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Here we go again! It's going to be a fire coloured challenge: my rash is acting up, I'm burning down old habits, and Christmas is coming! It seems that my challenges are made of guidelines that I test out in my ongoing quest of losing weight. At the end of the last challenge, I came up with a mixture of intuitive eating and calorie counting, which I'm testing out. The concept is simple: every day, I have a list of foods to eat, and I can eat them whenever I want. The point is to liberate myself from obsessing over mealtimes and counting calories: I'm gonna learn to listen to my body's signals, and since the calories are already counted, I can just pick the foods from the list. Boom. There are two different templates: for the days when I eat lunch at home, and days when I eat lunch at a university restaurant. The list is currently on a Word file, and I just mark down what I've already eaten. The calories have been already counted, so I just need to pick the items I want - if I eat only what's on the list, I know that my calories are in check, and... well, it's just simple. I have a certain amount of calories assigned for certain food groups (for example, meat: 350 calories), but I can shift and modify, if need be (if I have 150 calories left for eating eggs and I know that I'm gonna have fish for dinner, I can drop the eggs and have that fish instead). Since I'm already active and enjoy exercising 2-3 times a week, this is going to be my only goal this challenge. Keep it simple, stupid! Let's do this!

It's time for a new challenge! During the last challenge, I put up the Foxy Business, and the company's kicked off pretty nicely. I learned new things, and it's time to modify the business strategy! Where are we now? I've dealt with a bunch of emotional baggage, and I'm in a better place than two months ago. My stress levels have been very low for many weeks, and I'm noticing a huge change in my energy levels! I don't know how much I weigh, currently, but I'm taking a break from calorie counting and the scale during this challenge. Usually, when I hit 70 kg, my motivation drops - so, if I don't know the number on the scale, I'm only going to have to keep doing my best Where are we going? Towards stronger, healthier, happier me, and beautiful booties. I sometimes have a feeling that my life is pointless, but I now do my very best to see life as a wonderful possibility that's given to me, and I believe that being as healthy as I can will give me more possibilities to do what I want. That's where I'm going! Goal 1: Mental Training The biggest part of my weight loss journey. Every morning, I will dedicate at least 5 minutes to focus on the day ahead of me and visualize the way I want to act in certain situations (such as unexpected treats, not snacking). I'm just going to sit down, close my eyes, and go through a list of things I want to do. Some sort of purposeful meditation, if you will. Goal 2: Nutrition During the last challenge I realized that adding more protein in my diet keeps me filled longer and holds my energy levels high. During this challenge, I will focus on adding protein to my diet, and follow three simple guidelines: no snacking eat mindfully; focus on portion sizes one daily snack allowed, and one bigger treat every week That's it. No calorie-counting, just these three guidelines. ** As you can see, I have two main goals/business strategies in this challenge. In addition, I will do a kettlebell + bodyweight training WO twice a week (didn't make this a goal in case I get sick). DA WORKOUT PLAN (DISCLAIMER: I made up these workouts myself. I'm not a health or fitness professional, and if oyu want to try either of these workouts, you do it at your own risk. Thanks!) I'm gonna do two workouts every week: workout A and workout B. They are circuit workouts that combine kettlebells and strength training exercises. Each workout consists of three rounds. One round lasts 9 minutes: (2 min kettlebell + 1 min strength training) x 3 with 2 minutes of rest between rounds. This means that one workout takes me exactly 31 minutes, plus warm-up and cool-down. Each round has two exercises, A (2 min) and B (1 min). I do these two exercises three times without breaks, which means that one round lasts 9 minutes. WORKOUT A ROUND 1 A: 2 min kettlebell swings B: 10 push-ups AB x 3 ROUND 2 A: 2 min snatches B: 20 deadlifts AB x 3 ROUND 3 A: "stopped" figure-8 B: 20 mountain climbers AB x 3 WORKOUT B ROUND 1 A: 2 min kettlebell swing B: 15 squats AB x 3 ROUND 2 A: 2 min "stopped" figure-8 B: 16 single-leg deadlifts AB x 3 ROUND 3 A: 2 min kettlebell swing B: 30 second plank * AB x 3 *hold the last one as long as you can (DISCLAIMER: I made up these workouts myself. I'm not a health or fitness professional, and if oyu want to try either of these workouts, you do it at your own risk. Thanks!) Let's get this challenge going!

The revolution starts here, and our founding principles, comrades, are these: 1 Gun Running Well, just running, actually. Keep up one long run, two short runs per week and at least one exercise of some type every day, and complete the C25K with Flyer by the end of the challenge. She's about half way through now, so this should be doable, but I won't rush her gammy leg. I also need to find a new goal to aim for - another race, in other words, so I have a bit of direction. 2 Arms Dealing Well, just working on arms, really, and my aim will be to raise my capacity in pull-ups from one-on-a-good-day to three-on-a-good-day 3 Deciding who will be first against the wall Well, not against the wall, actually, but freestanding handstand practice where possible, looking to hit 5 seconds' PB in this 6 week period 4 Absorb Propaganda And generally, be a good citizen. There's an election coming up in my country in about 3 months' time, so the main plank of this will be to try and stay in touch more with politics. I already listen to a couple of global news podcasts, and one US politics weekly, but I for the home front (arguably the most important news) I only listen to the Guardian Politics Weekly. I don't read a paper or watch TV news, so I'm not really as informed as I should be as someone due to wield a voting paper, so I will aim to get a good, solid chunk of news content into my eyes or ears daily, and not all from one source or one political perspective - so The Guardian, the Daily Fail, the FT, the BBC, whatevs, just not via twitter or the Radio 4 comedy shows, which are usually how I find out what's going on. I'll also be doing some other stuff like volunteering for things, maybe signing up for sponsorship for the race, and marshalling at another a half marathon about 3 weeks in. 5 Singing "The Internationale" Or failing that, facilitating communications with our comrades overseas, say, by learning Portuguese.