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Hi, so I'm going to start off by saying I have no idea what I'm doing. Seriously, I first posted this in the wrong challenge section (thanks so much to the kind soul who pointed that out to me, I might've gone forever without noticing). I've never joined or posted in any forum before, ever, not just on Nerd Fitness. However, change is good, so I'm trying, even if I am starting late. Since I'm new, I'm just going to break this down into parts. Intro: Right, so, my name is Rose, I'm 23 and in college, but I work on the weekends. I live in Thailand, but I don't speak and am not Thai. I'm about 157 cm, and 50 kilos. I recently gained 6 kilos in one year, which is a lot for me, considering my height and size. I do exercise sporadically, and I sort of like running and yoga. Ah, I don't have any cooking implements except for a cutting board, knives, and a water heater for noodles and stuff, and I really cannot and for that matter do not want to cook. There's a lot of food around though, so that's not really a problem. There's even a sort of market a 5 minute walk down. I do occasionally do salads sometimes, because that doesn't require actual cooking. I once even got creative and used the hot water from the water heater to boil pasta. Right, so next is goals. My main quest would be just being more healthy I guess. I don't just won't to lose weight, I also want to be fit, to be able to do pullups or pushups or run for a while, etc. Overall betterment, so stronger, more endurance, more flexibility, and so on. So my three specific goals are: 1. Exercise 5 times a week for 30 min, preferably Running 3 times a week and Yoga or some other exercise 2 times a week, but if I don't feel well I may go with something easier in the beginning. Also 20 pushups (in whatever form or number of sets I can do) a day. 2. Eat under 1200 calories 5 days a week (preferably healthy food, but I'll try to work up to that, for now, whatever) 3. Get 7-8 hours of sleep a day, can be in the form of naps. (I normally average around 6 hours, currently) Life side quest would be to stay on top of school and work, but that's going to happen anyway, because it can't not. So, budgeting would be best. Stay under 15k per month. For picking a guild, I'm automatically in Recruit, I think. For my miniquest: Is your overall quest achievable (over a short or long period of time)? Is it reasonable? (Yes) Do your 3 quests all build towards your main quest in little ways, or are you taking on too much? Do your quests have sub-quests or is it just one thing to focus on? (Build towards the main, not certain what subquests are, but I don't think so?) Are your main goals realistic? Can you scale them to smaller steps to fit your life better, even if it will make it take a little longer to achieve them? (Yes, I can run at college, do yoga in the mornings, and there's plenty of food around. Getting enough sleep might be a problem, but I'll figure it out) Are your goals able to be measured and tracked? What will you use to track them? (Whether or not I did them) How are you grading your goals? Are they pass/fail (“every dayâ€, “not even once over the six weeksâ€)? Is there a reward for the effort, or are you only grading yourself on whether or not you “lose the weight†or “run the distanceâ€? (Pass/fail, save 100B for every day I meet my calorie goal, but running and yoga are kind of their own rewards and so is sleep) What is your plan for continuing/altering/grading those goals if you become ill or injured? (Ah, just stop and then pick it back up when I'm well again. Not going to beat myself up if something happens, but I've run and done yoga before, so I don't think I'll cause injuries) Did you take into consideration any special occasions (Labour Day, Independence Day, birthdays, anniversaries, etc) that may occur during the challenge? What modifications do you need to build into your goals for those? (End of the challenge coincides with Final exams, but 30 min a day isn't a big deal, so I don't think I'll need to make a change) Do any of your main goals conflict with each other? Will one goal make it hard to do another? (Yeah, exercise will cut into sleeping time, since I'll need to do the yoga when I first wake up, but it's fine, I can nap) Do you already have the time in your schedule to actually complete the goals you’ve set? If not, what are you planning to do to make time for them? (Maybe. 30 minutes isn't a lot of time, so I should have enough. The sleeping might be a problem because of my school and work and I'm sort of a night owl, but I'll try not to read or be on the internet so much and that should free up some time) Are you trying to build multiple habits, or is all your energy focused on your main quest? (multiple, in terms of food, exercise and sleep. But the main quest is overall health and betterment, so they all work towards that) 1200 calorie goal 88%88% 30 minutes of exercise 100%100% 7-8 hours of sleep 88%88% Ahmwahahahaha, I've made a progress bar. Awesome. Now if only I could find out how to properly label it....

All right, I just happened to stumble upon the notification that the challenge started today an hour or two before my normally-scheduled bedtime, so here's me getting things on paper (or screen) as quickly as possible so I can wake up tomorrow and start kicking butt! MAIN QUEST The Incredible Shrinking Woman!!!! This is my way of saying that I'd like to be a US size 16 or smaller. Current size is 26. Last time I was a size 16 was in 2001 right after I gave birth to my son. I realize that this will definitely take longer than 6 weeks, but I figure I can make some good progress. I have also never weighed less than 200 lbs as an adult (was 209 after giving birth), so that'd be cool too. GOALS 1. Cut out soda completely by 10/27. Diet soda is my weakness, and it must be eliminated. This is a pass/fail goal. If I've been more than a week without soda by 10/27, it's a pass (A+! 30 points!). If it's been less than a week since my last fizzy transgression on 10/27, it's a fail (F! No points!). 2. Eat Paleo at least 80% of the time. I'm allowing a "cheat" meal on Friday nights as I'm not sure I'm ready to give up my pasta entirely just yet. Baby steps. This goal will have to be self-graded at the end of the challenge, but for evaluation purposes I'll be tracking all food intake on MyFitnessPal to have a record when Judgment Day cometh... A = 30 points, B = 20 points, C = 10 points, D or F = NO POINTS. 3. Work out at least 3 days per week. By "work out" I mean "purposely engage in a physical activity no less than 30 minutes in duration". Working out might be Zumba. It might be karate. It might be playing Just Dance on the Wii. But if there's anything I learned this weekend on my two mile cave hike, it's that my strength is okay, my endurance and cardio abilities are poop. Especially when it comes to climbing stairs/hiking up hills. 10 points will be up for grabs each week, completing all 3 workouts earns the points. Total of 60 points available over the course of the 6 week challenge. Naturally, this is like Whose Line is it Anyway?, where everything is made up and the points don't matter (they're just a little gag to hold the show together), but I still like points. How can you level up without them?? LIFE QUEST Spend 1 hour every day "unplugged". No phone, no iPad, no computer, no TV... nothing with a screen. 1 point is available every day this goal is successfully completed, making for a whopping 42 potential points if I'm good and do it every day. Give me a few minutes here and I'll get a cool signature all up in this profile. Que comience el reto!

Well, I squeaked into day 1 just in time, and even managed to achieve today's goals! Thanks to my amazing friend (in real life) TheHalfie for telling me about Nerd Fitness long enough in advance that I had ample time to procrastinate about completing my post until the last moment! (This might be something for next challenge.) But I'm thrilled to be here and give six weeks a chance to retrain my habit patterns. With my new goals in place, I'm off on my mission to find balance. Here's the July 29 rundown. WIN: work up at 5:30am. (That'll be a point thanks.) WIN: yoga workout (yup, that's another point for day 1) WIN: No caffeine and NO gluten (boom -- 2 points) Side quest: totally unpacked my bags from a weekend away. Side quest score. 4 points, and priceless satisfaction. Ok Day 2, I'm ready for you.

Welcome True Seekers*! We’re all here on a quest and ready to help each other along. Whether your goal is to lose 10 pounds, stop munching on the cookies your friend baked, or just move past ‘gee that workout DVD looks cool’ to ‘yeah, that’s way too easy now!’ we’re here to help. If you want to join, sign up here, and/or message us below if we need to make more room. Members: Froggiesrock Wocket LassKerr We'll post goals below or on Facebook! (Find us at NF Challenge True Seekers) Since many of us are new, I am hoping this might help us be a little more accountable as I’m guessing new means we are not necessarily wired into the NF Forums yet. *If you missed the reference, it’s a Minbari sect from Babylon 5. Summary from the lords of info spamming at Wikipedia: “Minbari respect the role of "true seekers," which Delenn explains are those who follow the calling of their hearts in a quest. Even when such a seeker's task appears to be folly, other Minbari – especially religious caste – will provide what assistance they can.â€

Hi, Brand new rebel here with my first post. My name is Joe and I am from the UK. My nerd credentials first: I love comics. Right that is out of the way. Phew. Now on to fitness credentials. I have been in and out of the fitness world my whole life. Played football (Soccer) a lot (and I mean a lot) up until I was about 20 then at university I found beer and laziness and one thing led to another and I am in the state of unfitness I am today. During that time there have been sojourns into running - a year or so of training for 5ks and a half marathon, got back in to football (soccer) for a couple of years and most recently about 18 months ago - I started on some strength training (Rippetoe's starting strengh to be precise (man I love brackets(parenthesis))). Right, I'm getting bored of my biography so I'll call it a day on that one, except to say I am currently the heaviest I have ever been (dead on 200lbs) and I estimate my body fat % to be a little over 25%. Which brings me on to the first part of my challenge. Main Quest For me this is a no-brainer to reduce my weight and body fat % (ultimately getting down to 10-15% bf% and whatever my healthy weight will be at that time. This will obviously take time but I hope by posting here I will have the staying power to eventually reach this goal. So that is my main overall goal, what will I do during this challenge to start on my way to achieving it I hear you cry. Well, actually I've already started. This week I have dived into a Primal/Paleo diet (full paleo straight off, hope I won't regret it) and have started following the crossfit endurance 6 week plan. http://crossfitverobeach.typepad.com/files/competitor_06_2011_cfe1.pdf So with a running start my 3 missions to start me on my way are: Mission 1 Eat at least 80 % Paleo for the next six weeks - I have gone straight in full (95%) Paleo but not sure I will sustain this rate but I am giving it a go. Mission 2 Continue to follow the crossfit endurance fitness plan and at the end (week 6 of challenge) join the local crossfit box - Will try not to miss a workout during these 6 weeks which will be a challenge as I am going on holiday in 2 weeks time, this will also make Paleo diet a challenge too. eek Mission 3 Get 8 hours of sleep each night - This one will also be tricky because not only do I have 2 young children who enjoy waking up very early but I also like to play online poker and find myself up way too late most of the time. So challenge is to get to bed at a sensible time so the lovely kids can wake me up at silly o'clock. I realise this post is getting quite long already, so I will now rush to my life goal. Life Quest Start writing my screenplay - for a long time I have had a desire to be a writer/filmmaker - this 6 weeks is the time to start. Anyway, there it is. My initial foray into a 6 week challenge. Have I bitten off more than I can chew. Who knows? I hope some of you will follow me along as I see what I can achieve over this 6 week period. Enough for now. Will pose more another time to give a bit more details about myself. Sorry for the length of this post but I didn't have the time to write a short one. Joe/Spidey1978

Hi, Brand new rebel here with my first post. My name is Joe and I am from the UK. My nerd credentials first: I love comics. Right that is out of the way. Phew. Now on to fitness credentials. I have been in and out of the fitness world my whole life. Played football (Soccer) a lot (and I mean a lot) up until I was about 20 then at university I found beer and laziness and one thing led to another and I am in the state of unfitness I am today. During that time there have been sojourns into running - a year or so of training for 5ks and a half marathon, got back in to football (soccer) for a couple of years and most recently about 18 months ago - I started on some strength training (Rippetoe's starting strengh to be precise (man I love brackets(parenthesis))). Right, I'm getting bored of my biography so I'll call it a day on that one, except to say I am currently the heaviest I have ever been (dead on 200lbs) and I estimate my body fat % to be a little over 25%. Which brings me on to the first part of my challenge. Main Quest For me this is a no-brainer to reduce my weight and body fat % (ultimately getting down to 10-15% bf% and whatever my healthy weight will be at that time. This will obviously take time but I hope by posting here I will have the staying power to eventually reach this goal. So that is my main overall goal, what will I do during this challenge to start on my way to achieving it I hear you cry. Well, actually I've already started. This week I have dived into a Primal/Paleo diet (full paleo straight off, hope I won't regret it) and have started following the crossfit endurance 6 week plan. http://crossfitverobeach.typepad.com/files/competitor_06_2011_cfe1.pdf So with a running start my 3 missions to start me on my way are: Mission 1 Eat at least 80 % Paleo for the next six weeks - I have gone straight in full (95%) Paleo but not sure I will sustain this rate but I am giving it a go. Mission 2 Continue to follow the crossfit endurance fitness plan and at the end (week 6 of challenge) join the local crossfit box - Will try not to miss a workout during these 6 weeks which will be a challenge as I am going on holiday in 2 weeks time, this will also make Paleo diet a challenge too. eek Mission 3 Get 8 hours of sleep each night - This one will also be tricky because not only do I have 2 young children who enjoy waking up very early but I also like to play online poker and find myself up way too late most of the time. So challenge is to get to bed at a sensible time so the lovely kids can wake me up at silly o'clock. I realise this post is getting quite long already, so I will now rush to my life goal. Life Quest Start writing my screenplay - for a long time I have had a desire to be a writer/filmmaker - this 6 weeks is the time to start. Anyway, there it is. My initial foray into a 6 week challenge. Have I bitten off more than I can chew. Who knows? I hope some of you will follow me along as I see what I can achieve over this 6 week period. Enough for now. Will pose more another time to give a bit more details about myself. Sorry for the length of this post but I didn't have the time to write a short one. Joe/Spidey1978