…I will eat with purpose and planning all day. This includes cooking a meal for dinner, not eating microwaved turkey bacon and cans of green beans and beets (ahem, last night).
…I will complete a room before and after.
…I will abstain from all television and movies.
So, I didn’t make it to WOD or strength yesterday. M-W-F I go to the 11:30am WODs, but on T-Th I have to go to the 5pm. Yesterday I got home from class and was too overwhelmed by all the things to do around the house, that I spent an hour cleaning (seemingly barely making a difference) instead of working out. Then I devoted some time to getting wedding ideas together to send to the planner.
I was/am sad about it, but in the the end I’ll just do my best to get some progress in this weekend, and be glad the dishes are done and I have clean towels now. I also got all our plastic bags to the recycle bin at the grocery store, and a big bag to Goodwill. So yay for that :).
And, I got enough done wedding-planning-wise to get to sleep feeling on top of it all. Even if it meant spending several hours doing seemingly (and a little actually) unproductive bridal magazine flipping looking at things like this:
However, worth noting that I am TOTALLY ON TOP OF IT with my eating this week. Aside from Wednesday’s adjustment for the chocolate hearts, I have eaten exactly as planned, and felt completely satisfied the entire week. I plan on trying to be conservative but unplanned for the weekend and then planning ahead next week the same way I did this week.
But I know myself. The temptation will be there to relax just a bit too much and let things like portion control and good decision making slide just often enough to take a step or two backward. I should probably impose some guidelines, or come up with a way to keep my brain on track. Anyone have good ideas on how to keep focused and not end up treating the weekend as a “days off” free-for-all?
It’s all about preparation, right? Planned all my eating for the week, now to go to the grocery store to get stocked! Here’s the list:
So I wasn’t able to work the yoga in, but otherwise I made a little bit of progress in every area I wanted to today!
In order to keep moving forward, I want to keep the balancing/juggling act going. If I let something fall, I’ll lose a lot of forward momentum stopping to pick it up and get everything organized again.
Plus, being appreciably behind in even something as trivial as laundry brings on stress that becomes ever-present. And that, is no good.
Blueberries, cranberries and pomegranates, oh my!!
When I’m eating for fuel, I’m much bigger on convenience and ease than gourmet flavor. So I’m deeply in love with the snack-size ziploc bags that let me portion out things like dried fruit, nuts and (when non-paleo) Goldfish. I write the portion on the bag in Sharpie so it’s easy to track later. I have my lunch bag, and in the morning I just toss in the food for the day. Tomorrow is:
Nothing dramatic, no particular setbacks- just general blase lack of motivation I suppose.
I think the big thing is that I feel like a waste it I don’t get to CrossFit 5 times a week. I really really need that consistency. But my schedule has other ideas. I’ve been only going like 4/week, which really just doesn’t feel like enough to really progress.
Also, for the first time ever on paleo today I slipped up. I started craving sugar, and ate FOUR Nimble Balance bars. After a great day of healthy, well-spaced food.
Action plan: Make tomorrow work for me. Aim to make Thursday a feeling-on-top-of-the-world day for all I accomplished on Wednesday. I will aim to make one big accomplishment in each of the following areas:
I did not want to WOD yesterday. I got home from a long day of classes, after a crappy night’s sleep, and just wanted to curl up under the comforter. So I did. And I burrowed, and thought about the possibility of just staying there until dinner. But my conscious did its best. It nagged, it cajoled, it reminded me what I get out of CF and that once there I would probably even like it.
So I got up.
Dragged my reluctant ass to the car.
And WOD-ed.
And it was wonderful :)
3x: 150m run, 30 lunges w/ plate, 150m run, 30 situps w/ plate, 150m run, 30 KB swings, 150m run, 30 supermans.
Then I got home, ate dinner and did my problem set. I didn’t snack, and I stayed within my nutrition goals for the day.
So, after a few previous attempts, I thought it would take me the entire 6-week challenge to get up to a wall handstand on my own without a spotter.
But I did it today!
Clearly I’m in to using random dog photos as demonstration, but can you blame me? They’re so cute.
Check out the goals page: Crossed out :)
Moral: Sometimes you just need the impetus to TRY.
Feeling proud of myself for two awesome days in a row. < Random happy dog face :) >
Up to 9 days of NOTHING on the floor in the bedroom. Pretty sure I’m approaching being in the running for some sort of Nobel prize for that…
Multi-tasked by reading neurophysiology while on the spin bike. (Also keeps me from being put to sleep by neurophysiology)
Downside: I forgot my sunglasses today and so the white sky gave me a nauseating headache, so I missed WOD. Upside: I made it to strength and know where I’m at for my front squat.
Now, 8:30-9:30 I plan on spending with Rodney (Yee) yoga-ing in the kitchen, in bed by ten.
YIPPIE KI-YAY MOTHERFUCKER!!
Ok, so I cleaned and organized the bedroom. But I feel like I just conquered some sort of scaly, fire-breathing monster! (The before picture doesn’t really encompass the ocean-like state of the floor, although maybe the lack of things in the closet does. Also, the after is still waiting on two baskets that I ordered.)
Maybe there are people in the world who can truly focus all of their energy in one area and really excel at it. That doesn’t work for me. When I’m struggling with my fitness, my diet or my general attitude, I’ve found that oftentimes the problem is something completely unrelated! I spent the last week totally unmotivated, even though I was back from traveling and had no distractions. Finally remembering to look at my life as a whole, I saw the other area I was struggling in was organization. We moved this summer, and I’m still searching through boxes in the garage once or twice a week.
Having an organized bedroom will make it faster and easier to put clean clothes away. I will spend less time searching for what I need. I will feel more relaxed going to sleep at night, and more welcome when dragging myself out of bed in the morning (it’s really no fun to have to think about where is safe to step when you don’t want to get up anyway). This leaves me more time to study, more time to workout, and a better sense of control to translate into my eating.
Prepping for paleo!
This means:
1: Finishing off the growler that was the best part about driving to Oregon versus flying.
2: Revamping the pantry, so that all eye-level shelves are paleo only. (Yes, there are beans on the shelf. Fiance is trying to put ON weight, so he’ll be including them.)
Back at the box for the first time in… 3 weeks?-ish tomorrow, and T - one week until 6 Week Challenge at Crossfit. Searching out some inspiration in tumblr-land to start getting psyched up.
Also I started stocking my paleo pantry today and thought I’d share the following:
AAAAAND: Completed Day 2 of the Active.com beginner Half Marathon plan. Woop!
Tonight: Some Shiva before bed :)
I am often unsuccessful.
As is every single other human being on earth. All (near-as-makes-no-difference) SEVEN BILLION of them.
I will embrace every failure, every fall off the wagon, and every instance of complete apparent stupidity- thankful for the lessons they contain. Take what is good, leave the bad behind.
Here’s to working for increasing the consistency of success and the enjoyment of good habits.
…and SMILE :), even if you don’t feel it.
Lunch :)
Made a batch of elk chili a few weeks ago and froze individual portions with all the nutrition info taped to the top. Soooo nice to come back from a run and be able to heat up a healthy homemade meal! Happy tummy. It’s a bit high in sodium, but I’m usually careful about sodium so it fits in my diet alright.
*Notes: If I make this again, use a little less liquid (less broth would also help bring down sodium) and add carrots.
Fact: The evening of the 14th, and the 15th of December did not contribute towards any goals. (read: pizza, crackers, cheese, cookies etc)
Action: Get over it!
There is no reason today has to be burdened by the mis-steps of yesterday. There’s no reason to feel guilty over the mis-steps of yesterday, since guilt won’t remedy them. I acknowledge that today will be harder than usual as a result of breaking good habits, but it’s been hard before and been done before. So don’t use it an excuse.
Step 1: Run. Right now, I really don’t want to go. At all. I want to sit here in the recliner and feel relatively depressed and sorry for myself. But I won’t. I’m going to get dressed right now.
It's small actions and small decisions that eventually build big accomplishment!Top
