Day 1 —Tired of surviving

Hey, I’m Nathaniel Cole. I’m 25 and have lived in East London my whole life, now it’s getting to me.

My friend Tamika summed up London Living perfectly here, “When you’re tired of London, you’re tired of life. Or bored of getting paid, paying rent, paying bills and being poor again” preach Tamika, preach.

London life has me surviving these days. I wake up, cycle to work everyday and feel like there’s nothing to show for it at times. Now, I’ve done things in my life. I went on a crazy fitness journey a few years ago and lost five stone in one go. I’ve ran six marathons, been a part of an amazing running movement called Run Dem Crew which lead me to start Swim Dem Crew with two friends. I know that I’ve put a hell of a lot of good into the world.

So why is my life feeling so dark?

I’ve struggled for balance. As I’ve grown older I’ve come to terms with having a form of depression. With every up, there’s a down and I manage it in my own way. Hence the five stone weight loss, six marathons, countless half marathons and physical pursuit of a better Nathaniel. Running would keep me in check.

I stopped running regularly last year. I was chasing a 3:30 marathon time, in the build to Copenhagen Marathon, I ran two 1:27 half marathons and then got injured and had to pull out of the Marathon late in March. I still went on to run the London Marathon but that wasn’t my goal. I didn’t want to run after that. Shortly after all of that it was decided that my contract at work wouldn’t be renewed. I started to suffer from (and still have) anxiety attacks as my worries of life would take over before I tried to sleep.

I had a lot of shit to figure out. Like, you know, what to do with my life.

Thanks to everything I’ve done with Swim Dem Crew, I decided to retrain to become a swimming teacher. I did it because I thought it would make me happy to do what I love. As I near my first year of the career change I can say that I was wrong and I accept that. I am happy when I teach, while I’m in the pool with the kids teaching them a new life skill which will hopefully save their lives one day and help them enjoy other aspects of life. There’s just so much other stuff around it that sucks. I’m on a zero hour contract, as I said before, I work everyday. There’s no security and you can’t build a career like that. Surviving month by month, scared to lose a day of work and not be able to pay rent.

Life can’t just be about surviving. I’m not having that.

Today I look forward to a change. I won’t just survive, I will live. London life will not kill me.

P.S This is day 1 of my first 365. Lets see how it goes.