Jean de Muret

I don't know if I'm putting this in the right place, but I know a lot of weight lifters I have met have anger issues so I was hoping I could find some insight into dealing with mine. I used to have an issue with my thyroid that caused a lot of side effects, among them a severely hampered temper. It was very difficult to make me angry. After being on levothyroxine for over a year my thyroid is now fixed and I no longer have to take it, but now I have a very short fuse. Not having experience in anger management I have had quite the challenge in reigning it in and lately I've been getting urges to fight, which is completely unlike what I'm used to. I am trying to learn to stand my ground (having been taught all my life to turn the other cheek every time.)without resorting to physical confrontation, but it has been difficult. To make matters worse I work in a manual labor profession and I'm over weight which means people around me automatically assume I'm an easy target, to which they soon discover they're wrong, but I can't let it escalate to violence. As if that isn't enough I'm getting mad at myself for simple slipups which cause more slipups. I'm getting angry at stupid stuff and getting fighting mad. I am so confused by these new emotions and drives that I don't even know what to ask for specifically, just help.

I'll have to look more into that link, but the room idea might not be so bad. This challenge has been, I feel, an abysmal failure. I have improved on the sweets some though, I'm not eating sugar on all my breaks anymore, which was the goal in the first place so I'm not sure how to count that. My biggest hurdle this challenge though has been completely unrelated to any of it and that's a lack of sleep. Between 2:30 on Friday and 8:30 tonight I only got 5 hours of sleep, not consecutively. That's only a snapshot of the past few weeks with me averaging 4-5 hours a night. It's looking like next challenge may need to be more on general wellbeing and mental progress as opposed to weight loss. As for the fruit infused water water I hadn't thought of it because I was trying to even avoid juices. I'm not sure if that counts or not.

This challenge has been a disaster from the get-go but I'm learning why. Last time When I cut out soda I just replaced it with something else. I haven't been replacing anything with anything this time so the struggle is harder. I've been doing OK-ish with the no sweet treats. I'm allowing them in meals, but that sometimes also means my lunch is a blueberry scone. The 1 sweet drink a day has been rough. I'm doing decently with it I guess, but like all of the end of last week it was an abismal failure. It's hard to cut out something you enjoy more than most anything. (sweet tea) The house cleaning is a disaster. I put the money aside for the gaming, but I still haven't touched the house. Partially because I've been so busy, partially because I'm thinking about moving soon, partially because I'm investing my time in other projects, and partially because I'm just so tired I don't want to when I DO get a moment. (I've only been sleeping maybe an average of 5 hours a night and my body can't handle it.) The gym thing is going well though, I didn't go this week and probably won't get a chance, but I can still do something at home. I found a metal L frame meant to hold a loose trash bag and started doing dips on it for fun, so I think I'll be ok when workout time comes. Thank you all for the support! I kept meaning to come back and update, but with not having a smart phone, and very little time at home I haven't had the chance. When I came back and saw all the encouraging messages I was very uplifted. Thank you!

Glad you like it. lol

Just realized that with the wording I used I accidentally included my energy drinks into the sweet drinks. I'm excluding those from the challenge because some days I am non-functional without them. (as in I will literally fall asleep standing up)

I'm going to make a game of it. I'm a noble in charge of a small township and each room is a different building or area that I need to improve for the benefit of my serfs. For example, the bathroom will be the chapel. (Purely because of the phrase "Pay tribute to the porcelain god.") I plan to come up with a reward system as well. but I'm not sure how exactly that's going to work. I think I may set some money aside and only allow myself to access it as "taxes" and the cleaner the house is the more "Taxes" I get.

Anything I can do in place of icing my feet? Uncle Arthur doesn't really care for the cold.

I'd like to start adding some running into my exercise list, but my feet hurt so badly after work I can barely stand. It even hurts to drive home. I work in a factory so I'm on my feet all day, but I don't think this is the normal aching tired feet. If what I describe really is just aching tired feet let me know and I'll stop whining. It feels like the ball of my foot up into my toes cannot be touched or it would be the same amount of pressure as being punched full force, the outer edge of my foot feels the same way, but along with it the edge burns and feels almost disconnected and the pain stops at a very specific place in my foot. It comes and goes after work, I'll be driving fine one minute and the next I'll have to put it on cruise control and keep my foot from touching anything. I know the problem doesn't have a whole lot to do with running, but I also know runners are the feet/shoes people and I'm hoping someone can help me out here without going to a doctor. (I have no insurance until I get hired full time.)

Cut Sweet drinks down to one a day (any size) - Con 3 Wis 1- 15 xp Cut out sweet snacks (If they're already in my house, whatever, but no buying more) - Con 2 Wis 1- 25 XP Clean Entire House - Wis 1 Int 1 Con 1 Cha 1 - 50 xp Go to the gym at least once a week (If unable, work out at home) - Str 2 Con 1 Cha 1 - 10 xp

I've given some serious thought to the tactic of "burn it all" but I felt that while it would free up several days worth of labor, the financial loss would not be justified.

Alright well here it goes, Final Results: Cut Out Soda - CON 3 - 10 xp Track Diet Daily - WIS 2 INT 2 - 20 xp 10 Crunches/Night - STR 1 CON 1 WIS 1 Dex 1 - 25 xp Clean Entire House - Wis 3 INT 1- 50 xp Cutting out Soda - Roaring Success, as of tomorrow I have not had more than a single accidental swallow of soda in 4 weeks. Awarding myself full points. Con 3 - 10 xp Tracking Daily Diet - Unfortunately as time went on it became more difficult and overly complicated to track my diet. Due to a lack of anything to really track my progress on other than a flipphone with no memo writing capabilities and it being unrealistic to carry a memopad with me to work I stopped keeping track after my second week of the challenge. However I did not miss a day in those two weeks, so it should be enough information to analyse my bad eating habits and change, and I will award myself half-points. Wis 1 INT 1 - 10 xp 10 Crunches/Night - This Challenge sadly never took place. In its stead however I went to the gym at least once a week, and was training myself to do other hard physical work. I will not be granting myself points for that, but in its stead I feel I earned a couple points for the gym and other work. STR 1 CON 1 - 5xp Clean Entire House - I cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and got burned out and stopped. Sadly my house is not much better off than before the challenge. I will be awarding myself nothing for this abysmal failure, however, I will make this a goal for the next challenge and will not be taking a rest week for the particular goal. It's goal setting time for the next challenge. This time I know my limits a little better and can set goals more appropriate to my level.

I don't have that good of a memory, but that's what I've been doing.That's why it's so difficult.

Update: Things aren't going as well as expected. The no-soda is still on track. I haven't had a soda (except one sip from my daughter's cup I accidentally took when I thought she had juice) since I started the challenge. I really don't have much of a desire for it anymore, and it's kind of shocking. It certainly helps that my girlfriend's doctor told her to lay off the soda around the same time the challenge began so she's basically been running the challenge with me. Tracking my diet is a little more difficult than originally thought due to being out and about. Weeks 1 and 2 I tracked nearly flawlessly, but I have forgotten to track every day of week 3 so far. Part of the problem is a lack of convenient tracking tools. A notepad, even a memopad, is too inconvenient to carry around with me at work, and my phone is a flip-phone that only has T9 "typing" at best so it takes me 5 minutes to text "good morning." I have not ever really gotten on the wagon for doing my crunches. Just never really happened. I have been going to the gym at least once a week though and lifting weights. I don't really know what I'm doing, but I know I'm making progress. I would go into detail about what I'm doing when I work out, but I don't know the names of most of the exercises I'm doing. I do know that one of them is a leg press machine, and another is a bench press machine. I am lifting an embarrassingly small amount of weight on each, but I do feel I'm making progress. Cleaning my house has been slightly successful, however I'm doubting I'll be able to finish before the end of the challenge. I wake up, go to work, come back home and crash. Rinse, lather, repeat. I have Saturday off (I think) so hopefully, I'll be able to get some hard work done on it then. Separate matter: I have been pushing myself to do everything energetically. I have always felt naturally lethargic so this is a very alien experience for me. So far I have been able to push for about a week and I feel simultaneously drained and reenergized. I'm not sure if this is how I'm supposed to do things or if I'm just going to crash one night and not wake up for 24 hours. I have felt more productive since changing my mindset to this way of thinking, but I'm not entirely sure it's healthy. On the other hand, I'm so new to knowing what "healthy" is, this may be what I have been supposed to be doing the entire time. Any tips on this would be appreciated.

I am learning the basics I think. Ask more specific questions and I can answer. I've never been good at answering generalized questions.

Thanks for the tip!

I plan to, I've just been busy and didn't want to call if it was something easily fixed. I know what it is now, so it's mainly a matter of getting the water shut off and the parts replaced. I even bought some of the parts for it. Anyway: update time. Cold Turkey Soda: Haven't had a soda since Sunday Morning (my version of saturday night since I work nights) to prepare for the challenge I had already nearly cut out all soda during the previous week and then Sunday morning chugged a two liter as a celebratory last one. Doing well and the only time I really wanted one was when I went to taco bell and saw a Baja Blast; I just chose not to get a drink since it was a quick snack anyway. Diet Tracking: I just finished updating my eating journal (excel on an ipad is a handheld version of hell). I'm already seeing things I can improve on, which was the goal. I'll not start fixing my diet right now because I don't want to put too many goals on myself at once and get overwhelmed, but I plan to next challenge. If anyone is interested I may move the spreadsheet to google docs to get some advice. Crunch Time: Nope. Completely forgot about the crunches just about all week. I may have done 20 and they were pathetic half attempts, so I won't even count them. I did, however, go to the gym a couple times over the week for very very brief, unplanned, and unscheduled workouts, about 30 minutes each, went for a 5k walk yesterday, sounded better than aimlessly wandered for a mile and a half and had to turn back, and practiced a sword form for about 30 minutes today as a form of meditation. I really need to step this up. Clean entire house: So step 1 is almost complete. On accident. I meant to clean out the trash yesterday while I had the day off, but I put that off to try and fix my washing machine and the laundry room swamp. It's at least fixed for now in the most redneck way possible, so I did a whole lot of laundry yesterday, picking a lot of clothes out of piles on the floor. Unfortunately, I was a little too lazy (and excused myself as it being a time restraint) to actually fold the clothes and put them up so they're tucked away non-neatly in an unused baby playpen. So the house is a little cleaner, but still not anywhere near what I wanted it to be by this time. Maybe I can get some of the trash out tonight if it doesn't rain. Edit: As an extra element to my weekly Diet Track I think I'm going to track my weekly weight too. See if I gain or lose based on meal specifications.

I am talking about a leak, but I'm not sure if it's from an accessible pipe or something I need to call my landlord about.

Going over budgeting for this month and it looks like my last goal isn't actually possible, so I'm going to have to change it a bit. I figure it's better to salvage the goal and shoot for something possible than to just admit defeat on day 3 of the challenge. So instead of "Pay my bills a month in advance." I'm going to change it to "Clean my entire house." Very possible, yet still challenging. I'll give myself a bonus point if I can figure out where the swamp in my laundry room is originating.

Thank you all, I feel my question was satisfactorily answered and redirected in the mindset it was intended to be. I have begun to practice mindfulness when I get too angry at work. I'm not used to feeling angry due to a thyroid problem that went undiagnosed for too long so I'm still learning to control my temper. It's a work in progress, but I think I'm progressing nicely. Once again thank you all. Also not a Warrior; Rebel class.

I have been looking into mindfulness, and I'm not sure if I'm missing the point entirely or if I'm just missing the next step, but I would like some advice on this. From what I have been able to understand so far you need to stop daydreaming and focus on what is going on around you. But then what? What do you do with your newfound information? Do you just let it go and find out what's going on in the next moment? That seems like a waste of valuable information. However simultaneously, I'm not sure how to utilize this new information without falling back into daydreaming. How do you process mindfulness? Or do you process it at all?

Thanks!

I really don't have access, I can't afford insurance right now. Yes, it is always, but I'm beginning to think it's a dehydration thing because when I start to drink more water it subsides. However, the moment I get used to drinking the amount of water I moved up to they come back. It's also tied to my misaligned TMJ.

Thanks, I appreciate it from both of you. I may end up having to change the crunches goal though, I've been having upper back problems* when I get home at night caused by work. I'm ok in the morning, so I may change it to every morning, but at night it's really bad. *Where my back and shoulder blade meet at arm level, sometimes it feels like indigestion, sometimes it feels like it needs to pop, and sometimes it feels like I just need to stretch, but always feels painful when the problems return nightly. I'm doing something wrong at work and I can't tell if it's from a lack of arm muscle or just bad technique. I'm rocking my body with a locked arm onto an object for more force, I don't realize I'm doing it until I start to hurt. Once or twice doesn't bother me, but after about the 300th time for the night I start to have issues.

Caffiene doesn't bother me, something to do with the ADHD I think, and I've always got a headache anyway, so caffeine headaches are an "eh." I'm quitting cold turkey. If I don't quit something cold turkey I can't do it. I start out at 6 a day for example and go cut 1 cut 2 cut 3 aw one more wont hurt anything just for today back to 4 back to 5 back to 6 I did well I can have another extra, and now I'm at 7 a day. I do cold turkey, I'm just done. I'm starting out by switching soda with anything. Water, juice, tea, Gatorade, and if I drank even alcohol would be ok until I get used to not drinking soda. I'm just trying to get used to saying no. As far as tracking Diet, I'm probably just going to use a little hand notebook.

Cut Out Soda - CON 3 - 10 xp Track Diet Daily - WIS 2 INT 2 - 20 xp 10 Crunches/Night - STR 1 CON 1 WIS 1 Dex 1 - 25 xp Clean Entire House - Wis 3 INT 1- 50 xp