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Water, Earth, Fire, Air. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then everything changed when the fire nation attacked. Only the Avatar, master of all four elements could stop them. I must master all four elements to become Avatar, to become the master of my body! I'm very excited about the progress I've been making so far and want to keep it going. My Main Goal: still working towards a US size 10 jean but ultimately surpassing this goal is in the books. Officially becoming the Avatar may take a little more than being a smaller size so I am also really focusing on building strength as well. Going for that whole harmony thing. Of course one step at a time. My missions! 1) Book of Water- Upgrade my Diet! I plan to upgrade my diet 3 times using the NerdFitness Diet as a guide. Obviously I am starting at level one and have the potential to upgrade three times during this challenge. Ideally ending at level four. Each level up requires two weeks and each upgrade requires something different. I haven't focused too much on my diet during my last challenge as I have already drastically cleaned up my eating before beginning here at NF but each level of this challenge will help me to be more mindful and healthy in my eating habits. (Grading will be every two weeks as Pass/Fail. At the end of the challenge I will grade the overall progress. Still lvl 1 = FAILED/ lvl 2 = C/ lvl 3 = B/ lvl 4 = A) {Tough to allocate points because there is much that goes into this goal. Many different things going into it. 2 CON, 2 WIS} 2)Book of Earth- Daily Stair Mastery! This may be a big challenge since I live on the 8th floor but I plan to take the stairs instead on the elevator every time from now on! On average I use the elevator in my apt 12-16 times a week. Gonna master the stairs here instead. (Grading will be weekly. 100% use =A/ 90% use =B/ 80% use =C/ 70% use = D/ 60% or less = FAILED) {1 STR, 1 DEX, 2 STA} 3)Book of Fire- Do 3x body weight workouts per week! Last challenge I did the BBWW three times weekly. This week I will adding some variety by using the body weight brigade workouts. Also using my personal warm up and cool down routines. As I complete these I will be upgrading through brigade workouts to further challenge myself. (Grading will be weekly. 3x = A/ 2x = B/ 1x = C/ 0x = FAILED) {2 STR, 2 STA} My life Quest: Air- the air benders were nomads. Perfect for my travel planning goal. In a few months I'll be touring a few places I haven't been to yet Aus but have been procrastinating my planning. I love reading and seeing pics of the sites but I will be travelling on a budget with 2 others so this needs to be planned out properly! I need to get to the details too. {3 WIS} I have also taken new measurements and pictures for myself. My current stats: Bust: 43" Waist: 38" Hips: 43" Thighs L: 23" R: 22" Biceps L:13" R:12.5" Although my airbending skills are great, I still have a lot to learn before I'm ready to save anyone. but I believe, I can save the world! EDIT: This is obviously also my first challenge in The Adventurers Guild and if any of you have any tips or suggestions I would love to hear them!

Avatar: The Last Airbender is one of my favorite stories of all time and for my first NF Challenge, I want to invoke Aang and laugh at gravity. {For those who aren't familiar: The show was originally written for kids and aired on Nickelodeon, but it was so good much of the regular audience was made up of over 18s. My local bar in Brooklyn actually packed in a huge crowd when they played the final four-episode finale. The premise of this world is that there are four main superpowers in existence, and four separate nations or groups of people: The Water Tribe, the Earth Kingdom, the Fire Nation, and the Air Nomads. Special people from each can "bend" their own group's element. Fun fact: The bending styles are based closely on four Chinese martial arts, respectively: tai chi, hung gar, northern shoalin, and baguathang.} My friend and roommate, C, introduced me to this show the very same week she took me and our other roommate, L, to a medley martial arts class. We joked about what kind of bender we'd be and I was the last one to figure mine out. C already knew she was Waterbender (a natural at Tai Chi, sensitive, graceful) and after a few classes not even the giant dudes could knock L down, even though she's tiny. She's totally an Earthbender. It wasn't until we started using holds that I found I could escape almost any situation, particularly with spinning moves. I'm a goddamn Airbender. Fast forward a year, I'm no longer in New York (which makes me happy and sad at the same time) and no longer taking martial arts classes (which just makes me sad). I will again once I'm settled into a new city, but for now while I'm being a bit nomadic I have to do my Airbender training solo. And Airbending is a lot of acrobatics. In the past I've done exercise I didn't love: Running, swimming laps, lifting weights—along with (excessively) restricting food. It never works for long because eventually my resentment that I have to slog through it every single day outweighs the benefits and I start making rude hand gestures at the whole endeavor. The irony in all this is that the times I've been fittest in my life have been when I've done only the things I like. Mostly? Acrobatic, gravity defying stuff. Here on in I will no longer be dragging myself to a gym. I will no longer fight myself. I am going to do what I enjoy. I need to ditch the desire to be routine. Many people seem to take comfort in consistency and repetition. For me routines are shackles. So instead of trying to do a series of movements or circuits a certain number of times a week I'm going to learn specific tricks. Task 1 Upside down things 1: Learn to drop into a backbend. Aim to practice every day, with a minimum of four times a week. My starting count in an up-from-the-ground wheel is a max of 10 "mississippis" in this pose, I'll aim to stay up just a few longer than feels comfortable at the time and take a count at the middle and end of the challenge. 2: If I master drop-backs before the end of the challenge, I'll move on to practicing my crow/frog stand and bound headstand balance times. I'm currently at about 3 "mississippis" for each. Points up for grabs in first 3 weeks: Strength: 2 Stamina: 1 Dexterity: 1 Task 2 Get bendy Splits are a mainstay of acrobats, ninjas, and basasses of all stripes, including Airbenders. And I want in. My starting yet-to-split measurements are right leg front: about 30 centimeters left leg front: about 30 centimeters horizontal: about 23 centimeters To get lower I'm going to do the following stretches (each for a total of at least five minutes) throughout the day as I take breaks from working and/or before bed: Forward bends Butterfly Pancake Pigeon with quad stretch Frog stretch Reclining Hero Points up for grabs in first 3 weeks: Strength: 1 Dexterity: 2 Task 3 Slash at the thyroid monster with food I have a bit of a tendency to restrict my eating when I want to see results and it's problematic, especially because I have a mostly-dead thyroid. In my early 20s (I'm in my late 20s now) while my thyroid was secretly doing the hereditary death-rumba, I found that to lose about a pound a month I had to workout at least an hour a day, seven days a week, and eat less than 1200 calories a day. I did this on and off for years until my thyroid totally died about a year ago and I gained at least 30 or 40 pounds in a couple of months while barely eating at all. It was awesome. Of course, once I got on the right thyroid medication and threw out the grains, things started to change without the need to starve and exercise to exhaustion. I promise to eat. I will eat when my stomach rumbles. EAT. EAT. EAT. Like Appa and Momo. Points up for grabs in first 3 weeks: Constitution: 1 Life goal Fight the complacency beast I'm a freelancer, which means buckets of freedom, and that's great. But to get more (and more interesting) work I need to do some hard self-promotion including cold emails, and that blows. I'd rather bathe in leeches than "network" but I really like having a bed indoors, so I will spend five hours a week pursuing new work. Points up for grabs in first 3 weeks: Charisma: 1 Wisdom: 1 Ready? Set? Yip yip!