Wobbegong

Aren't we all haha Your goals look great! So specific, I love it. It sounds like you have plenty of experience so I probably don't have to say it, but take care of your injury and don't force it! I had not previously heard of the IronMind nail bending but I just looked it up and it looks great! And also like you have a pretty advanced goal there. GET IT! And keep us posted on how your progress is going, either here or in a Battle Log or 4-Week Challenge thread. That way we can cheer

Good luck and welcome to the forums! Motivation is a tough one -- super unreliable. Actually, your four month cycle sounds far more reliable than most people's motivation bucket. Steve wrote a motivation post that basically says "just don't" -- point being, generally, discipline is superior to motivation in terms of long-term practice and gains. If it works for you it works, but if not, you always have the option of trying a different approach. (Of course, as for how you develop discipline, especially when you're not motivated to begin with...) Have you thought much about why/where your motivation goes? If it's so regular, is it possible it's related to something? External, like the changing seasons, or internal, like a tolerance for the gym setting that's running out? If you can figure out what's happening there, it might help you figure out how to avoid the problem or overcome it. Anyway, like I said, good luck and welcome! Let us know how your quest goes. We're cheering for you!

Welcome Chimichanga! You definitely belong here with an intro like that. For powerlifting I'd say check out the Warrior challenge forums as well as (obviously) the weight-lifting forums. The Warrior class is all about dat power. Good luck on your quest and let us know how it's going!

Welcome Twinkie AND Estral! You both belong here. If you hate going to the gym....... don't. Unless you're one of those people who can get away with saying "I hate x but I have to so I'll just deal" and you can channel that gym-hate into an awesome workout I would seriously suggest investigating other fitness options. Ones you'll actually stick with. Do you like rock climbing? Skiing? Kayaking? Are you more a HIIT type? What about bodyweight exercises (you can do them at home!)? There are far more ways to exercise away from a gym than in one. You mentioned running; do you prefer a treadmill or the outdoors? (I'd shoot myself if I had to run on a treadmill, give me a trail any day!) Massachusetts probably has some weather that makes outdoors exercise impractical at times, but there are ways around that, too. On the other hand, if the only thing holding you back at the gym is feeling like an outsider, ask around at local gyms and find one that offers gym tours. Probably more do than don't. The tour will show you where everything is but is also an opportunity for you to point at things and be like "Wtf is that and how do you work it?" You can get a more in-depth version of this with a trainer or by signing up for a college PE course, too. If you and your partner-in-crime are ok with it, men at the gym are also great... especially if you're female-presenting, just walk up to any swole dude in the weight room, put on your damsel face, and ask for help. They'll be happy to explain anything you want.

Welcome Jango! Tell us about some of your level up goals? What brings you to Nerd Fitness?

I usually don't make it through a full challenge because my desire to hang about on the forums tends to last only one or two weeks at a time. Once I'm not reporting back, I'm not accountable, and then.... So I figure I'll jump in for just the last two weeks of this challenge and see how it goes! I'm off FB for the month of May anyway so I have a slightly higher than usual desire to be on the forums as a substitute. I do have trouble with setting my goals too high and/or choosing too many things. So this time I'm going to limit my ambition and get rid of point scoring (everything will be P/F) and just track wether or not I did the thing. Fitness: - I'm working on GMB's Elements program but nowhere near the rate they suggest (it's a daily program with one rest day/week; I usually do one or two of them a week. Yikes!) so I will make this week's goal "figure out a better time to set aside to do the program and schedule workouts into my calendar at that time for the next week." I'm usually pretty good at doing what my calendar says but not very good at putting things on it, so hopefully doing the program will follow naturally form having the time set aside. This goal is literally just put things on my calendar, but to make sure it's working, I will be tracking how often I actually follow through with the plans as listed. - Depending on how this week goes, next week's goal might be "keep up momentum by continuing to schedule workouts at that time and do them" or "start over/find a new time and schedule and see how that goes for a week" Nutrition: - I have a lot of nutrition goals because diet is my biggest stumbling block right now, and I'm tempted to list a bunch of them and go for it. That's a bad way to plan a challenge, though, so I'll stick to one: "don't go back for seconds at dinner." Not only am I usually not hungry when I do this (I just eat really delicious food all the time... it's a problem) but it often causes other members of my household to go back for more food THEY'RE not hungry for in an effort to "finish it" which means there aren't any leftovers for lunch the next day which means I have to spend money or plan ahead and make/pack something. So I just won't do it. That food will be there for me tomorrow. This is a daily goal (since I eat dinner every day) so it's a little harder to give a P/F on whether or not I did it (doing it once doesn't seem like enough...). I also don't always eat dinners that have leftovers so that screws with the base number of days a little. I'll say passing is successfully refusing opportunities for leftovers more than half of the time. Life: - "Set up a personal spend/earn tracker." I know there are apps for this and I've tried a few but I prefer to track my purchases by hand because it helps me connect the dots a little better between the data I'm looking at and the fact that it comes from my spending habits. My spend tracker will be in google sheets and I will know I have earned a passing grade on this goal when I have this year's spending and earning data filled in and a graph or chart of spending by category over time. - If by some freak chance I finish this goal today (it is my plan for the afternoon), my reach goal is to start reading my birthday book, Cannibalism: A Perfectly Natural History by Bill Schutt.

Sounds like a great quest! Good luck with the weight -- it really sucks when all your hard work goes up in smoke, but it sounds like you've got what it takes to make it happen! I love the entire Abhorsen series, great choice. Let us know how everything is going!

I've never done Whole30 but a cousin did it recently and said a lot of people she knows forget to add things back to their diet one at a time so they can figure out what the problem was. Go slow and keep track! Your other goals look great, and congrats on fostering and homeschooling!! That's awesome and takes a lot of work. Let us know how things are coming along.

Love your goals! I think I'll take a page out of your book and jump in myself, even though we're already like halfway through this challenge. Whatever. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

This. People will want pictures of you no matter what you look like or how well your costume came together; what matters is that you're expressing love for a character they love too. I would absolutely encourage you to cosplay, but if you're nervous, I would actually suggest going to the con in regular getup first. You'll get a chance to see other cosplayers and learn firsthand that they don't all have perfect bodies, and you'll get to see the culture. Although the comments in this thread are generally true - that cosplayers are friendly and welcoming as a community - the community etiquette can differ quite a bit from convention to convention. I've been to some cons where it's considered appropriate to run up to cosplayers - I'm talking total strangers here - and "glomp" them (jump-hug) if their costume doesn't look delicate... and other cons where people will come up to you all excited and respectfully ask for a photo. Going to the con without a costume can give you a feel for what to expect without putting you in the thick of it.

One thing I might suggest is spending some time in the sun/outside? It sounds like you walk around a lot so it may not be an issue but I definitely find that sunlight during the day a. helps me sleep better and more deeply at night and b. brightens me up and makes me feel more energetic. Even when I was walking a four-mile round trip commute and getting plenty of steps, since it was mostly in the early morning/evening I wasn't out and about at peak sunshine hours. Probably because I work in a city and live most of my life indoors, I'm like a wilted plant... I hydrate well but I really do need sunlight to survive. Try it any see how you feel! If you're prone to burning like I am, you'll be happy to hear that sunscreen makes only a negligible difference in the energizing effects of sunshine (although I always feel better about myself having avoided a sunburn, so maybe it makes a positive effect?) Anyway I'd say go for it and good luck!

I tend to have issues with muscle soreness after intense workouts, so I usually do a full period of stretching and foam rolling on rest days. It keeps me active, gives me something to do so I don't "break the chain," and isn't too strenuous if you do it right.

I like to get stuff somewhat unrelated to fitness and the goals I'm setting, because that way I can reinforce the idea that taking care of myself translates to happiness in other areas of my life as well. I keep a list of "big" purchases that I want to make (for me anything more than about $25, but usually closer to the $70-$120 range) -- only for nonessentials, things I won't use every day. I tend to have a problem with impulse-buying, so I set limits on myself and just write things down when I want them instead of buying them in the moment. I keep a master list somewhere safe and jot notes down wherever, and when I consolidate I get the opportunity to see if I still want what's already on the list. (Sometimes I don't and then I get to skip spending money on it!) Anything that stays on the list for more than a month can become loot! Everything from nice linen handkerchiefs to video games to a special pair of shoes or a trip to the aquarium has made it to my loot list. This practice is also really helpful if you tend to offer people blank looks around birthdays and holiday gift-giving season when asked what you want.

I hate LA and try to avoid being there but my sister lives down there so I bite the bullet and visit sometimes. If you eat meat, my #1 rec is a highly underrated fast food joint called Zankou Chicken that's local to the area (I know, fast food, really? But it's rotisserie chicken/mediterranean fast food). But I haven't been in years, so check Yelp to make sure it's still good. Overall I think the best thing about LA is the food (and I live in the Bay Area, we're no slouches up here either!), although many people like to tell me it's actually the weather. Psssh. Anyway, just stop a local on the street and ask "what's your favorite place to eat?" or if you're feeling fancy "where do you go to celebrate?" Also works for things to do... "if you could take a vacation day and do anything around town, what would it be?" Of course, you'll have to find a local on a street to do this. In some parts of town, that's easier said than done... Good luck and have a great trip!

I think motivation really comes down to the individual, but for me, I try to make it not be about motivation. I kind of think of "motivation" as a built-in excuse: "Well, I don't feel motivated today, so that's why I didn't ___..." or "Well, I had a lot of motivation for the past two weeks, but then I guess I ran out of steam, so..." I have proven to myself that I can go weeks or months on end without feeling "motivated." At a certain point, it kind of clicked that it wasn't working for me and I needed to reframe my mindset, but it took a lot of working up to commitment and then shying away from it for that switch to flip. So that's what I do now. Instead of "I should work out," or "I have a lot of energy, I guess I can think about my diet today," I just make it a thing that I do. Start slow. I picked a C25K program for running and assigned three mornings of the week (on days that I wfh and a weekend, since I'm that lucky, but pick what works for you) and just do it. Instead of "Well it's Tuesday so I should run today" it becomes "It's Tuesday, I run today." This morning, one of my running days, I woke up and saw it was dumping buckets. We're expecting five inches of rain this weekend, and so far have not been disappointed. But it's a running day, so I'm going out anyway. If you want to frame it in terms of motivation, I guess I tell myself "You'll feel great if you go and you'll hate yourself if you don't" and "you love wandering around in the rain anyway" but those aren't really the reasons I'm going out. With diet I find it very difficult to set a plan or a set of guidelines and stick to them throughout the week at every single meal (such as, "I'm vegetarian so I don't eat meat," or "I'm paleo so I don't eat processed foods") -- mostly because I just forget, and then it's too late. Instead I do meal prep once a week, and then I can just grab something and go whenever I get hungry. Instead of motivating myself to remember my diet all the time, I only have to remember it once a week, and then I'm all set up for success. It does take a little extra planning, but I think on balance a lot less than planning every day or every meal individually. Best of luck getting back into your groove! You'll figure it out one way or another.

Hello NF Gurus (please help me, I'm anxious), I changed my diet recently and have suddenly found myself simply not getting hungry. This is a pretty shocking state for me; the only time in my life I can remember not being hungry for any period of time not immediately following a meal is when I had the stomach flu in 6th grade. Reviewing my eating habits, I'm concerned that these past few days I haven't been eating nearly enough calories (I don't want to ruin my metabolism, after all) but I honestly haven't *wanted* to eat. In an effort to avoid eating crappy processed food and save money by not going out to eat all the time, last weekend I did some meal prep so that I would have healthy options waiting at my fingertips. I made this sweet potato hash (except I kept the skins) and a homemade version of Mixt Green's Orchard Salad (I subbed biltong for bacon because I had it on hand and cashews for almonds for the same reason, and significantly increased the proportion of kale to lettuce because I had to eat the whole head of kale and had no other plans for it, and my dressing is 1:2:3 balsamic vinegar : red wine vinegar : olive oil, about 2 tbsp total per salad). Made three enormous salads (about 6 cups each). In an effort to add some liver to my diet, I bought a slab of pate as well, which I ate once on cucumber sticks and then forgot about. Tuesday Breakfast: Sweet potato hash (1c), poached eggs (2) Lunch: Avocado w/ salt Afternoon snack around 4pm: chicken liver pate w/ cucumber (5oz pate) Dinner: not hungry (understandable since late snack w/ high satiety) Wednesday Breakfast: Sweet potato hash (1c), poached eggs (2) Lunch: Office catered lunch: teriyaki chicken skewers w/ onion + bell pepper (2), Coconut rice (3tbsp; trying to lower carbs), macaroni salad (1tbsp), pulled pork (1/3 cup) Dinner: homemade orchard salad, see above -- it was nearly impossible to eat all of this salad Thursday Breakfast: Sweet potato hash (1c), poached eggs (2) Lunch: Orchard salad (another 1/3) (took two hours to get through this salad, ate at my desk) Dinner: not hungry Friday Breakfast: Sweet potato hash (1c), poached eggs (2) Lunch: Thai stir-fry cashews w/ vegetables and beef (1 1/2 cup), brown rice (1/4 cup) Dinner: not hungry As I was trying to fall asleep last night -- another thing I never used to have trouble with, especially on days like yesterday when I go for a morning run, but I've been so high energy this week it's been harder than usual -- I realized my total calories might be only around 1200 some days. So this morning, I added an extra egg to my breakfast. I wasn't able to finish the hash or begin the third egg, despite feeling hungry for the first time in about 18 hours before I started eating (from filling up on lunch at 2pm yesterday to finally considering food at 8:30 am today). I usually eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and snack once or twice a day. I am 24 years old, 5'7", and on Tuesday morning weighed 187.8 lbs. According to Havoc's lean body mass calculator I have 136.6 lbs of lbm. My main concern is that I am eating too little to support a healthy metabolism. Do you think this is likely? I did a little research this morning and a lot of keto diets recommend carb cycling to protect the metabolism and maintain bodyweight, but I'm not sure if I'm eating few enough carbs to get into ketogenesis and I would like to lose weight (as a side effect of eating healthier in general, NOT from a starvation diet). If I'm honestly not hungry, should I just not worry about it? "Listening" to my body's needs and not eating when I'm not hungry is pretty foreign to me, but I would love to learn. If my body is being this obvious about what it wants, maybe everything is ok? Aside from the weirdness of not being hungry, I've been more energetic, more focused, and generally happier for the past week. Any thoughts or insight you might have is totally welcome, please tell me if I should force myself to eat more or if I'm ok as-is.

Oh man... I had the great privilege of traveling in France with my family many years ago. Our first night in Nice, exhausted from a long day of travel, we looked out the hotel window and saw a line stretching around the block. We all looked at each other and then kind of shrugged like "what the heck, we're in France, let's find out what it is!" and trudged down there. What followed was the most amazing gelato I have ever had in my life... served in the shape of a blooming rose. Not sure if that's common but it sure blew my 12-year-old mind.

Hello! Following along to cheer and because we have similar goals. Great job with reversing your T2D! You've made awesome progress already. Looks like you're covered on strength and cardio, but are you doing any flexibility training? I love foam rolling... I should definitely do it more. Did you end up finding anything out about appropriate timing? Have fun in France!! Sounds like you've earned a vacation. Although you mentioned being concerned about the food, none of the things you mentioned are particularly carby (except possibly the tomatoes). Eat those delicious fats with impunity, girl!

Hey! I love your mini quests. I'm going to follow along because you are exemplifying two things I suck at: simplicity and buildable, trackable goals. One of my coworkers just told me about Tim Ferriss yesterday. I will definitely have to look into this. Saitama is within your grasp! You too can be One Punch Man. Although the one thing that has always bothered me about his workout is the lack of pull exercises. Wouldn't he be really hunched over from having an overdeveloped chest in comparison to his wimpy back? Of course, there's a a simple solution: add 100 pull ups to the daily plan! You got this!

Well, IrishPiratess was specifically asking about non-protein high calorie options, but yeah, I feel ya. There are so many options for high calorie/high energy snacks that aren't going to derail your nutrition plan: butter, vegetable/olive/coconut oil, nuts and seeds, dried fruit (or fresh fruit, but it's less calorically dense because water), etc. It's not too hard to add a few calories and some fat/carbs in here and there; sometimes all it takes is some ideas! As for your friend, I'm not sure I would pick milk chocolate... although she does have a point about the calorie:weight ratio. Probably the most important thing for someone trying to increase their calories -- whether from a diet plan or due to volume or intensity of exercise -- is to have a variety of easy things ready-at-hand. Snacks are your friend, and variety will keep you from getting bored and forgetting (or refusing) to eat. Although on a backpacking trip there are a lot of other size/weight/packaging things to consider as well. And of course, this is why NF is here! No matter what your goals are, as long as in some way they are leading you down a path toward health and fitness, there are going to be people on the forums to bounce ideas around, offer advice and encouragement, and remind you that you always have other options. Maybe macros aren't gonna be the thing. Maybe they are, but it just takes some adjusting to get used to them. It's all about learning what works for you.

All of this. Glad you fulfilled the snark quota, Raincloak Any muscle definition is going to be impossible to see if there's a layer of fat on top of it. If you're overweight, or even in many cases healthy, no one is going to be able to see the muscle definition beneath all the padding. Basically, you can do crunches until the cows come home, but unless you're already lean you need to clean up your diet and overall body comp before you'll see that 6-pack. @Grymm makes a great point also about the type of exercise you're doing and the way it builds muscle. High reps build endurance; heavy weight builds strength. But no matter what, your muscles won't bulk up unless you're feeding them properly. You can also always consult an expert. I haven't read it, but the Kavadlo brothers get great reviews and seem to be pretty low-tech/no-nonsense.

If you're not sure you can do the exercise, you can always look up progressions for the movement. Just look up "pushup progression" or whatever the exercise is on the search engine of your choice and you will find more articles than you know what to do with. Shop around or pick one and jump in! Alternatively, there is always the advice that "the best way to learn how to do something is to do it." Some people say that progressions, especially for compound bodyweight exercises, don't target all the same muscles in the same way that the final form of the exercise does, so they don't properly build up your ability to do that motion. To address that, you can always just keep trying to do the goal form -- even if you can only handle part of the range of motion, just do a few (nowhere near an amount that will exhaust you) as best you can, as often as possible throughout the day. With consistent practice you will improve.

Keeping track of what kind of calories you're taking in is also important. Sounds like you're on track with eliminating some processed food, but I'd recommend this video for a quick introduction to the insulin reaction and the way eating and weight gain affect each other. If you're having trouble with between meal snacking, try increasing the protein, fat, and/or fiber in your meals. These three things -- fat and fiber especially -- contribute to satiety, how full you feel and how long you stay full. Also, if you don't drink much throughout the day or drink a lot of sugary things like soda, juice, or sweetened coffee drinks, try having a glass of water before your snack. You might just be thirsty, and you could be surprised at how often people in our culture confuse "hungry" and "thirsty" signals.

I just watched this video on NEAT (Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis) which offers a number of interesting studies and theories on the differences between lean and overweight people. Basically, the idea is that the difference isn't in the exercise you perform intentionally (going to the gym, working out at home, etc) but in the little actions you take throughout the day and the way those add up. Instead of emailing or calling your coworker, get up and go talk to her. Take the stairs. Walk to the bathroom that's farther away. Set an alarm to go off every hour and every time you hear it, do a lap around the perimeter of your building (inside or out). You can even look up exercises to do subtly at your desk and just work a couple sessions into your day. You can't outrun your diet, but you can teach your body to more efficiently use the energy you give it.

If you're not married to protein coming from meat, beans are great. Buy them dry for extra cheap and soak them to remove 95% of those pesky "anti-nutrients" paleo-followers are always complaining about. Also mushrooms, tofu/tempeh, and my personal all-time favorite, eggs!