If there's one piece of advice that I keep on getting in everything that I do, it's to not hold back. Put it on the page! Emotion, emotion, emotion! Give it all you've got, and then some.

Yeah, I kind of feel like I'm in the middle of the next Sylvester Stallone movie. Ka-pow!

And it's not just the writing I'm talking about here. It's in all that I'm doing. I mean, sure, I'm eating better and trying to get to the gym on a somewhat regular basis, but am I really "bringing it"?

Probably not.

Am I squeezing the most out of every day?

Not by a long shot. But that little voice inside my head always says things like "don't burn yourself out" or "save something for when you're really gonna need it." Ah, don't you just love it when your bottle of positive energy was put into the recycling bin by mistake?

I doubt that any Olympic athletes ever allowed themselves to even consider holding back. Heck, if they did, they'd be back at home, chugging back a cold one and watching the TV like the rest of us.

And, when I find myself in a holding pattern (usually during awards ceremonies, for some odd reason), I look at this photo for a reminder why holding back doesn't pay:

I'm swept away every time I see it. You can almost hear what the couple is thinking:

SHE: Je t'aime.

HE: Je t'aime you more, ma cherie.

Okay, so my French is not, how you say, fluent. But you get the idea.

Now, just imagine if, right before the shutter clicked, the woman wondered, "Did he pick up the dry cleaning?" or if he thought "Am I double-parked?" How do you think that photo would have turned out?

Probably something like this:

Sure, it's a kiss, but not one that holds such power, joie de vivre or the ability to make a woman wish that was her, just once. Maybe not in Paris, but somewhere.

Okay, back to the revisions...

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