Every day should be day 1

Posted on December 27, 2011 by Brent

Today is the first day of a new goal.  Scratch that, not a goal, but rather a new process.  The reason it is a process is because the outcome is to drop weight, a good amount of it too.  A goal signifies there is an end and once it is achieved one can stop.  However that’s the issue many of us have with weight loss.  We achieve what we want only to gain it back when we slack off.

So today is day 1 of just overall eating better.  What does my eating better entail?  For starters there is no major snacking.  There’s still some snacking allowed, but it has to be healthy and of snack size.  Like a tangerine and some carrots and about six crackers was what I had to snack on today.  Compare that to the six or eight mini candy pieces that I was consuming more than once a day.  That’s a lot of excess calories there.

The other part involves liquids.  A gym that I am “friends with” on facebook posted that the average person consumes 459 calories a day from beverages.  That is an insane number.  Of course that number comes from regular soda which can vary anywhere from 100-150 calories per can.  Myself, I was probably drinking around 300 calories a day of the bad stuff.  So now, diet soda is what I will drink when I want a soda, and hopefully I will break ties with all soda.

Back to the title of this post of “every day should be day 1″.  What this means is simple.  The first day of any new change be it diet, organization, exercise, whatever is always your best.  Why?  Because you started the path.  Once you make the commitment to actually start something and start it, you are full of energy and motivation.  Think back to your last diet and how “easy” day one was.  Now the crutch is that days two, three, four, and even more are the hard days.  So instead of counting the days, we make the days count.  And the way we do that is we keep the motivation from day one all the way until the end.

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Becoming more organized

Posted on December 21, 2011 by Brent

So this is still I guess in the first 24 hours since I started enacting the resolution stuff.  But unlike most people who would go through the list and try to accomplish it all at once, it will be a slow and steady process.  Baby steps will still get you to your end goal where as zero steps will not.

Side note: I learned this lesson last week when I went for my long run while training for my marathon.  At mile 14 of 18 I started to cramp up real bad in my right leg.  I walked it off but by the time I did, I still had 3.5 miles to go.  Unfortunately it was 40degrees outside and I was soaking wet and I had for all intense and purposes, stopped moving.  My legs froze up and it was next to impossible to run for more than 20 steps.  However I could walk.  And so I did.  I walked the last 3.5 miles of my run and it took me nearly 75 minutes to do it.  But I kept with the baby steps and I still finished.

Back on track to the organization.  Two little steps that I am incorporating into my routine and they will hopefully stick.

  1. Write down 3 goals for the day, these can be as simple as wrap a present, or write an email.
  2. No dirty dishes before bed

The second is great because now it means I am not waking up to a pile of dirty dishes that already makes the day feel overwhelming.  Nothing like starting the day off with zero chores instead of a big pile of dishes.

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New Years resolutions a bit early

Posted on December 21, 2011 by Brent

A lot of things have been slacking lately in my life.  Exercise, work, diet, self improvement, pretty much anything that would be productive.  But I have become aware of this issue, and because I have become aware of it, I can change it.

To quote Brian Cain, “What you are aware of you can control, what you are unaware of will control you.”

That’s a good quote.  So good in fact I have it written as part of my desktop image.  So I became aware that I was being lazy, and now I am taking the steps to improve and not only get back to where I was, but to actually be a better me.  So now, for my very public list of things I want to accomplish in 2012.

  • Lose 20lbs
  • Read a lot more – like at least two books a month
  • Get my website MMA Recap back to where it was and then some
  • Learn the aspects of online marketing
  • Learn the aspects of investing my money
  • Manage my money better so that by year’s end I have a significant amount in savings to potentially invest with

So there it is.  That’s my list.  It’s not a difficult list to accomplish, but it does require a lot of hard work.  That’s also where this blog will come into play.  I am going to be detailing as much of the journey as possible.

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Prepping for the next day

Posted on August 9, 2011 by Brent

It’s late and I am about done for the day.  But I am realizing something lately and that is about preparing things.  It could be food, it could be stuff before a workout, or stuff for work.  The idea though is to prepare it ahead of time.

I know what I am going to do tomorrow as I have thought it through and have my plan of attack.  This will make the day go buy a lot quicker and help me get things accomplished.

I know I have to run some errands and clean something and do some work, but because I thought it out, tomorrow will be easier.  This is a new idea for me to try out.  So the goal is each night before bed to think about what I want to accomplish the next day and then the order in how it will happen.

The best part is that if something comes up and sidetracks me for a bit, I know exactly where I left off.  I wonder how long I will be able to keep this up for.  After all I am now drinking 32 ounces or so of water every morning and I have only missed two mornings of it since I started.

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This diet is easy

Posted on August 4, 2011 by Brent

I know I said I wasn’t going to turn this into a food/diet blog, but as I said before, that’s kind of what is going on in my life at this point.  I am becoming more and more obsessed with my food, and I think that has the potential to be a bad thing.  If you like food and want to remain in the dark, then do not watch the documentary “Food Inc”.  That will scare you silly.

But back onto the diet thing.  For lack of a better term I am going to name this diet the 50/50 diet.  What that means is that 50% of my food intake comes from fruits and vegetables and the other 50%, well that’s what ever I want to eat.  Is it really 50%?  Probably not.  But it sort of looks that way on my plate.  Oh and corn and potatoes do not count as a vegetable.  Sorry, they don’t.  So pretty easy right?

Actually it is easy.  It doesn’t require any more prep time than normal cooking does, and actually is less time due to the fact that I typically am not cooking the fruits or veggies unless I need to.

Ok back on track to why this is easy.  I went on vacation.  The ten days or so prior to going on vacation I really started to focus on this.  And because of that I dropped about 3lbs in those 10 days.  When I got back from vacation I had gained those 3lbs back.  Actually it was probably closer to four due to how I traveled.

My last weigh-in was the day I left for vacation, but see I drove overnight that night.  So I had another full day to drop weight.  Coming home was the same thing.  I drove overnight and weighed myself in the next morning (about 24 hours after I got home).

But to keep things simple, lets stick with the three pounds.  I arrived home Saturday morning, weighed myself Sunday morning and found the weight gain wasn’t too bad.  After eating like I was prior to vacation (this 50-50 thing) since Saturday I have lost all the weight I put on while on vacation as of this morning.  Ok technically I am .2lbs away from being there, but I see no reason why I won’t be shattering that tomorrow.

Oh and for those curious about the exercise.  I have worked out just the one day this week and plan to work out tomorrow (Friday).  I have 3 more weeks until I start my full on training which will have me working out in some shape or form nearly seven days a week.  It’s crazy.

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Radio DJ’s don’t know how to tell time

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Brent

I have a love hate relationship with radio.  On one hand it is awesome for bringing me music while I am in the car.  On the other hand, the dj’s don’t seem to know how to tell time.  Sure they get it right when they are talking about traffic or actually tell you the time, but that’s it.

The time I am talking about is more along these lines:

“We have your chance to win in 3 minutes right after this song!”

Only problem is, they play a song that is near 5 minutes long.  Or they play two songs.

Even better are the specific time segments.  I understand that radio is live and that you can’t time things perfectly.  But if your segment is to air at say 7:40am and it is 7:50am, that’s not 7:40am!

Now I ask, if I was an aspiring radio dj and I had an interview at say 3pm and I show up at 3:10pm would I get punished for the tardiness?  What if I used the excuse, well your current dj this morning was 10 minutes late airing a segment, is that acceptable?

Seriously, there are radio producers who’s job it is to keep the show ON TIME.  Just do it people.

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Today I worked out harder than any other time in my life

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Brent

Today was my first workout back after taking two weeks off.  Between the son getting sick and a vacation, I just couldn’t make it to class.  But now I am back at my back-to-back workouts which consist of crossfit for an hour followed by Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for an hour.

For those that aren’t familiar with crossfit, it is about functional movement exercises.  The other big thing is that these workouts are non-stop from start to finish.  A typical workout with crossfit (at least at my gym) is roughly 30 minutes not including warm up.  And yet it burns in the neighborhood of 600 calories.

Yes it is intense.

So today’s workout just kicked my butt all over the place.  It was called a Tabata workout which is 20 seconds of an exercise, 10 seconds rest, repeat 8 times, then get a minute rest.  So basically 4 minutes of doing an exercise.

It looks easy, but it isn’t.  Today I worked so hard that I got light headed.  This isn’t a normal thing, but it has happened in the past.  The elevation changes from exercises really messed with me.  But that isn’t what hurt me the most.  The 1 minute rest nearly did me in.  I couldn’t see straight, my stomach was not happy, I could barely feel my legs and then it happened.

I got sick and puked.  I made it to the bathroom thankfully, but this marks the first time I have ever gotten sick from working out.  I couldn’t complete the workout and as a result I had to run a mile outside in the 90+ degree heat.  But honestly, that single mile run was way easier than this Tabata thing.

The best part?  I get to do it again on Wednesday since I didn’t finish it today.

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More on eating better

Posted on July 22, 2011 by Brent

Did not mean to turn this into a diet blog by any means, it’s just what is going on right now.  About a week or two ago I watched a movie called Fat Sick and Nearly Dead and it kind of changed a lot of thoughts I had about food.

I’ve read before about the benefits of eating more fruits/vegetables and at times I have done it.  This guy though went full boar and just drink fresh made juice for 60 days.  The results were amazing.

But what he got from it was even more impressive.  A bigger desire to want to eat more fruits and vegetables instead of all the processed stuff.  And the best part was the break down of micro nutrients versus macro nutrients.

The basic idea is that we need more micro than what we are getting.  Humans used to eat like 90%+ of just fruits, vegetables, and nuts and now we eat less than 5%.  That’s kind of insane when you think about it.  I can’t even think of a good analogy to that other than imagine if you were making $90,000 a year and then were forced to live off of $5,000 a year.

Yeah that’s basically what we are doing to our bodies.  So rather than do the whole juice thing right away, I am building towards it.  Breakfast is consisting of a protein shake followed by something else a little bit later but I try to get fruit in there.  Then lunch is typically a sandwich and this is where things are changing.

Before I would load up on the potato chips and find something else unhealthy to eat.  But now I am loading up on carrot sticks.  I am not sure why they are so good right now, but they are.  I still have potato chips, but about 25% of what I used to have.

Dinner is made up of a protein, a vegetable, and a salad.  But that doesn’t mean there isn’t fat or bad stuff in there.  Like last night was tacos, but then I had a salad and broccoli along side it.

Oh and the benefit for this?  I’m dropping weight faster than anything else and I am not craving stuff during the day.  Don’t worry, it’s my blog so I will keep you updated on the progress.

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Water, water and more water

Posted on July 21, 2011 by Brent

We all have heard that we should drink plenty of water. Some say we should drink eight glasses a day while others say we should aim higher like an ounce for every pound we weigh. This of course can be very difficult to do just for the sheer number of trips we have to make to the bathroom.

Back on topic. I read a little while back that while trying to drop weight you should drink a glass of ice cold water first thing in the morning. The reason for the ice cold aspect? Ice cold water actually uses more calories than room temp water as the body has to warm itself up.

But then I read a conflicting article that stated we shouldn’t drink ice cold water due to the impact it has on our throat while trying to drink it and we can’t drink it as fast. There was some other mumbo jumbo in there but one intriguing thing was we should drink anywhere from 1 liter to 2 liters of water when we first wake up.

So two different articles, but both were praising the idea of drinking water first thing in the morning. The only difference was that one said 8 ounces while the other said nearly quadruple that on the LOW end. Interesting.

So thus the test has started. My goal is to make this a habit, much like brushing my teeth in the morning. I am not going with the ice cold water, but just the cold water from the tap in my bathroom sink. I have a 16 ounce solo cup next to it and after I brush my teeth it is time to start drinking water.

Normally I can chug liquid like no body’s business, but first thing in the morning it is actually kind of difficult. The first 8 ounces are easy. The second, not so much. Then I have to take a quick break before I work on the next cup. Why? Because my system is all kinds of WTF!

Ever chug beer and then feel like you needed to vomit? It isn’t because it is beer that you were chugging. It’s just because of the sheer amount of liquid going into your system. Like with the beer, the urge passes and you can move on about your day.

So what benefit does drinking this much water have? I dunno yet as I am only three days into this little experiment.

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Most expensive milk

Posted on July 21, 2011 by Brent

In my attempt at eating better and feeding the kids better is just a better quality of food.  There’s nothing wrong with the produce from Meijer, but getting something local that was picked that morning is a bit better.

Same goes for meat.  We recently joined a community share program with a farm and that provides us with a lot of meat that we know was raised without a lot of filler.  The eggs that come from this are absolutely amazing and full of color and flavor.  Again, nothing wrong with the Meijer eggs, but they just don’t taste as good.

Which leads me to the last part of the equation: milk.  We switched to Oberwies milk for many reasons.  One of which includes the glass bottle that gets re-used and is better for the environment.  Aside from that it just, like everything else, tastes better.  But there’s one problem.

Oberwies milk at the grocery store is about 40 cents more expensive than at an Oberwies store.  So to “save” money we go into an Oberwies store.  The problem is that it is crazy hot here right now and thus we must order ice cream.

Three cones later and the one thing of milk we came in to get is now $14.  Thus it is the most expensive milk.  But hey it is worth it.

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