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Welcome, one and all, welcome to Level Four! Same basic premise as before, starting with the big goals: 1. Become an Ordained Deacon in the ACNA. Just started seminary classes so that will be the bulk of this goal for now. Also hoping to meet with my Parish Discernment Committee this challenge. 2. Strength GainZ Continue my Stronger by Science workouts 3/week. Currently doing Bulgarian Split Squats and Overhead Press, at the end of this training block (which will be about Week 3 in challenge time) I will be switching to lunges and rows (with deadlifts in both cycles, always). Also going to lump my cardio goals here, thought about making them separate, but really since the goal this year is a faster mile, that's more of a strength goal than an endurance goal. Also, three is a good number, so I didn't want to add another. For this challenge, the goal is just to start rebuilding the habit on my bike trainer. I'm also going to count it if I do stairs during my lunch break, to give me other options on busy weeks. 3. Finish Barndominium Spring is slowly creeping in, so I'll be able to start putting more work into my barn/apartment again. This challenge I want to get my north door hung, finish the interior barn walls, and at least start the barn ceiling.

Here we are, with my 4th cleric challenge, and while not much is changing with the format of the challenge, there are some underlying shifts happening. Starting with the fact that I have not tagged this with ranger, and instead am running in the warrior guild. You'll notice that my crest hasn't changed, because I'm easing myself into this, but my Ranger Brain(TM) is being put in the closet for 2024 while I focus on my three main goals of the year: becoming an ordained deacon in the Anglican Church of North America (which may take longer than a year), gaining as much strength as possible, and completing my barndominium. 1- Become an Ordained Deacon in ACNA I will be starting seminary classes on January 29. It's about a 2 year program, but depending on how things go my first semester, I may double up on classes. On Wednesday, I have a meeting with the Bishop, after which I'll hopefully have a better idea of the timeline for everything else. I'm actually not sure my seminary certificate is required to be ordained, but I do love classes, and it should be helpful, so either way I'm completing the program. 2 - Strength GainZ Why did I spell gains with a capital Z? I really don't know, but we're going with it. Anyways, I'm really enjoying lifting, and I want to take advantage of still being in the period of my life where strength is fairly easy to come by. I feel good when I'm strong, life is easier when I'm strong, and the stronger I get now, the easier it will be to maintain once my immortality wears off. I'm currently following Stronger by Science's free programming which so far has served me well. 3 - Complete Barndominium For those of you who have been following, you know I've been working on building a barn + apartment for 1.5 years already. The barn portion is mostly done. Horses are moved in, and they are loving life in their new digs. This will mostly be on hold for the beginning of the year. Through the winter, I may pick away at finishing a few things inside the barn. Once spring arrives, I'll be focusing on finishing the apartment. The goal is to be moved in by the end of 2024. Since it's all interior work, the weather isn't actually that much of a limiting factor, but at the moment I have very limited daylight outside of work hours, so I'm waiting for longer days as much as nicer weather. There are lots of smaller things I still want to incorporate into my challenges, but here are my big 3 for the year. Let's do this!

If it ain't broke, don't fix it, right? After stumbling on Week 4, I finished last challenge strong so I'm just going to keep on rolling through the holidays and into 2024. What's new for Level 3: Combat I am switching to Stronger by Science's General Beginner workout, which is 3x a week. Exploration After a good 5k last week, I'm high on that cardio life. Probably won't get a lot of running in due to weather and darkness, but I'm actually enjoying my bike trainer more than I had been previously, so looking to keep that going, aiming for 2 sessions/week. Social Holiday festivities plus usual socializing Cantrips I thought this was the level I got a 4th cantrip, but it's not, so no change here Spells I now have 4 1st level spell slots and 2 2nd level spell slots. As in the game, I can cast 1st level spells with 2nd level slots, but I only get 1st level points unless I do something extra to level it up. Channel Divinity - I'm going to tweak Turn Undead to getting rid of things, not just cleaning out the fridge. Roll 1d8 and pitch or donate that number of items. New Spells: My second level spells are as follows - Aid - go to an appointment Borrowed Knowledge - Trinity classes Calm Emotions - meditation Continual Flame - campfire Gentle Repose - no screens after 9 Lesser Restoration - baking Locate Object - cleaning Prayer of Healing - attend monthly healing service I start the challenge at 932 points out of 2,700. I don't expect to level up this challenge, but if I have a successful challenge, I get a sticker for my workout binder! I'm up to 25 hit points when fully healthy, and have 3 hit dice. I will be fighting Shadows: In addition to taking attacks if I miss a workout, I'll also be targeting phone use. Last holiday challenge, I had a lot of success limiting wasted phone time. So this challenge, I'm making a rule that I cannot play games on my phone at home. When I'm out and about and need a distraction, fine, but at home I can find plenty of other things to do. Every time I break this rule, I take 1d6 lightning damage. I kind of feel like I'm forgetting something, but that's enough to be getting started. Happy Holidays, nerds!

Welcome everyone, to my second level of Cleric-ness. Level 1 was a bit of an experiment that all in all went very well, so I'm not changing much. Mostly, I am going to be more intentional about posting my plans for the week on here, and a bit stricter about taking damage for goals I don't make. For combat, I'm switching to a mace for my melee weapon, because blunt force trauma. Also, this shirt is my loot item for this challenge. If I make it to level 3 (900 points) I get to order this. So, challenge set up. Combat 10 points per workout, and I get an attack on my opponent. If I miss a workout, they get an attack on me. And the opponent for this challenge is... Zombie Kobolds! An AC of 11, 16 hit points, a claw attack of +2 to hit, and deal 1d4 slashing damage. Plus undead fortitude, which means they have a chance to come back to 1hp unless I kill them with a crit or radiant damage. A challenge rating of 1/4, worth 50xp each. Exploration 1 point per mile walked, run, or biked. Only count for intentional movement, not incidental movement. Did not get much here last challenge, so this weekend I'm going to set my bike trainer up in the basement to make this more likely. Social 20 points for social interactions with non-family members, or fun outings with family. Cantrips 1 point for each casting. Light - get up without hitting the snooze. Word of Radiance - Morning Prayer (also deals damage!). Mending - routine preventative maintenance on stuff. Spells 10 points per casting. I can prep 3 spells, plus I always have Bless and Cure Wounds prepared because I'm Life Domain. 3 spell slots per week. Channel Divinity This is new for level 2. I can use it once per long rest, which for challenge purposes is once per week. 10 points/use. Turn Undead - My mom is a bit of a hoarder, which includes stuffing the fridge with food she doesn't actually intend to eat. So on a fairly regular basis, I should go through things and feed the chickens. Preserve Life - Canning. Which, unfortunately, I think I'm pretty much done with for the year, as far as produce goes, but I also want to start canning my own soups, so we'll see how that goes. Hit Points I now have 17 hit points, and 2 hit dice, which I can use on a short rest, which is exactly what it is in the game - an hour of rest, where I can read or nap or what have you, but no screen time. Let's roll out!

Hellllooooo, nerds! Welcome to the challenge I've been obsessing over for months, slowly piecing together as I experimented with my D&D themed challenges, the one that I am equally excited about for IRL reasons as I embark on what simultaneously feels like an unexpected yet inevitable turn in my lifelong journey. I am beginning the process of becoming an ordained deacon in the Anglican Church of North America, and so with that, I am embarking on a new phase of challenges where I seek to level up my cleric character, who is really just me, fully embracing my love of TTRPG. This is a more involved challenge format than I usually mess with, and will I stick with it long enough to actually hit level 20? Like and subscribe to find out! So, as with any good RPG, it all starts with The Three Pillars Combat My combat encounters are my workouts. I am going to be focusing on free weights, but any type of resistance training counts here. My original thought was to get 10 XP for every workout I complete. Then I thought to have more fun with it and pick a monster for each challenge, and every time I complete a workout I get to attack the monster, and for every workout I miss the monster gets to attack me. There will be a lot of trial and error this first challenge (and probably moving forward as well) as I figure out what combination of experience points work, finding the balance of getting some points just for completing a workout but also getting additional points whenever I slay a foe. My first enemy is the dreaded Slaad Tadpole. An AC of 12, 10 HP, +4 to hit and 1d4+2 damage. At a big bad 1/8 CR, each one of these ferocious beings is worth 25xp. Our fearless cleric enters the ring with an AC of 16, 12HP, and fights with a spear that gives her +3 to hit and 1d6 damage. Cardio workouts (mostly runs, but we'll see what else crops up) will be ranged attacks, so the sling comes into play with +4 to hit and 1d4+3 damage. Exploration For the exploratory portion of this challenge, I'm simply counting miles I run, bike, or walk. Daily steps don't count, just purposeful movement. 1xp/mile. So I don't get the base 10xp for cardio workouts in the previous section, because I'm getting mileage points here, on top of any tadpole damage I do. Social Encounters One of the things I want to get back after spending so much of the last 2 years focused on building my barn is to go out and see people again. So this is simply 20xp for every outing I have that isn't a family gathering (outings with my sister count as long as they're fun stuff we've decided to do [like going to see a show in Pittsburgh] and not just our normal hang outs.) Hit Points, Healing and Long and Short Rests I have, as previously mentioned, 12 hit points. Since I am DM as well as player, I'm going to be making stuff up as I go (for everything in the challenge, not just here) deciding when I take damage and for what. So if I miss a workout, the Slaad Tadpole gets to attack, if I get sucked into too much screen time, I'll pick a trap that I triggered, etc. But I might also use HP just as a somewhat subjective measure of how I'm feeling. For level 1, at full health I'm at 12, so if I start to feel like I'm at 6, that's a sign I need to slow down and do some healing. As a cleric, I have some healing spells, which we'll cover in the next post, and I'll also have some healing potions available, which I haven't fully ironed out yet. Additionally, I'll be able to roll hit dice on a short rest, which is exactly the same as it is in-game - a period of downtime at least one hour long during which I do nothing more strenuous than eating, drinking, reading, and tending to wounds. Long rests came up at the start of every week, so on Sunday nights I can switch up whatever spells I have prepared for the week and my hit points reset to full. If I die during the week, I regenerate on Sunday night, but earn no experience points for the week in which I died. Stats I went through a bunch of different methods to determine my IRL D&D stats, and this is what I finally came up with: STR: 12 (+1) DEX: 15 (+2) CON: 11 (+0) INT: 13 (+1) WIS: 13 (+1) CHA: 14 (+2) To succeed this challenge and reach level 2, I need 300 experience points. As I get to higher levels and need more xp, I don't expect to level up every challenge, but for the first one, I should be able to get to level 2 in 5 weeks.

"But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Eowyn am I, Eomund's daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him." So there's a reason I wrote my Middle Earth character as a half-elf Rohirrim. While the Dunedain get all the love, usually, I have always thought Rohan was underrated, and no one more so than Eowyn. (It makes me so happy that she ends up with Faramir, another criminally underrated character.) She is such an amazingly deep character with some truly awesome moments (most notably the one above where she faces down the Witch King) and even though the films touch on some of this, they don't begin to do her justice. Though to be fair, no movie could capture the sheer brilliance that is Tolkien. But back to me, while writing my character, I felt like I had some major decisions to make about what direction I wanted to go with my life but was becoming more and more resolved to stay in my hometown (i.e. stay in Rohan and live as a mortal instead of an elf). So now I have decided where I'd like to live for the foreseeable future and where I'd like to work for the foreseeable future and I've started to take some steps to actually do something with my writing and there's one more big decision I've been putting off for a while. What to do with my church. I have no issue with my particular congregation (or no more issue than would arise with any group of people) and it's been my home church for most of my life. These people really are like extended family to me. But the denomination we belong to has some serious hangups when it comes to women in leadership. It's been bothering me for a while, but I was kind of waiting to do anything because if I ended up moving, it wasn't going to be an issue and I'd be looking for a new church anyways. But now that I've decided to stay in the area, I need to decide if I want to stay in my church. It really comes down to two questions: 1. Can I fulfill my calling in my current church? 2. Do I want to be part of an organization that doesn't want women in leadership? In order to help answer these questions, my goals for this challenge are to: -Read Leading from the Second Chair, which was recommended by my ministry coach -Write up my vocational values, another homework assignment from my ministry coach -Spend at least one day fasting and praying -Meet with my ministry cohort and get their input (our next meeting is the end of March, so it will actually be after this challenge ends) -Meet with my pastor to discuss how I'm feeling (don't want to do this until after I meet with my cohort, so again, will extend past this challenge) This doesn't really fall into any of my stat categories, so I will earn +1 Power Point for completing this quest. For my stats, I'm mostly repeating my last challenge to stay in a good rhythm and keep myself in the best state possible to do some soul-searching. I did tweak the experience values some and also broke down some of the bigger goals to make it easier to grade out how I did: Constitution: Take my vitamin every day (1 exp/day, 35 total) Presence: Write one blog post per week (10 exp/post, 50 total) Intuition: Outline my novel (45 experience possible) Mystery subplot - 15 experience Magic subplot - 15 experience Romance subplot - 15 experience Strength: 3 workouts/week (3 exp/workout, 45 total) Intelligence: Calculate siding costs and draw up framing for my barn/apartment (50 experience possible) Siding - 10 experience Framing - 10 experience/side Agility: Continue Walking to Mordor. My goal is to hit 12 Days after Rivendell, which is 135 miles away. A bit of a stretch goal for me, but I haven't been walking enough and need to really get out and move more. 50 experience possible

My Pokemon and I have journeyed far and wide through Kanto collecting 8 badges, honed our skills in preparation for the Elite 4, made our way to the Indigo Plateau to defeat four of the region's top trainers and finally stand before the ultimate challenge, the Champion of the Indigo League. Oops! Charizard knocked out all my Pokemon! (I tore a tendon in my knee during my first Krav Maga Class). Alternate challenge: Pidgeot - mobility every day, alternating between feet and shoulders. Maybe look up some videos of exercises for the neck and wrists, since I'll be spending a lot of time drawing in an armchair with a laptop on my lap rather than my ergonomic desk, which isn't as good for my knee. Writing up workouts tomorrow. Gyarados - 3x seated aerobics per week. I'll try out some videos until I find one I like. My workout buddy has agreed to join me for some of these so we'll connect a computer to the big TV screen and pretend we're in the gym. Otherwise I should be able to do them in my room in the morning. Rhydon - 2x strength workout per week. Once I can get someone to bring me a pair of 5kg dumbbells from the shed. I can do rows, overhead press, seated deadlifts (are apparently a thing), bench press, bicep curls. They'll be too heavy for rotator cuff exercises but I could use cans of soup - I got that idea from one of the low mobility workout videos "And now… I am the POKEMON LEAGUE CHAMPION! BITTEROYSTER! Do you know what that means? I'll tell you. I am the most powerful Trainer in the world!" I had this planned out from way back that the Champion's six Pokemon would correspond to six weeks of the challenge, but since it's four weeks now I'm upping the ante and taking them all on - each Pokemon represents a quest. This is more than recommended but I'm confident that they're achievable goals. To reflect the magnitude of the end of my Pokemon journey, I'll do this for two consecutive challenges, with a small increase in difficulty if I do well. Rhydon - Fitness #1, Strength Training Not going to mess with success - keeping up my routine of 2 Stronglifts workouts and one Pump class per week. Charizard - Fitness #2, Krav Maga I've paid for three trial classes and I'll do one per week with one free week in case I need a recovery. Gyarados - Fitness #3, Swimming/other Use the gym at least one other time per week, usually for swimming but can include Yoga or other classes. Pidgeot - Life #1, Drawing Draw at least two things every day - one drawing copied from a real life object (plant, cat, person, landscape etc) and one drawing out of my head. Sorry to say I won't be uploading these as I've found in the past this becomes a barrier to actually doing the drawing, but I might post one or two. Alakazam - Life #2, Light Screen No backlit screens for one hour before bed. Instead, tidy up, play with the cats, read a book or Kindle, draw on paper, anything without a backlit screen. Exeggutor - Life #3, Relaxation Relaxation meditation at least once a week before bed. Rather than trying to make a regular habit I'm curious to see what happens if I don't meditate daily, but put aside more time for it when I do. Quality over quantity. Bring it on!

PKMN JOURNEY, part 1 I don't need to be the very best, but who hasn't wanted to go on an epic journey of self-development, forming relationships and overcoming challenges along the way? Grab your ball-related puns and let's get moving! Now, I don't live in Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, or Sinnoh, and I have little interest in visiting Unova or Kalos. Looks like I'll have to challenge the fictional PKMN league of New York. If you're unfamiliar with the Pokemon series, that means I have to defeat the leaders of eight type-based gyms, then take on the Elite Four, finally facing the Champion. Each gym in this challenge will be based on a New York location I've visited or called home. Every trainer can carry a party of up to six critters. Three is a good number to have by the first gym, so that's how many will be hanging from my belt to start with. Of course, since this is NF, I'll choose my companions based on how they demonstrate the sort of strength, dexterity, stamina, constitution, wisdom, and charisma I'd like to emulate. STARTING PARTY: Beacon the Litwick - WIS Legato the Ralts - CHA THE CHALLENGES: tl;dr: Six pages of writing per week; Only water or occasional milk or unsweetened tea; Wheat products restricted to a maximum of three per week; Meditation of at least 5 minutes daily; Interval walking for a total of four hours. GRADING THE CHALLENGE Unfortunately, I had to drop bodyweight exercise from this challenge because of my living circumstances. Hopefully I'll be able to add it back in for March's challenge. I'll still look for opportunities for strength training this month, but they'll be off the books, so to speak. FC: 4124-6365-8699 IGN: Aranie

Heads up: In case the title wasn't a tip-off, this challenge is The Force Awakened themed. I'll put any major spoilers behind spoiler tags, but I'm not going to bother hiding non-spoilery stills from the film or minor world spoilers, so if you're avoiding even minor spoilers, best to avoid this thread until you've seen the movie. A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away... Starstuff has been running for a long time. Running from rakghouls. Running toward the next adventure. But now she finds herself facing a new challenge. One she can't run away from. Stranded on the remote desert planet of JAKKU, Starstuff must develop the skills to survive in this harsh new environment... I've been away from Nerd Fitness for a while (if you want the long story, you can take a look at my respawn post), and it's time for me to get back into the game. Because this challenge is all about getting back to the basics, I'm spending it with the Rebels. I'll still be running (I'm actually running the Disney Star Wars Half Marathon halfway through this challenge), and I'm sure I'll be poking my head into the Scout forum from time to time, but that's not my main focus this time around. Main Quest: Build fundamental fitness habits My partner in crime and I have recently gotten serious about having kids, so I want to build healthy habits that will be beneficial to me when I get pregnant and that I can pass on to our kids. Specifically, I want to make the following things ingrained habits. Eat at NFA diet Level 6 90% of the time. This was pretty much where my eating habits were before everything went off the rails last year, and hopefully it will be easier getting there the second time around.Run ~25 miles a week. This was what my running base was for nearly a year before I started slacking, and I know it's a comfortable amount for me.Academy bodyweight workouts 3 times a week. In addition to just being all around good for me, it turns out that a consistent strength routine that focuses on functional and core strength can make labor easier.Yoga or other balance-focused fitness 3 times a week. I have both dyspraxia and loose ligaments, which means that my balance sucks and I'm at a higher risk of randomly spraining or dislocating joints out of nowhere. During pregnancy, the body releases a hormone that makes joints even softer (which is important for being able to give birth, but not so great if your joints are already over-soft), which means I'll be at an even higher risk of falling over at a time when falling over could be really dangerous. So, I want to get some serious balance and stabilizing muscle work in beforehand in the hopes of mitigating that risk. Quest 1: Balance practice You've got to have a good sense of balance if you're going to scavenge any of the good stuff! To complete this quest, I need to do three yoga sessions every week for the duration of the challenge (except for the second week, when I will only do two sessions due to traveling and running a half marathon). 10/10 100%100% Quest 2: Do the boring-but-necessary stuff Sometimes, you've got to do the boring stuff before you can get to the good stuff, like cleaning your haul before you can get paid for it. In the past, I've been a terrible slacker when it comes to warming up and cooling down, which probably contributed to not sticking with my strength training programs. So, before I jump back into strength training proper, I'm going to focus just on warming up and cooling down for a few weeks. To complete this quest, I need do my NFA warm up and cool down three times a week (except for the second week of the challenge, when I will do only two sessions due to traveling and running a half marathon). 11/11 100%100% Quest 3: Eat less Overeating isn't an option when you're working with less than one half portion a day. I've spent the last week tracking my food intake, and it's no wonder I've put on some weight recently. To complete this quest, I need to keep my caloric intake within the budget set by Fitbit an average of six days a week. 25/23 109%109% Life Quest: Spend some time rockin' it at the cantina I've really been wanting to get back into playing my flute, and it's time to work on making regular practice a habit. I even bought myself a book of Star Wars sheet music to encourage myself. To complete this quest, I need to practice my flute for at least 30 minutes, five times a week (except for the second week of the challenge, when I will only practice three times due to traveling and running a half marathon). 15/16 94%94%

I am a female-bodied person who is about to turn 40. Unsurprisingly I am also a nerd, and one of fairly diverse interests. I'm happy with my weight, my diet is reasonably healthy, and I'm able-bodied and capable of doing the stuff I really need to be able to do, physically, so while I'd like to improve my stamina and strength some, my main concern is mental, not physical, fitness; I'm dealing with depression and probable (testing is in progress) AD(H)D and a lot of inertia/momentum issues. Last challenge did not go so well, but I'm giving it another shot with similar, but simplified, goals. Not sure if I'm more suited to the Druids or the Adventurers under the new system... I'm really more of a Cleric. 1) GET UP! At 9am (I have an alarm), get out of bed, take my meds, and stay out of bed. Occasionally I need to get up earlier, in which case it all happens whenever I need to get up. 2) GROUND AND CENTER! After my daily prayers (something I'm already pretty good at keeping up), do a basic grounding and centering exercise. Doesn't have to be fancy or take ten minutes, just has to actually get done. 3) EXERCISE! Between dinner and my night meds alarm (in fact I may set another alarm just for this), do some kind of brief workout. We have a bunch of stuff -- treadmill, exercise bike, various light dumbbells, some kind of TotalGym thing -- around the house that I can use, but I expect to be falling back on jumping jacks fairly often since they need neither equipment, space outside my own bedroom, nor advance preparation. (Note to self: choir rehearsal probably doesn't count, not even when both choirs are rehearsing. You can work out when you get home.) If I've done something that counts earlier in the day, like gone for a hike, or taken advantage of a rare moment of being alone in the house to shake my booty, then I'll probably skip the nighttime thing, but I think that's probably the best time to get the possible sleep-related benefits of exercise, plus it puts the exercise before my shower whether that's at night or in the morning. SIDE QUEST: TAROT CARD STUDY! Paradoxically I have kept this up better when I wasn't involved in a challenge, but now it's starting to become a habit. Keeping it simple, just drawing a card (not with any intention that it's meant to reflect the day or anything), writing down my own impressions, then taking notes from my favored book (Learning the Tarot by Joan Bunning) so they'll stick in my head better. Occasionally I do a three-card reading too; thus far they've been fairly insightful. (And good at telling me to get off my butt. Possibly because I'm using my Hanson-Roberts deck, and while I haven't actually READ with it that much, I've owned it for about 20 years, so it's probably used to my BS by now.) EXTRA SIDE QUEST: POST, YOU FOOL! Post about how I'm doing so I can't hide it if I slack off. Ideally all these things will happen every day, but I'm aiming for getting them done more often than not and not letting missing a day turn into giving up.

WELCOME! This group is for disciples of Christ who wish to improve their bodies to glorify their creator. This thread IS NOT for religious debate! It is for encouraging your brothers and sisters in the faith to "Run in such a way as to get the prize." (1 Cor 9:24) Here's the Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1393420364214700/ Spiritual health is more important than physical health, but you cannot properly glorify the LORD your God if you don't act as a proper steward of everything He gave you! May God bless this 6-week challenge and all its participants.