1,220,434,031

That's how many meters were rowed by all of the participants in the Concept 2 Holiday Challenge. 2,327 people rowed at least 200,000m (approximately 124 miles) between Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve. Another 2,749 people rowed between 100,000 and 200,000m, and 281 adaptive or under age 16 rowers completed at least 50,000m. That's a lot of crazy people who raised $26,629.72 for three environmental conservation organizations. Concept 2 is donating that money as part of the challenge.

Personally, I rowed 200,804m. That would be 2008-04, as in I just completed my fourth holiday challenge in 2008. C2 is donating $6.03 on my behalf. I will also receive a commemorative pin. And the opportunity to buy a t-shirt and download a certificate... So why exactly did I sit on my erg (and make my butt sore) for all that time?

Actually I've spent a lot of time thinking about that. Sure, I didn't gain any weight over the holidays. But that's just a fortunate side-effect. I'm in better shape than I was when I started. Another fortunate side-effect. I also annoyed my husband by working out so much through the busy pre-celebration weeks. But that's just an unfortunate side-effect. There's no acclaim, in fact, no one really even notices the accomplishment. So why do it?

I like challenges and I had fun (I think). And I made this one more interesting by requiring that I not get compulsive about it (a major failing of every past C2HC). Every time my life started to get out of balance because I had too much going on, I had to stop and reconsider my priorities. Sure, the C2HC stayed a priority, but I made sure that it was a conscious and positive choice... or I tried to. I forced myself to pay attention to my body and take days off when I was tired. I slowed down to conserve my resources for the rest of my activities of the day. I got a lot of good introspection done because of this particular challenge.

Full disclosure here: after rowing 24 of 28 days of the C2HC I have worked out on only 2 of the 9 days since it ended. I have rowed only once. If I wasn't so good at rationalizing I would say that I did burn out over this challenge. But I realized something important yesterday (this would be the rationalizing), I am not recovering, collapsed even, from excessive rowing, but from the excessive demands I placed on myself during the holiday season.

You can argue that the C2HC was one of those excessive demands, and I would counter that it provided balance and perspective. Fundamentally, I took an already busy life and added an awful lot to it. The rowing just made sure that some of that extra was focused on me and what I think of as fun. Sorry, I just haven't gotten to the place where being responsible for planning, choosing, buying, wrapping, distributing, creating, mailing, doing everything for Christmas is fun. Setting limits on the volume of demands, then placing my fun in there first, made sure I put down some of those other responsibilities. And it stopped me from being even more stressed and overwhelmed. Maybe that's just the endorphins talking...

So maybe I didn't put enough down. Maybe it would be better to set the limits even tighter and place my focus on the love and fun of the season. Maybe this year I'll learn how to rest into life and enjoy all that comes my way with graceful perspective. Maybe this year I'll stop demanding anything of myself and simply give what feels good.