Spiritual enlightenment at the gym??

I have a different kind of story for you today. But first, the facts.... my inner thighs are totally shredded today - can't even walk without pain! So I lifted back today instead of legs and plan to lift legs tomorrow..I better feel better! That's all... (although I enjoyed the cute blonde with pig tail braids, pink shirt and pants with a darker pink skirt over the top... really?)

So I had massage lab today. For those of you who may not know, I'm getting my AA in Massage Therapy, and I give a damn good massage. (insert ego here...) Lab is once a week and today was our second week, so we did introductions. Everything was going well..."Hi, I'm Billy Bob Jim Joe... etc" Until we get to the guy next to me. He is saying how he changed his name to Atrayu (yes, like "Never Ending Story" except this dude is too young to know anything about that) ... I had to ask him why he chose Atrayu as a name change? why not Derrick? or Billy? He says (the short version) that he was given the name by his "Enlightenment Mentor" at a spiritual retreat about 5 years ago (etc, etc.... weird... etc, etc) So this other guy asks him what was his "mode of enlightenment, mushrooms?" (I'm thinking..."Is this conversation really going to go here? I'm from ND for goodness sake!") Not mushrooms... LSD! He continues on about how it really helped him get healed from all his mental woes, and how he found such piece and enlightenment...etc, etc.... freaky... etc, etc. I'm last to go. Thank God I get to change the subject! "Hi I'm Rachelle...." married, kids, body building, done. Then I get the question from my Never Ending Talking friend, "So why did you decide to do that? Are you finding spiritual enlightenment?" I said, "No, I don't find spiritual enlightenment in the gym, I only find sweat, and iron, and physical exhaustion. I do it for the physical and mental challenge." Then my TEACHER says, "I'm sure you find some kind of enlightenment doing that at some level." I say, "No, I'm a Christian and I find my 'enlightenment' through God. At the gym, I just workout."

California is really a beautiful place but it is filled with freaks! (No offense if you are from here...unless you are freak too.. then you can be offended if you want. But I'm sure you won't think you are a freak anyway, cuz you fit right in with all your freak friends.... So it can be safe to know that I am not offending anyone)