mevre

haha thanks Ceasefire! i've kind of been toying with a Drunken Master theme, but we'll see... well, totally forgot today was the first day of the challenge. but i actually did really well! i'm still going through the extreme ups and downs of having a new job after being unemployed/freelance for so long. i get really happy that i have a routine again, and that i have money again, and that i can afford to do things again. but then i get really depressed that i've lost all my free time, and that i work in a cubicle, and that i'm not totally passionate about my job. but that last one could definitely change once i actually start doing the work i've been hired to do. [still going through all the hoops of getting the myriad accounts set up, registering for a phone number, learning my way around the systems, etc. ugh, terrible. it's like purgatory.] after being freelance, it feels like i traded one kind of freedom [time] for another [financial]. but both are useless by themselves. and there's this whole big thing about having to save 4 of your paid vacation days every year for Christmas time, and we only get 8 a year to begin with [maybe it's not 8. i can't remember... it's the standard number, whatever that is.] and i don't know if i'd be able to take additional [unpaid] time off. the biggest reason i wanted a job was so i could travel for weeks at a time without going bankrupt. but if i only have a week or less every year, what's the point? i guess for now i just gotta take what i can and make the most of it. it'll be nice. i know it will. i'll be so glad to have this experience on my resume, and to be financially independent, but it just feels like my wings have been clipped, and it makes me sad. aaaand now i feel bad for being that person, who's all "oooh boohoo, poor me, i have a salaried job and health benefits." haha anyway. it's just hard. and it's exhausting going back and forth between happy contentment and depression all damn day! but i'm hopeful.

yay! great goals, Ceasefire! glad to see you back.

hello all. not quite sure what my goals will be for the next 6 weeks, and so i'm also not sure what kind of theme i could use. it will probably end up being awesome though, so stay tuned!

that's what happened to my brother. the thing got straight up torn out of his flesh. and i'm pretty sure it never healed right, so he's got a nipple that's slightly split in half. ugh. i can't even imagine.... ugh.

here's a brief recap of this week. goal 1 - exercise. result - killed it. here's a cute otter family. goal 2 - eat right. result - pretty good, and i'm calling it a win. here's a panda who looks pretty pleased with himself/happy about life. [exactly how i feel. ] goal 3 - explore. result - win! here's a cat enjoying the spring time! aaaand here's an extra. fly, little guy! and now, the song that's been going through my head this entire challenge. EVERY SINGLE TIME i read the title of my thread haha. which i guess makes sense, since it's the thread's name-sake. [apparently it was in Vampire Diaries? lol i had no idea!]

wow, handstand!!! way cool! good job all around, man. you finished your first challenge! keeping myself motivated is one huge skill i learned in my first few challenges. for me, it's a balance of tweaking my home environment, leaning on the nerds here for support, and kicking my own ass into gear. if you give yourself some time and actively try to find a system that works for you, you'll get it.

YES. excellent advice.

so you didn't get where you wanted to be in this challenge. that's ok. you know what you have to do to get there, and you can do it. dust yourself off, take the time between challenges to relax and reflect on what exactly went wrong and why, and change what needs to be changed in order to keep yourself from doing it again. things will be easier when you're actually able to be outside for a few minutes, and as Jitters said before, spring will come. also, if it makes you feel any better, whenever i read about your workouts, or when i saw that picture of you at the gym, my first thought was always "god, what a badass!" like, really. you kick a lot of ass. try to remember that, too.

hope you're finishing the challenge strong!

finishing up this challenge strong. which means i get to level up! yay!!! i'll have to re-read the rules on that again later... probably will make another post about how i divvy up the stat points. exciting! had a GREAT workout today to make up for skipping yesterday. my diet has been pretty good considering Valentine's day and various other things. but i'm going to make it even better. i also had a cool experience the other day. i was going through my post archive and i found one where i talked about being stuck at 24% bodyfat since the summer, which is pretty much where i still am. so i got all frustrated because i thought i was making all this great progress. well, it turns out i was full of BS in that old post, and actually i started at 29.8% in July. i'm 23.7 as of Tuesday. woot!! my hips were nearly 40 inches back then, i weighed 121 lbs. and now my hips are 36.5 inches and i'm 116 lbs. it's been really slow progress until this challenge, but now that i'm finally getting the hang of things, i think it'll be faster and faster. other than that, i'm getting really excited and increasingly nervous about starting my job on Tuesday. and i realized yesterday...i'm probably gonna have a desk! haha so yeah, that'll be great.

ok, so it sounds like you're more pro-protein than anti- anything like carbs. would you say that's accurate? i'm just curious because i'd like to learn more about the various schools of thought regarding diet. i don't know of any diet other than paleo that's worked well for people, and you've obviously had great success.

oh my god, the lines on that vegvisir are BEAUTIFUL! great tats, iatetheyeti. you'll have to keep us posted on that sleeve, too! sounds rad.

so Waldo, i'm curious what your diet looks like. care to give us a run-down of your food intake on an average day while cutting? or maybe the kind of stuff you ate at the beginning of your fitness journey?

some of my current favorites: Baby's On Fire - Die Antwoord Roar - Katy Perry Starships - Nicki Minaj Countdown - Beyonce Powers - Blackalicious

oh man, i just got a job - i can't wait to blow all my money on piercings and tattoos! gonna get my right ear pierced in 4 more places [double helix and two upper lobe. i already have one standard piercing, so it'll make a nice uneven 5.] i'm particularly excited about this because the right side of my head is shaved [the rest of it is past shoulder length - i'm working on waist-length!] and i love the asymmetry. the possible tattoo plans i have for myself seem endless. i only actually have one right now: a roughly 2-inch "V" on the inside of my right ankle [stands for "veritas" which is latin for "truth"] but once i'm down to ~19% bodyfat, i'm gonna get a big triskelion on my front-upper left ribcage. other ideas would make use of vines, trees, and elvish script...

lol right?! oh man. those pants. i have all these grand plans of making crockpot meals every day, packing lunches, fitting my workout in the morning... we'll see how it all goes! my first day is the 18th. also, if you're interested, all you have to do is find the URL of the imagine [gif or otherwise] you want to post, put "img" in brackets before the link, and "/img" also in brackets after the link [both without the quote marks, though], make sure there are no spaces, and you're good to go!

another update... I GOT THE JOB!!!!! phew! alright, that's all i got.

so cool! i've always wanted to learn how to spin yarn! i enjoy knitting and pottery because they both require just enough presence of mind to keep you distracted, but you can pretty much zone out while you work. soooo relaxing! it seems like spinning would be similar. where do you get the raw materials? do you dye your own stuff, too?

happy Monday, everyone!!! my, where did the weekend go? ok, first thing's first. progress. goal 1 - exercise. accomplished! this otter is very excited that i'm reaching my goals. goal 2 - diet. eeeeeh mostly accomplished, but i'm giving myself a fail. i feel like i've been making too many exceptions to this rule throughout the challenge [more on that later]. seems like every week there's some reason to throw my diet stuff to the wind, and it's starting to wear on me psychologically. so no panda today. and it's too bad, because i had a very cute picture all picked out haha. goal 3 - explore. accomplished! oh man, i think i've outdone myself with that one! that cat might be the cutest animal i've posted so far. life goal - hour outside. lol nope. but actually it ended up getting really cold and gross again, pretty much as soon as i posted about being too pumped about spring coming haha. so oh well. here's the next installment of my "animals wearing bow ties" series. ok, so for those of you who are curious about the interview, i killed it. don't think anything could have gone better, so i'm just hoping that no one else they interviewed was as cool as me. and also, those pants were great. yay! about my diet... the day before yesterday, i went over to a friend's house, and he had just baked a GIANT cookie and he scooped some vanilla ice cream on it and handed me a spoon. haha so i had some of that and didn't feel too bad because i had really been wanting a cookie and felt like my diet could stand up to a couple spoonfuls of ice cream and chocolate chip goodness. well, today is the boyfriend's sister's birthday, so last night we went out to the super fancy fondue place in town and gorged ourselves on 4 full courses. haha oh man. dat cheese. i really missed cheese and bread. so that was nice, but then tonight their parents are having us all over for cake and gifts and i'm starting to feel like "ok, i've had enough bending of my diet," as i mentioned before. so i don't know how that'll play out. i'll probably just end up with a tiny sliver of cake and some coffee. so those are my dieting woes. the sun is out today, and i really want to blow off these deadlines and take a nice long walk. i guess we'll see... now. who's excited that it's Monday??!?!?!

i did some meditation on Wednesday night, meant to do it every day... didn't happen. when did i get so busy?? haha i've never had a problem taking time to relax before...

Bof is back and kicking ass! most excellent. good job getting it done, man! how's the eating? and how are you feeling about it all? bored? super-charged? somewhere in between?

yay, welcome to the rebellion!! first of all, congratulations on taking the first step! haha even if it is a step you've taken several times already, it's the most important one. the only solution i have to your lifting quandary is bodyweight exercises. but then, i'm a ranger through and through and of course i would say that. it is something to consider, though. for more alternatives that are actually based on free weights and stuff, check out the warrior's guild. lots of badass lifters who are friendly and give good advice over there. a note about diet: good job! most people don't realize that diet is at least 80% of the reason their body looks the way it does, if not more. so, good for you for knowing what you're getting into! something huge that i've realized in the last half a year concerning diet is that the battle is lost once the food you're trying to avoid is in the house. the war against junk food is fought in the store, not in the house. i would also suggest tracking your calories for a week or two just to get an idea of where you're at. because as we all know, the one thing you HAVE to do if trying to shed weight is live in a caloric deficit. and last but not least, an inspirational picture! i dunno, maybe it'll help some day down the road when you feel tempted to throw in the towel. i hope you never have to use it though!

my short answer would be no, don't have a cheat day. i agree with this, and i will expand upon it too. not only is thinking of it as a "cheat" automatically putting negativity into your relationship with food, but having a built in day or meal or snack where you can indulge is pretty much a guarantee that you will indulge. does that make sense? so, if you've been good all week, or all month, or all day, or whatever, and you decide "screw it, i'm gonna have a cookie." then by all means, have a cookie! just be careful to not let it turn into a habit [as it so often does with cheat meals.] because if you know that you'll let yourself to have one candy bar every week, there's probably like a 90% chance you will have one candy bar every week. but if you allow yourself some flexibility when you know you need it without building in a cheat to your diet, you're more likely to have one candy bar in a month, if that. also, a hard truth to consider: eating bad food will set you that much farther back in your weight loss. just remember that your priorities are what you actually do, not what you say they are. if you say it's a priority to drop weight, but you're eating cake for breakfast lunch and dinner, your priority is clearly eating cake, not weight loss. if you know that you need to have a sweet treat every now and then in order to keep yourself from bingeing later on, then do that! if you know that you need to cut all the bad stuff out of your diet in order to have success, then do that! for me, i know that i need a cup of coffee with a teaspoon of raw sugar and 1/8 cup of milk in it every morning. it gives me sanity. without it, i freak out and eat a pint of Ben & Jerry's in a single afternoon. haha and this is something i had to learn for myself, the hard way. working out a diet that's right for you will likely only be found with trial and error. and that's ok. as long as you're learning, you're making progress. just keep pushing yourself to be better tomorrow than you were today.

yesssss!! bahaha, too good. also, did you draw that? mad skills, yo.

Jitters the Truth Speaker. preach on, man.