Tag Archives: challenge

I Feel Like Every Monthly Challenge Is The Same (or Will This Be The Month I Get Back On Track?)

Posted on September 1, 2020 | Comments Off on I Feel Like Every Monthly Challenge Is The Same (or Will This Be The Month I Get Back On Track?)

The longer we are told to stay at home, the harder I’m finding it to figure out new monthly challenges. My life seems stagnant. I don’t feel like anything in my life is moving forward. I’m trapped in this moment of time and nothing is changing. I know I’m not alone in this feeling, but that doesn’t make it easier to deal with. I’ve said that this year is going to be the lost year. I have to understand that I might not accomplish much at all this year. But if not accomplishing much means I stay safe and healthy, it’s worth it.

Most of my monthly challenges lately have been about trying to stay positive in this difficult time. And that’s exactly what last month’s challenge was all about. I wanted to try to focus on the good and track good things that happen to me each day. I know I need to remember that even on my worst day, there is something that was good about it. It might be something as small as eating something I like or being able to watch a good show on tv. But no matter what, there is always some good every single day.

I wasn’t sure how I would track these things, but it ended up just being easiest to combine it with my gratitude list that I made each night. I made sure that at least one thing listed on the gratitude list was something that made the day good. And there were some days that I had really good things like being able to see a friend or having an amazing workout. And there were plenty of days where the only good thing was that I slept ok or that I didn’t do something destructive. August wasn’t a horrible month for me, but it was still a tough one and I needed to make sure that I didn’t make things worse for me by forgetting the good that I had.

I’m planning on continuing this idea because I know that with each month that passes with the pandemic still being a huge concern, I’m feeling more and more disconnected from my life and what I have liked to do in the past. And I need to be reminded that things are not all bad and that there are some things from my life that I am still enjoying or that are good.

My monthly challenges for the past 6 months have all been along the same line. My motivation to do a lot of things isn’t that high right now, so I am trying to find challenges that aren’t too difficult to accomplish. And I try to find things that I know I need to do, especially with the setbacks that I’ve been encountering while staying at home.

And this month’s challenge is no different. I know I’m not on track with so many aspects of my life. I have been letting things go, ignoring stuff I should focus on, and haven’t been caring enough about things that I used to care about. Some of this is about my health and weight. My workouts haven’t been what I know they should be. My food is much worse than it’s been in a while. My sleep is still tough at times and I’m sometimes having a week or two with under 4 hours a sleep a night. And some of these things about my physical health is taking a toll on my mental health so I’m not focusing on doing things that I know will make me happy.

So this month, I want to work on getting back on track. I need to figure out a schedule for myself, even if I don’t have much to do. I need to prioritize myself more and to make sure that I’m setting myself up for things that will be positive for me. I need to get my food under control (or at least more regular). And I need to push myself harder in my workouts when I can.

I have gained weight in the past 6 months. I’m not happy about it. I don’t feel like myself. I hate that my clothes don’t fit me correctly. I feel like I have ruined so much that I have worked so hard for. I know that weight is not everything, but I want to get back to a place where I feel like myself, and I know weight is something holding me back. And hopefully getting myself back on track with other things will result in at least a little weight loss. I’m not too concerned about getting back into weight loss more than getting myself back to where I was at the beginning of the year. If I lose more than that, then I do. But that’s not the goal I’m giving myself right now.

Hopefully, focusing on the things that have been getting out of control will result in a lot of good things for me. And maybe it will make things easier for whenever we start transitioning back to what life was life at the beginning of the year. I know that eventually, that will happen and I want to make that as easy as a switch as possible. And if I can get my life to feel close to what it used to feel like, then I think that will be an easy change for me when it happens.

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Doing The Opposite Of My Monthly Challenge (or Continuing To Focus On The Good)

Posted on August 4, 2020 | Comments Off on Doing The Opposite Of My Monthly Challenge (or Continuing To Focus On The Good)

My monthly challenge last month was to focus on things that made me happy. I really did want to update my happiness checklist to see if there were new things I could add and take some old things off. I have been using the same checklist for a while with very little editing. So I felt like it was time for an update.

My plan was to focus my month on what things were making me happy and keeping track of those so I could see what should be on my updated checklist. And that was a really good plan when the month started. That’s just not what happened. What I ended up doing was almost the exact opposite.

Instead of tracking what I was doing each day that made me happy, I noticed things that were not making me happy and seeing if I could eliminate them from my life. And while there are a lot of things I don’t like to do that I have to do, there were plenty of things that I could just stop doing or get rid of. For example, if there was someone annoying me on a dating app, I didn’t try to stick it out. I let them know I didn’t think we were a good match or I wasn’t interested and unmatched with them. I am starting to not feel the desperate need to try to make any match work. I know there are plenty of other guys I will match with. And when dating apps were annoying me in general, I stepped away from them. If I didn’t feel like doing dishes immediately (which I do try to do), I would rinse them off and wait a bit longer before scrubbing them. And when the entire day just felt like too much for me and I needed a break, I took a nap.

While I wasn’t necessarily finding things that made me happy, I was doing things to make my day happier. And I think that is a big accomplishment for me. My checklist might still be the same, but since the overall goal was to be happier I think I did accomplish that.

And my challenge for this month feels like a continuation of last month. I want to put focus on the good things in my life. This was inspired by a podcast I listen to that is all about the good happening in the world right now. There are good things in my life right now, even when it doesn’t feel like it. I am very lucky in many ways and I want to focus more on that.

So I’m going to work on tracking the good in my life each day. I’m going to do this along with my gratitude list that I do each evening. I’m going to try to make at least 2 of the things on my gratitude list things that are good each day. That way, even when I have a bad day I can remind myself that not everything is bad.

I need this challenge as being isolated is getting to me more and more. I don’t want my mental health to be a struggle and I can see how I can get to that point if I am not proactive about it. So this is something I am doing in order to make sure I stay more positive than pessimistic each day. I know this won’t fix everything or magically make my life better, but I know that it will at least force me to acknowledge that I do have good things in my life even when I don’t feel like that is true.

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Still Trying To Get Back To Normal (or Isolation Monthly Challenges Really Are Not Easy)

Posted on July 1, 2020 | Comments Off on Still Trying To Get Back To Normal (or Isolation Monthly Challenges Really Are Not Easy)

The beginning of another month brings one monthly challenge to an end and the start to another. And these challenges haven’t been my strong point lately. Figuring out challenges to do while I’m stuck at home shouldn’t be as tough as it is. But I’m also lacking some of the motivation I normally have. So even though a lot of the challenges I’ve done before could easily be done while at home, it’s not the same. I’m really trying my best, but I also know that I probably could do more.

My challenge last month was to try to get back on track with my physical and mental health. I really don’t know how to rate myself with that challenge. I think I took some great steps forward but also had some big falls back. I think my physical health had the most progress, mainly because I have figured out a few things that are helping me with food right now. Food is still a huge struggle for me, but anything that makes it a little easier is so nice. But my mental health took some serious swings. I recently had one of the lowest days I’ve had in a while. I got out of it quickly, but being in that type of funk isn’t good when I don’t have a lot of the usual things I can do to feel better.

And that inspired what my challenge will be for this month. I want to find new things that make me happy. I need to almost create a happiness checklist for isolation. What can I do to keep me happy that doesn’t require me to go out? For example, on my happiness checklist, I have going out for a meal because that does make me happy. Getting delivery food isn’t the same. So I need to figure out what else can temporarily replace that on the list. Same with the idea of going out with friends. I can’t do that right now. I need to find something that I can do in my house that gives me some happiness to replace it on the list.

Even though things are starting to reopen here, I don’t know how long that will last or if things will continue to reopen. Some things that have reopened and have needed to be closed again. So as much as I want to believe that things are getting better and I can start venturing out of my house more often, I’m trying to prepare myself for being in isolation at home for a lot longer. I don’t want to believe that it will take until there is a vaccine before that happens, but that might just be the case. If I have to stay home for a year in order to stay healthy then that’s what I’ll do. It’s not easy staying inside and as I’ve mentioned I am struggling a bit, but I have to remember that I’m doing this for a good reason. I just have to make staying home easier and more tolerable.

I wish I would gain some motivation back so I could do some better monthly challenges. But right now, I feel like I’m in survival mode and my brain really can’t take on too much. Maybe if I can find more ways to be happy, next month I can find a better challenge. But if all my challenges while in isolation are low effort like this, then that’s what will have to be. My time right now is not normal. I can’t expect to have my normal motivation either.

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Hope And Health (or I Don’t Have The Motivation To Do A Bigger Challenge)

Posted on June 3, 2020 | Comments Off on Hope And Health (or I Don’t Have The Motivation To Do A Bigger Challenge)

When I was struggling to figure out monthly challenges in the past few years, I had no idea how tough it would be to plan them when I’m isolated at home. Even though many of my challenges don’t involve me leaving my house to do them, my motivation while isolated is nowhere near it normally is. I don’t feel the push to do a ton every day. Some of this is due to physical exhaustion and some of this is mental exhaustion. This isn’t an easy time for any of us, but I’m trying my best. I am working on being gentler and kinder with myself because it’s so easy to compare myself now to myself before. But we are living in a different time and that’s not a fair comparison.

Because of those factors, my monthly challenges lately haven’t been very intense. They have mainly been about taking care of myself. Last month, I challenged myself to stay hopeful. And for the most part, I think I did an ok job with that. I paid attention to the news to see how things were progressing with testing and cases in LA. The news was sounding better. Things were starting to be able to reopen. Even if I wasn’t going to go to places, I was hopeful that them being reopened was a good sign. And I was staying hopeful that we were through the worst of this wave (I still fear another wave in the fall, but that’s another issue).

But then at the end of the month, it became harder to be hopeful. Not because of the pandemic but because of police brutality. I was saddened to see those stories happen, but I tried to stay hopeful in amplifying the voices that needed to be heard and working on being a better ally. I wasn’t quite as hopeful as I was before, but I also became more aware of the racism and discrimination out there that I might have been blind to before. I found hope in seeing people taking action and learning how to take action myself. I am hopeful that one day, we will find a way to have systematic change with law enforcement and how people are treated. I am not hopeful that it will happen soon. It will take a lot of work and we cannot let up.

This month, my challenge is related a bit to wanting to be hopeful. I want to work on my health. This is about both my mental and physical health. For my physical health, I need to find ways to work out harder and I need to eat better. Those aren’t easy, but they can be done. And they are things that I have been working on for a long time.

But more importantly, I want to work on my mental health.

I am overwhelmed with everything going on in the world and it would be so easy to retreat and hide. But the more I learn about racism the more I know that I cannot use my mental health as an excuse to avoid hearing these stories. I need to find a purpose and actionable things to do whenever I hear stories of police brutality or racism. I need to find a way to not let these affect my mental health because I need to be a source of amplification of voices who may not have the same privilege that I do. I need to find a way to turn this activism into a positive thing for me and not an upsetting thing. This is a huge shift in my mindset, but I know it will be for the better. If these situations don’t make me run and hide but instead make me feel like I can help and seek ways to do so, I will be a better ally for so many people. I will likely be able to handle other stress in my life as well, but that is not my focus. My main focus is to turn the feeling of being overwhelmed or sad into the push to get to action.

I have already been working on this idea. Yesterday was Blackout Tuesday where we were not supposed to post on social media. Originally, I thought that meant we were supposed to stay off of social media and I was planning on doing that. It would be an easy way to avoid and hide from things. But my friends corrected me and said it was not about being silent but about sharing and amplifying the voices that should be heard right now. And that’s what I did. I found posts from leaders in the Black Lives Matter community and shared them. I took time to educate myself, find reading and watching lists, and followed new accounts that I know would continue to share information. I didn’t hide and avoid things because that would have been easier. I took in the information, which wasn’t always easy, and made sure to share it. And I feel like I felt better doing that than I would have if I didn’t.

Hopefully, I will be able to continue to strengthen and repair my body and mind this month. My mind is the priority to me because I know that being able to be focused and taking action is more time-sensitive. I know that it is needed now. And I am hoping that doing that will lead to other positive changes with my mindset and how I react to things that might be negative or upsetting. I want to be a voice of change and not a silent supporter.

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Modifying Mayhem (or A Good But Challenge Week Of Workouts)

Posted on June 1, 2020 | Comments Off on Modifying Mayhem (or A Good But Challenge Week Of Workouts)

With all of the at-home workouts, Orangetheory is trying really hard to make them as fun and unique as the regular in-studio workouts are. I really appreciate the effort that they are making and I feel like they are doing a great job considering that they didn’t have this plan in place before the pandemic started. The workouts aren’t necessarily as hard as they are when we have someone coaching us, but I think that also has something to do with what efforts I put in when I’m home alone compared to when I’m in class.

But this past week of workouts was made extra hard. One of the things that Orangetheory does is have a challenging week called Mayhem. It’s similar to Hell Week, but during May. These workouts are very tough and they usually push you to try to do more than normal. I love having these challenging weeks because it does help me believe that I can do more than I normally do in workouts. And since almost all the studios around the world are still closed (very few are open, but more are getting ready to open), they made Mayhem part of the at-home workouts this time.

You can usually get something for completing Mayhem in-studio. I think it’s always a hat (Hell Week is always a shirt). This time, you could pre-order the hat to have it after completing Mayhem. I think you were supposed to do 4 of the 6 workouts, but because of the timing of when the workouts were I only got 3 done. But I still pre-ordered the hat and used it for motivation during each of the workouts.

The first part of the week of workouts was much better than the second part of the week. I didn’t have too many issues with pain and nausea on Monday or Wednesday. But Friday and Saturday were really bad. I had to make so many modifications in my workouts to be able to get through things. But I still tried to make the workouts harder for me in my own way. I did focus as much as I could on working on strength/weight-lifting exercises since those don’t always make me feel worse.

What I did notice while doing that was that I do feel weaker than I did before. I have known that this would be a possibility as I’m not able to work as hard at home as I do in class, but it was hard when I really thought I was trying. But I just have to keep going because that’s the only way I can limit how much of a set-back I have. I know when I get back to class (hopefully at some point this summer they can reopen safely) I will have to not have any expectations of what I will be able to do. I might struggle in the workouts the way I did when I start. But I also know that I might have a faster time getting back to where I was since I had already been there once. I honestly don’t know what it will be like when I get back to class, but having few expectations will probably be best for me.

Even though I know that this Mayhem wasn’t as hard as past ones were, I still am proud of what I did. I tried my best. I worked as hard as I could. I pushed through pain and nausea when I could. And I did have harder workouts than the other workouts have been.

I know this week is likely to be a struggle, mainly due to pain and nausea, but I’m still figuring out how to do workouts the best that I can. It’s not as easy to modify things at home, so I’m still figuring out what options work for me. I’m doing a lot of completely different exercises instead of modifications due to what equipment is available at my house. So I’ll have another week of practicing how to modify things for myself this week.

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Finally A Good Workout Week (or Continuing To Build My Home Gym)

Posted on May 25, 2020 | Comments Off on Finally A Good Workout Week (or Continuing To Build My Home Gym)

When I wrote my last workout recap, I had dealt with multiple bad workout weeks in a row. I was dealing with different issues and it felt like when I got over one thing I had another to deal with. And some of the things I dealt with were expected (like nausea) and some were random and unexpected (like cutting my finger or getting cellulitis). Having so many bad workout weeks in a row really were taking a toll on my mood. I knew I was in a worse mood than I had been. I was fighting that feeling, but I couldn’t help feel really down on myself.

And when I writing my last recap, I said that this past week would be the week my nausea likely would kick in again and I was frustrated that I was going to have to have yet another bad workout week. But I don’t know if I mixed up what day it was or what else got me confused, but I had the wrong week for when my nausea would most likely start. That’s actually going to be this week, so last week’s workouts actually were much better than expected.

I did have to still deal with a few issues like my finger still healing (so it’s not really too flexible) and the tail end of taking antibiotics and those making me a bit sick. But overall my workout week was a good one and I really did need that. I still was making modifications to things, but there were few modifications needed and I really was able to get into the workouts.

I think some of the motivation to do more was from knowing that there are some studios in other states starting to open up. I know we aren’t ready for that (and I do wonder if the other states might have done it too early), but it gives me hope that gyms and fitness studios in California will be opening up sooner rather than later. I have no clue if it will be this summer or this fall, but I feel like it is coming and that is making me really excited. And adding to the fact that some states have been able to open their studios, they have been starting to say that if things continue the way they have been going that maybe we will start reopening more by the 4th of July! I would love it if that could happen. I know it’s not really soon, but it’s a date to keep in mind that might be when things start turning around. And if that is approximately the right date, then we are past the halfway mark of quarantine (I know I’ve said that before, but every time there is a new date I think of if I’m past halfway).

There is no real substitution for working out in the studios, but I’ve really tried to make my home workouts the best I can be. I have gotten a lot of different equipment for my house. If I had more space and money, I’d probably buy a lot more. There are a lot of things that I wish I had (like a rower, weight bench, and more weights), but I have a pretty good setup for my house. I know that when I get back to the studios that I might not be able to lift as heavy, row as hard, or bike as fast; but I will not be losing all the progress I’ve met. And as I’ve been doing the home workouts, I have found that there are some things I wish I had at my house more than others.

One thing that I wished I had was a BOSU ball. While the home workouts aren’t using them, I use them a lot for modifications and it would be nice to have them for that. Plus, I do like some of the balance work that we do on them and I know that balance work is something that can help my hips. BOSU balls aren’t difficult to buy, but they aren’t cheap and they take up a lot of room. But when I was looking online at them, I saw something called BOSU Pods that looked like mini-BOSU balls. And that’s pretty much exactly what they are.

You can’t do everything on BOSU Pods that you can do on the full-sized ones, but for what I was hoping to do I could get a lot done. The only thing I wouldn’t be able to do would be to use them to help me with incline plank work or as a replacement for a workout bench (they just aren’t high enough for that). But they would help with plank work by adding some difficulty. I also could use them for balance work like squats and lunges, plus they could be used for step-ups since they do add a bit of height and they are not going to slide on my floor as my step ladder does. So I ordered them and they arrived at my house just in time for my Saturday workout.

They are pretty cute, just like miniature BOSU balls. And they are much easier to store in my home gym collection than the full-sized one would be. In Saturday’s workout, there was only one exercise that really could use them (we had hip bridges so I put my feet on them for an added challenge), but after I did the home workout I did a little extra just so I could use them. I only did squats on them, but I could tell right away that it was making squats so much harder and my body was working a lot more to do them. That’s exactly what I was hoping they would do and it proved to me that I can work on regaining some of the strength and muscle that I have lost.

I’m excited to keep using the BOSU Pods in my workouts and finding ways to continue to challenge myself. This week I’ll also be able to test them with if they do help enough with plank work when I’m nauseous. I’m not expecting them to be enough, but you never know. I’m in a much better mood and have a much more positive mindset after this past week so I’m hopeful that I can make things work for me.

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Struggling To Figure Out Challenges Right Now (or I’m Just Going To Try To Stay Hopeful)

Posted on May 1, 2020 | Comments Off on Struggling To Figure Out Challenges Right Now (or I’m Just Going To Try To Stay Hopeful)

March felt like it lasted 6 years. April felt like it just flew by. I guess that’s a sign that we are getting used to isolation and the days are starting to go quicker. But there’s no question that I’m ready to see how we try to find a new normal. It will take time and this won’t be happening overnight. But I know that it will happen. And until it does, everything I do has to be something I can do at my house.

And figuring out monthly challenges while in isolation isn’t easy. Even though very few of my challenges require me to leave my house, there is a different mindset that we are all in while isolating. Motivation isn’t the same. It’s hard to plan but at the same time, most of us have nothing but time.

That’s why last month, my challenge was to try to get a better handle on how I was handling things. I could feel my life feeling out of control. And while there are very few things that I can control right now, I spent April focusing on what I could control. And those things focused mainly on things related to a daily schedule.

I do still need to wake up at my normal time a few days a week, but I was getting into some bad sleep habits with going to bed late and sleeping in if I could. Sleeping in didn’t mean I was sleeping very late, but I wasn’t getting up with my alarm. And that is a habit that I didn’t want to start. Sleep schedules aren’t easy for me to get into, but very easy to ruin. So I wanted to make an effort to be better about that. I haven’t been perfect this past month, but it’s been much better than it was in March. I haven’t slept later than my alarm, even if I was up too late the night before. Yes, that results in me being tired sometimes. But I’m working on fixing that too.

I also wanted to get better about when I was eating. With nothing really dictating my schedule, it was hard to get into a routine. Just like with sleeping, I am still working on this. I’m pretty much having 2 meals a day (which I don’t know if that’s good). I pretty much have brunch and dinner. I eat brunch after I do my little bit of work or my workout (depending on the day). And dinner is pretty much at a normal dinner time. I’m cooking a lot, which is a good thing. But I also want to get better about what I’m cooking and adding variety to my recipes.

I’m glad that I made my monthly challenge last month to try to get things back to how they should be. I needed that sense of control and regularity in my life. And even though I still have moments that I struggle, April was much easier for me to deal with than March.

And for May, I wanted to continue working on feeling better. But I did struggle again with what I could make my challenge to be. Doing something like picking up a new skill doesn’t feel right for right now. So I decided to make it another challenge related to being in insolation and the state of the world right now.

My challenge for May is to work on staying hopeful. I want to be hopeful that things will be ok. I want to be hopeful that we will be able to be out with our friends and family again soon. I want to be hopeful that I will stay healthy and so will the people I love. And I want to stay hopeful that I will get through this and soon enough it will be just a memory. It’s not always easy to stay hopeful, but I know I need to do it. I need to work on keeping a positive mindset as much as I can. And hopefulness will do that for me.

Hopefully, when I do my recap of this challenge, we will have a better idea of when things will be changing to close to normal again. But if not, I know that day will come one day. And it’s going to be so amazing when that happens.

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An Isolation Monthly Challenge (or Just Trying To Keep Things Going)

Posted on April 1, 2020 | Comments Off on An Isolation Monthly Challenge (or Just Trying To Keep Things Going)

When I set up my monthly challenge for March, I had no clue what the month would end up being like. I really had all the best intentions to work on my budgeting and to get back on track with where my money was going every month. I know that this is something I need to do and that’s why I created the challenge. And for the first week or so, I was doing ok with trying to figure out a good plan for myself with what I wanted to do.

But then everything went crazy. I’ll do another post another time about my mental health right now because it’s been a lot. I’ve written a few things about it, but I feel like how I feel is swinging back and forth a lot. And part of the struggle with mental health has meant that I have neglected to do some things that I wanted to do. And budgeting did slip off my radar.

I have tried to catch up this month with getting back on track and I know I am making some good strides toward it, but there is a lot that I wanted to get done this past month that I didn’t even get close to doing. I wanted to do the online classes with how to use the software the best way possible and I never did that. I occasionally had to look up how to do something so I did learn a bit, but nothing like what I wanted to do. I still feel like there is so much I need to learn in order to feel comfortable with budgeting things the way I was able to do it before.

But I had to be gentle with myself because I know that I had the best intentions going into the month and I didn’t have any control over things going crazy. I know that maybe some people would have been fine and able to continue working on the goals that they had set up for the month. And maybe under other circumstances, I would have been able to do so. But that’s not how things worked out this time for me and I am ok with that. We are all dealing with something that we have never experienced before and we don’t know how we will react or deal.

And being in an unknown situation is what made me think of my monthly challenge for this month. I know that there is a chance that I will settle into how things are right now, but there’s a good possibility that I will be struggling the same way that I am now. Things keep changing so there is no way for me to feel settled or like I can be comfortable with how things are. I cannot control the world around me, I can only control my reaction to it.

And that’s what my challenge is for April. I want to stay more in control of how I’m dealing with everything. And the main part of that for me is trying to maintain a somewhat normal schedule. I do still have 4 days a week that I have to get up at my usual time to do work, but I have 3 days a week that I can sleep as late as I want. I did take advantage of that last week, and it’s thrown off my sleep schedule. Things aren’t my normal schedule and I can’t always do everything when I’m used to doing them, but I can create a new schedule for myself that is as close to normal as possible.

And along with that schedule, I can get better about regular meals. I have been cooking more, but I haven’t been great about eating as often or when I should. Having dinner at 9pm isn’t good for me, but it’s happened more than once. I usually don’t eat breakfast, but I have been doing that lately and I think it is out of boredom. I need to plan meals the best that I can and work on scheduling when I am going to cook and when I am going to eat.

The only thing I have been ok at trying to maintain is having a few fun things in my life. They are limited to things I can do on my computer or phone, so that is a bit of a struggle for me mentally. But it does help when I have something to look forward to in the afternoon or evening. I’ve mainly been doing movies with friends, but I should try to find other things that I can do virtually with friends. This will be over one day, but it might not be soon. I need to get to work on adjusting my life so I will thrive during this time. Surviving isn’t enough for me right now. I need to find ways to continue pushing forward and working on myself. And I think figuring out a plan for this time is the best way I can do that right now.

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Default ThumbnailTaking A Month To Reset (or This Doesn’t Really Feel Like A Monthly Challenge) Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge Down (or The Prosperous Heart) Default ThumbnailThinking Of Changing Up My Monthly Challenge (or I Guess This Would Be A First) Default ThumbnailStill Trying To Get Back To Normal (or Isolation Monthly Challenges Really Are Not Easy) Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge (or What To Do When You Are Crazy Busy) Default ThumbnailNot Perfect This Month (or Challenged With The Monthly Challenge)

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Adjusting Monthly Challenges (or Books And Happiness)

Posted on February 4, 2020 | Comments Off on Adjusting Monthly Challenges (or Books And Happiness)

Last month, I set a monthly challenge to only read self-help/improvement books. I really was excited about this challenge because I had so many books on my library list that I wanted to read. I thought I’d be able to go through a big chunk of that list and I started the challenge assuming it would be easy to do and I’d get it done.

Then, only a week into the month, I realized that this challenge might not be the right one for me. It was actually stressing me out to not have reading as an escape and I had to read something that wouldn’t make me have to think too much. I wasn’t sure what a new version of the challenge would be, but I was open to exploring other options. But this was before I started to feel horrible so I think my ideas just weren’t realistic for me. All the ideas that I was thinking about trying just didn’t happen.

What I did end up doing was spending one or two days reading a self-help/improvement book after completing a fun book. This ended up being once or twice a week so I did get quite a bit of reading done in the book I started working on. I think part of the struggle was how close to home the book I was reading was hitting me and it was tough to get through. I was taking everything in that I was reading and I had to take some time to let it sit. I didn’t want to start reading another chapter when I was still thinking about what I just read. So only reading a little bit at a time and then taking a break did end up working for me. That just wasn’t what I was planning on doing. But this routine is working for me right now and I plan on continuing it as I work through this book and hopefully as I read a few more books I have on my list.

I’m not declaring last month’s challenge a total fail because I did adjust things as I need them. That’s not something I normally do, but I am proud of myself for realizing I did need to do that in order to have a bit of success.

This month, I’m doing a challenge that I’ve told myself I needed to do for a while. It’s been a long time since my old therapist had me work on a happiness checklist. I’ve made some minor changes to the list, but for the most part, I have the same things on it that I’ve had since the beginning. And that’s just not working for me anymore. I need to take some time to find what makes me happy and what doesn’t and adjust the checklist accordingly. And in the past, when I’ve tried to change up what’s on the checklist, I don’t think I’ve taken enough time.

There are a few things on the list that are easy for me to decide that I want to remove. Either they aren’t important to me anymore or they are things that I don’t feel add to my happiness in life. For example, getting 10,000 steps is currently on my list, but I don’t really care as much about this anymore. I would love to be able to get 10,000 steps a day done, but that’s not always possible. When I’m extremely busy with work or I’m feeling nauseous, I know I won’t get my steps in. And I don’t want to stress about not getting that done just so it can be checked off when I don’t care.

But when it comes to what I want to add to the list, that’s a bit harder for me. There are some things that I think would be good on the list, but I don’t know if I want to have it as something I worry about getting done. So this month, I want to test out a few different ideas to see how doing them regularly affects me (or stresses me) and I also want to take notes on other things that make me happy or bring me joy. I might discover something I didn’t think about having on the list because doing it randomly made me so happy.

I’m not going to rush into making any final decisions about what I want on the list until closer to the end of the month, but I will play around with different list ideas and probably make some mock-up checklists to see if they feel right to me. Right now, I have 10 things on my list, but I don’t know if that is going to stay the same. I don’t know if I want to have way more than 10 or how low I want to go below 10. 10 seems like a good number, but it doesn’t have to stay there if I discover having 9 or 11 on the list works better for me.

Hopefully, at the end of this month, I will have a better idea of what I want my checklist to be. I might not have the final checklist idea, but I want to have at least some adjustments to it to reflect what makes me happy a bit more. And by having a better checklist, I hope that I can find ways to be happier more often and I will find the checklist as useful to me as it was when I started using it.

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Default ThumbnailFirst Monthly Challenge Of The Year (or Setting Up For The Year And Self-Improvement) Default ThumbnailThinking Of Changing Up My Monthly Challenge (or I Guess This Would Be A First) Default ThumbnailRecapping My June (or Still Thinking Up New Monthly Challenges) Default ThumbnailGetting More Productive (or More Monthly Challenges) Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge Down (or July and August Challenges) Default ThumbnailStill Trying To Get Back To Normal (or Isolation Monthly Challenges Really Are Not Easy)

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Some Nausea And Benchmarks (or A High And Low Workout Week)

Posted on January 20, 2020 | Comments Off on Some Nausea And Benchmarks (or A High And Low Workout Week)

This past week of workouts started out not so good and ended pretty great. It really was a swing between how I felt in the beginning of the week and how I felt at the end. But I managed to make it work no matter how I felt.

Monday’s workout was an endurance day. I think it was supposed to help get us ready for our mile benchmark this week, but it was a tough one. And it was made tougher because I was feeling so awful that morning. I tried to remember that I wanted to take it easy to try to make it through as much of the workout as I could, but on an endurance day that’s not always easy.

For cardio, we had a 23-minute block. It was rounds of push paces and base paces. The base paces were 1-minute for a majority of the time, but at the end of the block, they increased to 90-seconds. And the push paces got longer each time. We started at 30-seconds and went all the way up to 3-minutes. I didn’t have a big difference between my base and push paces because of how I felt. I just tried to pedal as long as I could before needing a break. We did have an all out at the end and I did try to increase my speed a bit more for that.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block had regular lunges, lateral lunges, and swing lunges with a 1-minute row. I modified the swing lunges to be regular lunges while holding weights, but I wish I had just used the straps instead. For some reason, I didn’t think of doing that when I was in class. The second block had low rows on the straps, hip hinge reverse flys, plank work, and double crunches. The only modification I had to make was using the bench for my plank work, but I do that all the time so I don’t necessarily think of it as a modification.

When class was done, I was still feeling awful, but not that much worse than I was when I started. So maybe the idea of going easy on myself is a good one that I need to continue. Of course, my pain and nausea likes to change from month to month, so what works this month might not work next month.

Wednesday’s workout was a power day. I was still feeling off, but I was over the hump and doing much better than I had been doing on Monday. So I still wanted to take it a bit easy, but I knew I could do a bit more than I had earlier in the week. And power days are perfect for that.

For cardio, we had 3 blocks. All of the blocks were intervals with 30-second push paces and base paces. Almost all the base paces were 1-minute, but there was 1 that was only 30-seconds. And all the blocks ended with a 30-second all out. I did go a bit faster with my push and all outs than I did with my base paces. It wasn’t exactly what I would normally do, but it was closer.

On the rower, we also had 3 blocks. Every block had rounds with a 150-meter row and 10 squats. Technically, we had a specific number of rounds to do for each block, but I never made it to the end of those so I spent all 3 blocks alternating between the rowing and squats. I’m glad the rows were all short because they were starting to make me feel a bit worse. But I took some time to take breaks when I needed to and it did help a lot.

And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. I did have to make quite a few modifications, but it wasn’t too bad. The first block had pull ups on the straps (which I modified to low rows), plank Spiderman to leg raises (I had to split up the exercises and do them using the bench), and hollow hold chest presses. And the second block had split stance high rows with weights, plank arm extensions (I modified these by using the bench), and single-arm snatches with weights. And just like on Monday, I was only feeling slightly worse than I had before the workout, which I consider a good thing.

Friday’s workout was the 1-mile benchmark challenge. Even though I’ve been using the bike for a while now, doing benchmarks on the bike still feels pretty new to me. I also don’t have the same type of records noted as I do on the treadmill, so it’s not always easy for me to remember what I have done or what my goal should be. Fortunately, the new Orangetheory app tracks our benchmarks as long as we enter them in the computer during the workout, so I knew what my previous attempts on the bike were like.

I was finally feeling better, but I still didn’t know if I could beat my best time on the bike. I did the math in my head with what I would need to be able to do by certain times or checkpoints with the benchmark so I could stay on track. My PR for the bike was 8:28 and I was hoping to come close to it. Even if I couldn’t beat that, I wanted to be around the 8:30 mark. And as I was biking, I knew that I was cutting it really close to being able to beat my best time. When it was down to what would likely be the last 30 seconds to get to the distance, I pushed myself harder than I think I ever have before. And it worked because I was able to get a new PR!

After the benchmark, there was still a little bit of time left before switching to the rower. We had short sprints with recovery to do on cardio, but I spent almost all of the time recovering because my legs felt like jello.

On the rower, we started with a 400-meter row and then we had 20 squats, Each round, we went down 50 meters on the row and the squats stayed the same. The rowing still felt like a bit of recovery time for me after the benchmark, so I didn’t make it as far down the rowing as I would have liked to. And on the floor, we had lunges with overhead presses, rows on the straps, torso rotations with weights, and double crunches with weights. I was feeling a bit more recovered by the floor, but I still took it a bit easy and didn’t go too heavy on the weights.

And on Saturday we had a strength day. I was feeling completely like myself and I had recovered from the benchmark the day before.

For cardio, we had 2 blocks that had a similar format. We had a 2-minute push pace with no incline, a 90-second base pace with no incline, a base pace with incline, a push pace with no incline, and we finished with a 30-second all out. The time of the incline and the push pace before the all out changed, as well as the incline we had to use. I’m glad the incline work wasn’t too long because it’s always so tough to add resistance on the bike. I did better than I thought I would, but I still could feel myself struggling a bit with the added resistance.

On the rower, we started with a 100-meter row with 10 squats with a medicine ball. We went up 100 meters each round and ended with a 400-meter row before things switched up. The second half of the block started with a 400-meter row and we had 10 medicine ball front raises. The rowing went down 100 meters each time.

And on the floor, the first block was all mini-band work. We had front raises, bird dogs with hand slides, and static crunches with scissor kicks. And the second block was all upper body work. We had single-arm chest presses, tricep extensions, and y raises on the straps. Between the mini-bands and the upper body work, my arms were sore!

I’m so glad that this past week ended on a good note. I like it when that happens because it helps me to forget the struggles I might have had for the first part of the week. And hopefully, this week will just be awesome workouts!

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Default ThumbnailA Good, Strong Workout Week (or I Really Love Feeling Like Myself) Default ThumbnailAnother Weird Workout Week (or Dealing With A Different Type Of Nausea) Default ThumbnailA Short Workout Week (or I Would Have Ended On A High Note) Default ThumbnailA Low Key Workout Week (or Working Through The Stitches) Default ThumbnailBenchmarks and Hard Work (or Having A Week Of Feeling Awesome) Default ThumbnailA Week Of Bike Work (or Working Through Nausea and Pain)

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