12 Words to Six-Pack Abs and Dethroning Hemingway

I wake up at 7:30am every morning.

Correction. Almost every morning.

I’m not Jesus’ angel fallen from the heavens above.

I don’t piss 9Ph alkaline water or shit thornless roses.

7:30am screams in my ear and jolts my head off my pillow and occasionally I choose to hold my blankets tighter and daydream about the women I’ve had, lost, and have yet to touch.

But, more times than not, I roll over, grab my phone and nearly go blind by its brightness that makes enemies with the sun.

I scroll and swipe my guilt monsters to demonic restlessness.

I watch old clips of my hero, my idol, the man who fills me with more inspiration than an overpriced cup of joe from Starbucks — Kobe Bryant.

I roll out of bed, and I’m on the courts before 8:30am. I dribble, shoot, and run til my legs loathe me and my lungs reach and clasp air to water their burn.

After an hour of cardiac torture, I lift weights for another sixty minutes because pain’s best friend is more pain.

I only eat organic fruits, vegetables, beans, and meats. And, of course, bread — the food that’s as comforting as a nursery rhyme to a newborn baby.

I shower. Then search Google and Youbute a bit, giving my mind and body a deep breath before I do The Work.

From 12–4:30pm I toss words around the internet like a paint splatter muralist.

For the rest of the sun’s being, I watch basketball. But I use this time also to study The Work and hone my craft. I read prose in all shapes and sizes during commercials. From Leo Tolstoy’s 817-page brick, Anna Karenina. To modern poetry from Billy Chapata, Halsey, and Rupi Kaur.

I don’t have to do any of it. I don’t have to wake to the birds singing. I don’t have to lose my leg’s friendship. I don’t have to hammer and mold letters and sentences and paragraphs.

I don’t have a job right now, thanks to COVID. I could wake up at a reasonable time like a normal human. I could lay in bed in a silk shirt and sweats and cover my mustache and goatee in powdered sugar and chocolate while I watch Netflix.

But there’s a reason for the madness.

I need to lose weight. I have wrinkle lines in my stomach from rolls of fat sleeping atop each other. I want my six-pack back. I want to wear a shirt without having to adjust it to hide my tits.

I don’t want to die from cancer. I don’t want to be obese and get diabetes like many of my family members. I want to live longer for my baby nephew and the kids I have yet to create.

But I’d be lying if I said my brain, my mouth, didn’t miss like hell the euphoria of donuts and Reese’s.

I want my words to heal scars and inspire dream chasers. I want to be one of the greatest writers of all time. Kobe targeted Jordan. I have my sights on Hemingway.

Honestly, german philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche said it better than me and in twelve words.

“He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”

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