VIVA LA REVOLUCION!
I haven't posted in a while but that's because I've been waiting for this particular day to come.
As my FB status said today "funny...keep a food journal = lose more weight...who would have thought?!"
I hadn't weighed in for over a month, which was tremendously difficult considering I was used to weighing in every day for over a year. I have to be honest, there was a sense of trepidation stepping on that scale again for the first time in quite a while. I got that little pit in the stomach and all of those negative thoughts started creeping in.
"What if the number went up?" "What if I'm not doing enough?" "I hope I'm not wasting my time!"
Then I thought to myself again...wait a minute...you've been tracking everything in a food journal for a month, you've been CrossFitting 4-5 times a week, and you've been making good choices...that number is going to be lower...and really if it isn't so what...your clothes fit better, you've been in a better mood, etc. If you need to tweaka couple of things so be it.
Big deep breath...then the moment of truth...
I looked down and saw a weight loss of 5 pounds. A little over a pound a week...perfect. That's sustainable loss. Throw that on top of the results I've been getting in the gym and you know what...I'm on top of the damn world.
So here it is again...keep a journal, make good decisions and trust that you're making the right choices every day. Do yourself a favor and focus on those things and weigh in less often...keep your eyes focused on the work and then celebrate the successes when they come!
Keep on truckin!
Monday, February 1, 2010
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Planning your meals
Today was a travel day...quite possibly the most difficult type of day for me to stay on track. There's no workout on the schedule today so the food I put in my body has to be right...no real margin for error.
Traveling used to be the excuse for poor eating. "How can I possibly eat well while I'm on the road?". It's funny how we justify bad behavior to ourselves, it happens so quickly and almost automatically. If you slow down a second you can actually hear the conversation going on between the good and bad angels that reside on each shoulder.
In the past, the "bad" angel was dominating the fight. Recently the 'good' angel has grown a pair of stones and is standing up to that prick.
So...planning your meals, evidently it works. The night before my day trip I put together all of my snacks for the day. 2 apples, an orange and about 1/2 cup of almonds. Put them in my laptop bag as emergency "holy shit, I need food" snacks, which usually hit me between meals.
In addition I also committed the night before to a plan for an early breakfast first thing in the morning and gave myself 2 options for lunch while I was going to be at work so that I had a plan walking into the cafe.
It worked...I came home having achieved that perfect balance of not overeaten and not having felt hungry all day. I was even able to resist the temptation of one of my favorite cheat foods...the Sleeping Lady Cowboy Cookie.
I also returned with one apple and a few almonds to spare...plan your meals...it works! If left to my own devices who knows what would have happened.
SRR
Traveling used to be the excuse for poor eating. "How can I possibly eat well while I'm on the road?". It's funny how we justify bad behavior to ourselves, it happens so quickly and almost automatically. If you slow down a second you can actually hear the conversation going on between the good and bad angels that reside on each shoulder.
In the past, the "bad" angel was dominating the fight. Recently the 'good' angel has grown a pair of stones and is standing up to that prick.
So...planning your meals, evidently it works. The night before my day trip I put together all of my snacks for the day. 2 apples, an orange and about 1/2 cup of almonds. Put them in my laptop bag as emergency "holy shit, I need food" snacks, which usually hit me between meals.
In addition I also committed the night before to a plan for an early breakfast first thing in the morning and gave myself 2 options for lunch while I was going to be at work so that I had a plan walking into the cafe.
It worked...I came home having achieved that perfect balance of not overeaten and not having felt hungry all day. I was even able to resist the temptation of one of my favorite cheat foods...the Sleeping Lady Cowboy Cookie.
I also returned with one apple and a few almonds to spare...plan your meals...it works! If left to my own devices who knows what would have happened.
SRR
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
1/12/2010 WOD: 'Cindy'
"If I only had 48 hours to live...I would invade a neighboring country and impose my ideology on them...even if they didn't want it"
-King Julien (Madagascar II)
That's how I feel today...ready to conquer...after a workout like that how could I feel any different.
'Cindy' 5 pull-ups, 10 pushups, 15 air squats...as many rounds as possible in 20 minutes. It's a CrossFit Staple, and if you push yourself hard a real beatdown.
Today I managed 12 rounds...hell yeah!
To put that in perspective, just a couple of months ago when I did 'Cindy' I posted a 7. I nearly doubled the output! The first time I did the workout was the first day in the gym. I made it through one round of Cindy and puked.
A lot of people that workout don't get the opportunity to see such dramatic improvements from their gym in such a short period. It's not that they aren't working out on a regular basis or pushing themselves hard from time to time. The issue is in the metrics and the consistency of the effort.
The numbers don't lie...you've got to measure it for it to matter. If you're not actively tracking your results you have no real incentive to push harder.
It's not about waving the result in everyone's face, you celebrate the improvement over last time. That's how real progress is measured.
So track your results in a journal or notebook...set a benchmark for next time and celebrate your success!
SRR
-King Julien (Madagascar II)
That's how I feel today...ready to conquer...after a workout like that how could I feel any different.
'Cindy' 5 pull-ups, 10 pushups, 15 air squats...as many rounds as possible in 20 minutes. It's a CrossFit Staple, and if you push yourself hard a real beatdown.
Today I managed 12 rounds...hell yeah!
To put that in perspective, just a couple of months ago when I did 'Cindy' I posted a 7. I nearly doubled the output! The first time I did the workout was the first day in the gym. I made it through one round of Cindy and puked.
A lot of people that workout don't get the opportunity to see such dramatic improvements from their gym in such a short period. It's not that they aren't working out on a regular basis or pushing themselves hard from time to time. The issue is in the metrics and the consistency of the effort.
The numbers don't lie...you've got to measure it for it to matter. If you're not actively tracking your results you have no real incentive to push harder.
It's not about waving the result in everyone's face, you celebrate the improvement over last time. That's how real progress is measured.
So track your results in a journal or notebook...set a benchmark for next time and celebrate your success!
SRR
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Backstory Part II
"2 years is not a plateau...its a you problem"
2 years of frustration
284...that was the number that the scale read, give or take a pound or two for roughly a year and a half. I can't explain to you how frustrating that was. I guess deep down I knew that I needed to increase my activity level and I had tried (half heartedly at best to do so) through a number of avenues. I tried different routines at the gym, bought a mountain bike and embarassed myself.
No matter what I tried nothing stuck...every time it was a case of start, stop and repeat. Frustrating...then something happened...I stopped caring.
This was possibly the worst thing that could have happened at the time. We had our food intake as a family in a good place (at least in regard to maintaining weight)...but I just stopped caring...all together. Sold the Mountain Bike, pretty much wrote off the gym as a waste of time and settled on the fact that this was the way I was and always would be...
In June of '09 we decided to make a huge change. We decided to move our family from Leavenworth back 'home' to Western Washington. In doing this we had to uproot everything, come up with new routines, routes, shopping patterns, etc. It was a stressful/hectic time to say the least.
It happened almost immediately after the move...I started feeling like a huge piece of crap. There was almost no activity...the control we had over our food had lost a bit of focus and I felt the pounds slowly creeping back on...about 1 pound every 2 weeks or so...
Frustration doesn't even begin to describe how I felt...disappointed, angry, unfulfilled.
See, I have a habit of starting things and not finishing them, and I felt I was on a path to the same result here.
Then I had another one of those 'aha' moments like when I originally stood in front of the mirror 2 years earlier.
This wasn't a plateau issue...this was a me problem.
Life's a different ballgame when you take responsibility for your situation, and this was the 2nd time in 2 years I had chosen to address it head on.
What was my next step...let me explain (soon)
SRR
2 years of frustration
284...that was the number that the scale read, give or take a pound or two for roughly a year and a half. I can't explain to you how frustrating that was. I guess deep down I knew that I needed to increase my activity level and I had tried (half heartedly at best to do so) through a number of avenues. I tried different routines at the gym, bought a mountain bike and embarassed myself.
No matter what I tried nothing stuck...every time it was a case of start, stop and repeat. Frustrating...then something happened...I stopped caring.
This was possibly the worst thing that could have happened at the time. We had our food intake as a family in a good place (at least in regard to maintaining weight)...but I just stopped caring...all together. Sold the Mountain Bike, pretty much wrote off the gym as a waste of time and settled on the fact that this was the way I was and always would be...
In June of '09 we decided to make a huge change. We decided to move our family from Leavenworth back 'home' to Western Washington. In doing this we had to uproot everything, come up with new routines, routes, shopping patterns, etc. It was a stressful/hectic time to say the least.
It happened almost immediately after the move...I started feeling like a huge piece of crap. There was almost no activity...the control we had over our food had lost a bit of focus and I felt the pounds slowly creeping back on...about 1 pound every 2 weeks or so...
Frustration doesn't even begin to describe how I felt...disappointed, angry, unfulfilled.
See, I have a habit of starting things and not finishing them, and I felt I was on a path to the same result here.
Then I had another one of those 'aha' moments like when I originally stood in front of the mirror 2 years earlier.
This wasn't a plateau issue...this was a me problem.
Life's a different ballgame when you take responsibility for your situation, and this was the 2nd time in 2 years I had chosen to address it head on.
What was my next step...let me explain (soon)
SRR
Monday, January 4, 2010
Backstory Part I
"What the f**k! That scale has to be wrong"
That's exactly what I thought back in December of 2007...it was 2 days before Christmas and I just by chance jumped on the scale to see where I was at. The scale read 315#. Yes folks, that's right I had sped past the 300 pound threshold.
Needless to say, this prompted about 5 minutes of quiet reflection to figure out where I was going to go from here.
Now, to put this in perspective, I'm 6'5" tall. I'm built large, kind of a wide body. I’ve always carried my weight pretty well. In fact, when I tell people that know me well what I weighed, they can't believe it. This in fact was part of the problem...I carried the weight and pulled it off ok.
But the truth of the matter was, that here I sat, over 300 pounds, carrying the bulk of it in the torso, starting down a path toward Type II Diabetes, Heart Disease, and a whole host of ailments that can be avoided with proper care and attention.
The way I saw it I had two choices...
Option 1: Continue doing what I was doing. Keep going along as though I had never stepped on that scale. Keep tucking in the shirt and tugging at it just so in order to hide or "minimize" the ever expanding waist line and belt overhang. Keep on chalking up the fact that I couldn't shop at a regular department store b/c I'm just built bigger than everyone else and I have "extra thick legs". Continue coming up with excuses for why I didn't want to go Hiking/Biking/Snowboarding anymore...sounded exhausting. Keep feeling bad about being too tired to do things with my 3 year old.
Option 2: Fix it asshole…
Needless to say I went with option 2. Which I knew would require a great deal of change on my part. I knew that it was going to physically suck (at least for a while) and I knew that whatever I had been doing so far to "manage my weight" hadn't been working. Then I heard down the hallway my wife and 3 year old daughter talking (they were actually arguing, which is hysterical to listen to) and I realized that really there was only one option for me.
Gut Check Time.
So, where do you start? I was already standing there in front of a full length mirror in my bedroom in gym shorts and a t-shirt...well...take the shirt off and spend a few minutes accepting reality.
They say that if you're faced with a challenge in business you need to stop and take a couple of minutes to face the cold hard reality of your situation...accept it, and devise the plan of attack. Accepting the areas in which you are weak provides clarity, and a realistic view of your issues. I decided to try it for myself.
Off with the shirt...If you haven't done this in a while, it's not an easy exercise. There I stood, facing the mirror taking it all in. First from the front, then the side. No words, no adjusting, no sucking in the gut...I just looked.
Now, it would be easy to say "this is hopeless" or "fuck it, want to order Chinese?", but for some reason, I made a different choice. I decided to make this my "Rock Bottom".
Not many people get this choice, often their rock bottom comes in the form of a doctors office or emergency room visit. Some people even find themselves face down in a urinal after a night of partying (yes, this means you have a problem...and no...I did not suffer this fate, just painting the visual).
Choosing your Rock Bottom moment only happens once...you only get one shot at it...otherwise you're setting yourself up for enormous disappointment. You better be ready to act....now.
I hate the term "stars aligning" because it implies that you had little to do to put yourself in a situation for success. In my case though, I did have a couple of things going for me. My wife had just lost over 50 pounds by managing her diet and doing some more moderate exercise. With her looking and feeling better than she had in years, it wasn't a huge effort to start changing the diet and exercise habits.
No great comeback story has ever started without the phrase “oh man…I think we’re f**ked”.
So 2 days before Christmas I joined Weight Watchers. I had the picture in my head of some bean counter at the WW offices seeing my registration date and thinking..."yeah right" here's one that will drag down our statistics.
But I did join, and I did take it pretty seriously. Watched what I ate, KEPT A FOOD JOURNAL and went to the gym sporadically at best. Over the course of the next 4 months I proceeded to lose about 30 pounds and notice that my clothes were starting to fit a little bit differently.
Then I hit "the plateau". What I have since learned is that the "Plateau" is simply code for...what you're doing is no longer working, time to change things up a bit. No, not me, I decided to keep doing what I was doing and hoping for different results (this is the definition of insanity by the way).
If you're interested in reading about what happened next...part 2 of the back-story is coming shortly...hang in there, the story gets good. Once we get there I'll start making MUCH shorter and more frequent posts.
SRR
That's exactly what I thought back in December of 2007...it was 2 days before Christmas and I just by chance jumped on the scale to see where I was at. The scale read 315#. Yes folks, that's right I had sped past the 300 pound threshold.
Needless to say, this prompted about 5 minutes of quiet reflection to figure out where I was going to go from here.
Now, to put this in perspective, I'm 6'5" tall. I'm built large, kind of a wide body. I’ve always carried my weight pretty well. In fact, when I tell people that know me well what I weighed, they can't believe it. This in fact was part of the problem...I carried the weight and pulled it off ok.
But the truth of the matter was, that here I sat, over 300 pounds, carrying the bulk of it in the torso, starting down a path toward Type II Diabetes, Heart Disease, and a whole host of ailments that can be avoided with proper care and attention.
The way I saw it I had two choices...
Option 1: Continue doing what I was doing. Keep going along as though I had never stepped on that scale. Keep tucking in the shirt and tugging at it just so in order to hide or "minimize" the ever expanding waist line and belt overhang. Keep on chalking up the fact that I couldn't shop at a regular department store b/c I'm just built bigger than everyone else and I have "extra thick legs". Continue coming up with excuses for why I didn't want to go Hiking/Biking/Snowboarding anymore...sounded exhausting. Keep feeling bad about being too tired to do things with my 3 year old.
Option 2: Fix it asshole…
Needless to say I went with option 2. Which I knew would require a great deal of change on my part. I knew that it was going to physically suck (at least for a while) and I knew that whatever I had been doing so far to "manage my weight" hadn't been working. Then I heard down the hallway my wife and 3 year old daughter talking (they were actually arguing, which is hysterical to listen to) and I realized that really there was only one option for me.
Gut Check Time.
So, where do you start? I was already standing there in front of a full length mirror in my bedroom in gym shorts and a t-shirt...well...take the shirt off and spend a few minutes accepting reality.
They say that if you're faced with a challenge in business you need to stop and take a couple of minutes to face the cold hard reality of your situation...accept it, and devise the plan of attack. Accepting the areas in which you are weak provides clarity, and a realistic view of your issues. I decided to try it for myself.
Off with the shirt...If you haven't done this in a while, it's not an easy exercise. There I stood, facing the mirror taking it all in. First from the front, then the side. No words, no adjusting, no sucking in the gut...I just looked.
Now, it would be easy to say "this is hopeless" or "fuck it, want to order Chinese?", but for some reason, I made a different choice. I decided to make this my "Rock Bottom".
Not many people get this choice, often their rock bottom comes in the form of a doctors office or emergency room visit. Some people even find themselves face down in a urinal after a night of partying (yes, this means you have a problem...and no...I did not suffer this fate, just painting the visual).
Choosing your Rock Bottom moment only happens once...you only get one shot at it...otherwise you're setting yourself up for enormous disappointment. You better be ready to act....now.
I hate the term "stars aligning" because it implies that you had little to do to put yourself in a situation for success. In my case though, I did have a couple of things going for me. My wife had just lost over 50 pounds by managing her diet and doing some more moderate exercise. With her looking and feeling better than she had in years, it wasn't a huge effort to start changing the diet and exercise habits.
No great comeback story has ever started without the phrase “oh man…I think we’re f**ked”.
So 2 days before Christmas I joined Weight Watchers. I had the picture in my head of some bean counter at the WW offices seeing my registration date and thinking..."yeah right" here's one that will drag down our statistics.
But I did join, and I did take it pretty seriously. Watched what I ate, KEPT A FOOD JOURNAL and went to the gym sporadically at best. Over the course of the next 4 months I proceeded to lose about 30 pounds and notice that my clothes were starting to fit a little bit differently.
Then I hit "the plateau". What I have since learned is that the "Plateau" is simply code for...what you're doing is no longer working, time to change things up a bit. No, not me, I decided to keep doing what I was doing and hoping for different results (this is the definition of insanity by the way).
If you're interested in reading about what happened next...part 2 of the back-story is coming shortly...hang in there, the story gets good. Once we get there I'll start making MUCH shorter and more frequent posts.
SRR
"You're not that big..."
So why is this the title of the blog?
You have no idea how many times I've heard this...and every time I heard it, I knew the person was lying (to a degree)...
I actually think that this simple statement is nothing more than the type of conditioned social response that we have been trained to give our entire lives. "You're not that big..." is a reflexive response to a fat joke that the respondent has no control over.
Sure, some people might actually mean it when they say it, but if they really stop, and think about it they'll probably come to the following conclusion. Saying these simple words defuses the socially awkward situation, but that's not all. Unfortunately it also has another side affect...it enables the behavior of the person that hears it by providing them the false sense of security they are seeking.
See, that's the only reason for a self inflicted fat joke...its simple compliment fishing...you're looking for the one person in the crowd to bail you out with a nice comment, that's it. When you get that kernel of positive reinforcement, more often than not you use it as reinforcement of your current behaviors, thus, the downward spiral continues...
For me, this was the standard response from friends and family every time I made a fat joke, and believe me I have made quite a few in my day. My wife actually got fed up with me a while back due to their frequency and pointed nature. She made a good point..."If you don't feel good about you, don't you think it makes it hard for me to feel good about you?" Hmmm...so if I hear you right, you're saying...no more self deprecating fat jokes?
Point taken.
In reality, my friends and family could have done me a huge favor by making their response to one of these barbs "yeah...no doubt, you could really stand to lose a few." Looking back about 2 years it really would have been the best thing for me to hear. Painful, but true. Short of my buddy Rob, I doubt that anyone would have had the balls. Bottom line, I guess that its just not something that you do if you expect anyone to show up at your funeral.
I tend to believe that all people are generally good, and in this case I think we always want to make people feel better about themselves even when we know in our hearts that they are fighting an uphill battle. It happens all the time, we all do it. The question is, can we find a way to deliver the message that actually needs to be heard in a way that will actually affect change? Tricky to be sure, let me know if you figure it out.
These are the types of issues and the type of questions I'll be bringing to the discussion here on the blog...
So...that's the reason for the name.
To be clear though, this blog is being put together because I feel like I need a record. A record to look back and reflect upon as I reach my goals. A record for me, my friends/family and other folks that struggle with weight and fitness to draw some sort of motivation to be better. Sure, to be healthier for their families, longevity, their kids, etc. But more importantly, to be healthier and happier for themselves.
So, to the reader, maybe there will be something in a post that inspires you to get off the couch and get moving, maybe there's something in here that inspires a new exercise regimen or diet change. Maybe I just piss you off and you're not interested in coming back...really that's all up to you. Who knows...this blog is primarily for me and if you can pull something out of it, if it causes you to respond somehow, then great, welcome aboard. I hope you enjoy it.
SRR
You have no idea how many times I've heard this...and every time I heard it, I knew the person was lying (to a degree)...
I actually think that this simple statement is nothing more than the type of conditioned social response that we have been trained to give our entire lives. "You're not that big..." is a reflexive response to a fat joke that the respondent has no control over.
Sure, some people might actually mean it when they say it, but if they really stop, and think about it they'll probably come to the following conclusion. Saying these simple words defuses the socially awkward situation, but that's not all. Unfortunately it also has another side affect...it enables the behavior of the person that hears it by providing them the false sense of security they are seeking.
See, that's the only reason for a self inflicted fat joke...its simple compliment fishing...you're looking for the one person in the crowd to bail you out with a nice comment, that's it. When you get that kernel of positive reinforcement, more often than not you use it as reinforcement of your current behaviors, thus, the downward spiral continues...
For me, this was the standard response from friends and family every time I made a fat joke, and believe me I have made quite a few in my day. My wife actually got fed up with me a while back due to their frequency and pointed nature. She made a good point..."If you don't feel good about you, don't you think it makes it hard for me to feel good about you?" Hmmm...so if I hear you right, you're saying...no more self deprecating fat jokes?
Point taken.
In reality, my friends and family could have done me a huge favor by making their response to one of these barbs "yeah...no doubt, you could really stand to lose a few." Looking back about 2 years it really would have been the best thing for me to hear. Painful, but true. Short of my buddy Rob, I doubt that anyone would have had the balls. Bottom line, I guess that its just not something that you do if you expect anyone to show up at your funeral.
I tend to believe that all people are generally good, and in this case I think we always want to make people feel better about themselves even when we know in our hearts that they are fighting an uphill battle. It happens all the time, we all do it. The question is, can we find a way to deliver the message that actually needs to be heard in a way that will actually affect change? Tricky to be sure, let me know if you figure it out.
These are the types of issues and the type of questions I'll be bringing to the discussion here on the blog...
So...that's the reason for the name.
To be clear though, this blog is being put together because I feel like I need a record. A record to look back and reflect upon as I reach my goals. A record for me, my friends/family and other folks that struggle with weight and fitness to draw some sort of motivation to be better. Sure, to be healthier for their families, longevity, their kids, etc. But more importantly, to be healthier and happier for themselves.
So, to the reader, maybe there will be something in a post that inspires you to get off the couch and get moving, maybe there's something in here that inspires a new exercise regimen or diet change. Maybe I just piss you off and you're not interested in coming back...really that's all up to you. Who knows...this blog is primarily for me and if you can pull something out of it, if it causes you to respond somehow, then great, welcome aboard. I hope you enjoy it.
SRR
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