james452

Day 5: Upgrading my battle attire

Instead of posting about my progress so far (which has been pretty good for 5 days), I'm going to mention some things that I've changed at home, changes to my routine and to my personal life which have all happened within the last week.

Purchased a sit/stand desk mount to use at home.

I was at Officeworks getting some notes printed and I had a look around (because that's what I like to do). Noticed they had a desk mount for $200. Went home, thought about it for 24 hours and decided that it was a worthwhile investment. (For comparison, full standing desks cost about $600 here). 

How has this changed me? The problem I've had over the last year, I've spent too much time sitting at my computer doing nothing. I've spent the year job-hunting as opposed to my previous 5 years of being active around uni. Hence why I've pulled my back and had knee problems all in the past year as a result of sitting down too much (I should write an article titled "How sitting down for 1 year ruined me".) Now, I stand up at my desk at home which is more fun than sitting. I can move around and unintentionally walk around my room whilst watching tv. I do occasionally put it into sit mode depending on what I'm doing or if I'm too tired from standing, otherwise I try to keep it in standing mode as much as I can. For now, it is definitely a worthwhile investment.

Started a new relationship

I had been going on a few dates with this old friend from uni, though it was hard to tell if they were dates or just two friends spending time together. After the last week, they were definitely dates. I guess I mention this because the start of a new relationship is always a happy time for people. It's been one area of my life that's been really lacking the last year so it's nice to have fixed it up. As for her, she's a PhD research student too at a different university which means we can talk to each other about our work and understand it (and we get to have quite interesting conversations).

Mixing my routine up

As mentioned in my first post, I'm technically a pre-PhD student. This means I'm waiting for Monash to formally approve my PhD application and for them to award me a scholarship (which covers living expenses). If I get accepted, I don't officially start until February 1st. Until then, I'm doing a bit of work mostly because I'm getting too bored at home. Plus it would be great to understand a lot of things beforehand which means I can jump straight into research on day one.

As for my routine, I'm heading into uni multiple days a week, finding a nice quiet place in the library and studying both mathematics and japanese. The biggest thing that has helped me, discovering the Pomodoro technique. It's so simple, work for 25 minutes, rest for 5 minutes, repeat. Every 4 intervals, take a 15 minute break. The way I'm using this, I dedicate 2 hours to maths study, then 2 hours to japanese study. In just a couple of days I have gotten a lot completed. I'll still trial it out, though it looks quite likely that I will use this when my PhD starts.

Anyway, those are the few big changes that have happened this week. I'll most likely post again on Wednesday detailing my progress in 1 week towards my goals.

Do you have a reward system built up? Sometimes it's motivating to have something to work for and show off later on.

I haven't been too big on using reward systems, I should use it more.

Right now, when I hit 82kgs, I will let myself buy a fancy new GPS watch to use when I run. I've had my current one for 3 years but it's a bit too basic. I want to do fancy stuff with intervals and be able to record cadence and get more data from runs.

Howdy friends. Thought I'd finally join one of this 6 week challenges so at the end I can look back over the 6 (or now 4.5 weeks) and see what has changed. A bit about me, I'm 24 and I've been a member of the Academy for a year now which is why I haven't used the Rebellion forums until now. I started getting into fitness about 3 years ago after hitting 100kgs and failing to diet for a year. It was finding the couch to 5k program and getting some personal training that finally got me started on the right path which resulted in me losing 20kgs, running 5/10k races, completing sprint and olympic triathlons and becoming a crossfitter. Hence I am a ranger who uses crossfit to improve my running. 

Over the 3 years my weight and fitness has fluctuated however I have generally improved in most areas over the years. I can do pullups, squat 100kgs, deadlift 150kgs, my best ever 5km run time is 25:30, I can do a handstand and a lot more. Even if I'm not at my peak fitness right now, I'm still fitter than I was for my first 21 years of life. 

As for my 6 week challenge, I've written it up a bit differently. I have 4 main goals broken up into diet, fitness, career and personal. Each of these goals has mini quests/rules I'll follow. Yes 2 of my goals are broad however the quests are more specific (such as completing x chapters of a book). I usually write my goals as just too ambitious so to make me work harder. For example, I usually set a weight loss goal of 4kg per month, which is achievable if I'm really strict. However, if I lose 1 or 2 kgs a month, I consider that a 100% success as I've made positive progress. 

Some reasoning for my goals. After 3 years of playing around, I've realised running is what I'm best at hence my fitness goals are running based instead of crossfit based. I prefer running 5 and 10k races as they are short and require speed. If I lose weight and run/train consistently, then my running will improve. Based on past experience, sitting at the 78-82kg range is optimal for my running which is what my CrossFit coach thinks too. Career-wise, I finished a maths/chemical engineering degree, spent a year struggling to find engineering jobs, so decided to pursue my other career path of becoming a Maths Academic which will start with a PhD in Mathematical Biology. I'm always happy to discuss this as I'm passionate about Mathematics. Personally, with the spare time I've had this year, I decided to learn Japanese as I have an interest in their culture including an enjoyment of tokusatsu shows like Super Sentai and Kamen Rider. I've been self-learning for 4.5 months now and feel like I've made good progress. I plan on continuing with it when my PhD starts. 

Current stats

• Weight: 88.3kg
• Best recent 5km time: 27:30
• Career: In pre-PhD mode with start date of Feb 1^st
• Japanese level: (Upper beginner) 454 kanji learned, 1500 vocab learned, 3 chapters of genki completed

Goals

• Weigh less than 84kgs (Diet)
• Run a sub 25 minute 5km (Fitness)
• Prep for Maths PhD (Career)
• Improve my Japanese (Personal)

Diet

1. Stick to 90% paleo
2. Eat only paleo foods at home
3. If eating out, make it as paleo as possible (e.g. no bread, veggies/salad instead of chips, no rice). If paleo is not possible, that’s okay as long as I stick to rule 2
4. Batch cook foods
5. Keep coffee consumption to twice a day

Fitness

1. Run 3 times a week
2. Go to CrossFit 3-5 times a week
3. Stick to my run/CrossFit training program
4. If my body is extra sore, then either take a rest day, skip a CrossFit session or do an easy CrossFit workout.

Races planned

• 22^nd November: 5km Spring into Shape race 3
• 5^th December: 5km Emma and Tom’s Christmas run
• 2^nd January: 8km Portsea Twilight run

Career

1. Complete 300 pages of bio-maths lecture notes
2. Write up one problem set in LaTeX
3. Attend weekly meetings with supervisor and summer research student
4. Read 3 articles on oocytes

Personal

1. Read “The Name of the Windâ€
2. Read “よã¤ã°ã¨â€
3. Complete 4 chapters of Genki
4. Use WaniKani every day to learn Kanji and vocab
5. Learn JLPT N5 vocab and grammar
6. Write one blog post per week on lang-8