My job is incredibly demanding—60-80 hours a week during the busy season (about six months) and 40-50 hours the rest of the year. Over the past decade, my health took a serious hit. I was constantly stressed, overweight, depressed, and completely burned out. A year ago, I finally decided I had to make a change—at the very least, I needed to start getting some exercise.
As a kid, I had always enjoyed swimming—not competitively, just for fun. I remembered learning the basic strokes in high school PE, and since high-impact exercises like running weren’t ideal for my weight, swimming seemed like the best option. Plus, working out in water meant I wouldn’t overheat as easily, which had always made exercise miserable for me.
So, I got a gym membership, reserved a lane in the small pool, and gave it a shot. I walked in feeling self-conscious, trying to slip into the water as quickly and discreetly as possible. As you can see from my first workout photo—I barely lasted 30 minutes and had to constantly switch strokes because I was exhausting myself. My 100-yard time? A solid eight minutes. 
But I stuck with it. I squeezed in lane reservations whenever I could between work calls, making sure to swim at least four times a week. Gradually, I increased my distance, bit by bit.
When I finally reached 1,000 yards (a mix of strokes, since I still couldn’t freestyle the whole way without stopping), I treated myself to a waterproof MP3 player—basically a waterproof iPod Shuffle, if anyone remembers those. Listening to music helped me zone out and enjoy the swim, especially since the pool was usually noisy in the afternoons, which was often the only time I could book a lane.
Then, during one random swim, something clicked. A Jimmy Eat World song on my MP3 player was just slightly faster than my usual freestyle pace. I realized that if I timed my strokes to the beats on the 2s and 4s, I could push myself harder. That night, I looked up the song’s BPM, then loaded my MP3 player with music at that tempo. GAME CHANGER. The difference was obvious—just look at the progress between photos two and three. I shaved 30 seconds off my 100-yard time!
It gave me a goal: keep up with the music. I started alternating between swimming eight lengths freestyle and two lengths breaststroke, determined to work my way up to freestyling the entire distance.
And finally, I hit 1,000 yards…
