Greg’s Unparalyzed Story

Greg Simony, this name may be familiar to you from seeing it in the headlines. He’s been all over the country helping people with different abilities complete races and triathlons! He is a man who doesn’t get a lot of recognition for waking up at 4:00AM to train so that he can help others experience the joy of completing in a race who wouldn't be able to otherwise. According to him, that’s the way he wants it. He doesn’t do this for the recognition.

Greg has had two bouts with addiction to alcohol and weight gain and as we were talking you could hear the real and rawness within his voice. He said he gets accolades for what he does but he’s not a hero. He’s just like everyone else. There’s something that makes him a hero in my book though, his willingness to put in the effort to turn destructive patterns into opportunities to grow.

You don’t typically just get up one day, make a decision, and everything is great. The process of becoming unparalyzed is a journey. Some days you take two steps forward, other days you’re dragged three paces back.

“It’s very normal to fall, but it doesn’t become permanent until you quit.” Said Greg.

Greg attributes the power of routine and purpose to not falling back into destructive ways. He chooses to replace negative addictions with positive routines.

Greg shared that most of us have routines whether we know it or not. If a person has become accustomed to drinking every day, that’s a routine.

“I think people are routine oriented, but it’s about finding a positive thing to do with it versus a negative.”

For him, the routine of getting up each day before sunrise to train is a routine that’s working for him. The fact that he gets to help those who some may call disabled (I like to call differently abled) experience something that they may not ever have the chance to without Greg is a bonus for him. It’s his reason to get up and go. (Getting up and go means that he will travel across the country to race with an individual without earning a dime.)

“It’s definitely a win-win!”

The second time he fell back into drinking, he said that he knew that he’d have to shock his system to get back into positive routines. He gave an example of driving an hour out of his way regularly, early in the morning, to attend Master Swimmer‘s classes when he was anything but a master swimmer. He knew that committing to this routine would mean that he couldn’t drink on a regular basis. His body literally couldn’t handle it, so he chose to shock his system in this way.

Greg gives so much credit to the power of trying. He said unfortunately he doesn’t think people give themselves enough credit and they just give up. If you fail but you choose to get back up and put in the effort, that’s not failing! Failing is when you stop.

Watch Greg’s Story: https://youtu.be/AQ4mF3kqjS8?si=Y0IO5TY_Ok3KKKIJ

#Unparalyzed #UnparalyzedMovement