would like to share.

This may indeed become a self help book someday but for now it will just be a work in progress in which I add topics and add some knowledge based on my life experience.  No need to read it all.  Just read the parts that resonate with your life. 

My favorite teacher Roberta Ford said during my licensure, “If you can use something, great.  Take it.  If you can’t, that’s okay too.”  That’s how I feel about Lemonade Coaching.  A place where you may find some tools of how to turn some of life’s lemons into lemonade or how to view certain situations in a different light.

The theater vs The Sea: When you are doing what you love, the journey is the reward.

My first few years were devoted to Star Wars then lacrosse and moved on to Windsurfing at the beginning of High School which took me south to Aruba and across the country from NY to Hawaii.  I wanted to see just how good I could be.  I was pretty good and then hit a high plateau and realized I wasn’t going to get much better.  I moved on.

Back to NY and the theatre.  My dad ran one on Long Island.  It was like a second home.  I spent the next 8 years working all over the country in the theatre and film stopping for periodic breaks to windsurf, climb and surf.  But my primary focus was the theatre. I lived and breathed it.

Then came cycling in my late twenties and it was my sole purpose and focus in life.  I slept, ate and drank cycling.  My career ended with a few wins, a national championship and some medals.  Then it was into the classroom as a teacher with a renewed interest in surfing going so far to have a wave named after me by the locals in Bali and then trail running which is my current primary focus.

What makes trail running the best is the focus on smelling the roses.  For so many years I was focused on winning, nutrition and the equipment that I neglected to appreciate the beauty around me.  Trail running allows for stopping and smelling the roses which is what I do often to date.  I wish I had learned this lesson earlier and was able to apply it sooner.  

Looking back, I saw but missed experiencing a lot of beauty.  A double rainbow.  Dolphins during races.  A breaching humpback whale next to me.  Countless deer and elk and antelope to share a few.

Now daily, I search out for the little things.  The fox I see scurrying away.  A sprig of sage to carry and enjoy.  Birds flying sometimes stop me in my tracks.  What I have realized is that winning isn’t what’s most important.  What’s most important is enjoying all the ups and downs, right turns and wrong ones that get me to the finish line no matter the place.

Sure it’s nice to podium, win or set a record, but it’s even better to enjoy the view along the way.  My view on coaching is the same.  I will cater your program directly for you no matter if you are looking for high performance or just to have fun, I can accommodate your needs. 

Sometimes life’s lemons sour something sweet and our next step defines us.

I remember this moment very clearly.  I was sitting in Robinson’s Food Court next to Terminal 12 in Bangkok with a friend at the time, Arianne.  I was eating noodle soup, and I was processing what to do in my immediate future.

I saw two roads: jump or run.  Jump meant exactly that, fall either into depression or out the window..  Out the window, splat.  Run meant, knowing that now my time was limited, to live life.  A few months later I was living in Bali, had started a small school and had set a course record in the Philippines for the TransCebu Ultramarathon.  

Not only had I not jumped, I had decided to focus my life on being happy and content with where I am, what I am and who I am.  Life has been much easier, ironically, with a disease than without.  I was forced to either live a life of hate and self-pity or to accept life on life’s terms, which is the path I chose.  Acceptance comes easy once you accept that life is both the ups and the downs and its best to savor both. 

Making lemonade is simple: lemons, water and honey. The best ingredients may be from afar.

The ability to change comes from our core and any person whose life revolves around their core understands just how important it is to be able to sway with the wind instead of snap and fall over from it.  To me, that is the ability to change. 

All athletes, military and manual laborers have developed cores.  It’s why they can adapt and work under multiple conditions, in ever-changing environments, and through whatever is thrown at them.  Those that fail just don’t seem to have the ability to ebb and flow no matter the situation.

I learned this a few times and will be reminded of it a few times more.  But I know this to me a core value of mine that I need to be malleable to what the world throws at me and use whatever the circumstance to better myself.  If you get knocked down, there is only one way to go, and that is up.

On the inside of my arm I have a tattoo:  LaVita Va Come Dovrebbe.  In Italian it means life comes as it will or should.  Once we accept this as a truth or value then life becomes simpler.  I no longer focus for much time on the bad.  Instead I focus on the IS.  It’s an easier path once mastered and I recommend it.

A great place to start is with the physical body if you can.  Activities like yoga, trail running, martial arts, surfing, supping, cycling and dance are all designed to strengthen your core, both the physical and the mental.  By doing this, you will be ready for whatever obstacle or path is put in your future.

Please contact me to make an appointment either through chat or video.

Have a great day. Dylan

• All works at Observations from the Spectrum written by Dylan Netter
• Observationsfromthespectrum.org
• OFTS.blog 
• On? a third point of view – book of Essays
• Marinehippie.com podcast w/ Docstodden.com – dialogue exploring politics and musings of life 
• Horizoncoaching.org – English Tutor and Guide
• beehiveplus1.org