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I'm seriously excited for the upcoming year. I'm going to turn 50, I have a great race calendar planned, I feel healthier than I have in a decade, and I'm moving into a new age group. All this means that this might be the year I finally podium. Even if I don't, this is going to be the Year of the Sloth. The trick is turning hype into daily, consistent action. There's going to be a touch more structure than my previous two in-challenges. The next several weeks are a base-building/ general physical preparation phase. Flexibility: I'll do a minimum of 15 minutes of "power" yoga, 20 minutes of Pirate Yoga, or my own mish-mash of Yoga, Flexible Steel, and the S&S warmups. Near daily action required. Strength: Daily Dose of Deadlifts using a hex bar and Simple & Sinister. Near daily action required. Cardio: Gotta get my base miles in. Look for 90+ minute trainer sessions. 3+ sessions/week.

The struggle is real. The struggle is real, and it continues. But what is life without it? So the theme of this challenge is something @Kyellan said, about emptying the cup of oneself that one approaches an art with. During that time, I could feel a lot of ego trying to come up in me, and that's something that's come up in me before, to my detriment. I need to throw that away and be willing to learn, because I'm beginning to think that good movement is good movement and that really the arts are just ways to bridge the various places where one moves. From strike to clash. From clash to clinch. From clinch to throw, and all the permutations thereof. Here's why. Remember when I said last challenge that I was going to change up my lifts and such like that? Try to make more time for martial arts? Well, it worked! After a fashion. Last night I went and practiced my lifts and did the things that I wanted to do. I even added in some plyometrics at the start to warm up the CNS for this kind of work, and it turned out great. It feels perfect, actually. And I finished with so much time to spare that I actually decided to go off and do Kali last night. (turns out it actually is full blown Kali). And it was fun. No real randori to speak of, but as a movement and flow discipline it's a lot of fun. After discussing some theories of movement and such, he put me to work with a drill where I had a stick and a bolo knife (practice knife, of course, not the real thing) and flowing into cuts and control on a staff held to resemble sugar cane. The clack and shing of metal and wood clashing against each other... it was awesome. I was shit at it. BUT IT WAS AWESOME. But the best part about it, to me, was that he wanted to find ways in which Kali could work with kickboxing (which is basically what I do. Kenkojuku-lineage Shotokan, but it's basically kickboxing) and with judo. One of the judo brownbelts practices with this guy and it's apparently made his judo just... sick broken. I actually got to see them practice it. Essentially, it's a very hyper aggressive form of grip fighting. In judo, you fight for grip on the sleeve and lapel of the judogi. When you mix kali into that, your approach is such that you don't necessarily need the lapel anymore. You make a trade instead for an aggressive sleeve grip - wrist and elbow as opposed to elbow and shoulder. If you apply leverage and footwork in the right ways, the result is apparently a kuzushi - unbalancing - that is so radically different from what orthodox judo does that you can execute a throw before the other guy even knows what's going on. As far as kickboxing is concerned, I think it would ultimately work in terms of training the concept of getting off the opponent's center line and staying a step ahead in your timing. Also, in the clash - being ready to punch and kick and apply leverage as opposed to just trying to go and smother on a clinch. Mind, I don't know how well it would translate. He's about being quick and letting a knife do his cutting as opposed to generating lots of force, and we're kind of the polar opposite of that. But I think there's value in it and it's worth trying to find some bridges. Here is how I will attempt to put myself into positions necessitating an empty cup: GOAL 1: MANAGE MY WEEKEND BEDTIMES I thought that if I got more sleep during the week, this would translate into a need for less sleep during the weekend. This has proven wrong. I stayed up late again and slept through judo again. So, that confirms it. I need to get to bed early enough on Friday nights that I don't have the excuse of staying up late. Truthfully, in a lot of ways this could be challenge enough on its own. It's just one day a week, but making this work is going to require a lot. If I lift on Fridays and then do kali afterward, that's going to mean getting a lot of food in a very short period of time. I honestly don't know what approach is going to work here. Batch cooking won't work because the only day I have to do that is Sunday and all the food will basically have expired by the time I get to Friday. Chipotle could work, but it'd be pretty pricey too. Also, it's a lot of sodium, and I'm kind of growing suspicious of it. I could stick some chicken breasts in the microwave after thawing overnight, I guess, which might wind up being the solution to all this. I dunno. Gotta keep playing with this. GOAL 2: MANAGE MY PAIN I have pain in my left elbow, right shoulder, and my lower back. The good news is that they are responding to treatment. The left elbow is finally, finally starting to relax. My right shoulder stopped hurting this week. The lower back is new, but GB came to the rescue by forcing me to confront myself with the fact that I bit off more than I could chew with the SL progressions. Weighted Russian Twists are just too much for me right now, and the prescribed integrated mobility doesn't work for me. Fortunately, I'm not alone in this. I just tried out one of the forum solutions to the problem and my back pain almost completely resolved. I'm... really happy about this. I was afraid I'd have to indulge my ADD again, or worse, be stubborn and try to soldier through it. But yeah, mostly this goal is about emptying my cup of my training ego and to be mindful and listen to my body. To take my time and build well. If that makes any sense. GOAL 3: PLAN This is in reference to my writing. I'm at the point now where I'm writing scenes out, but I'm pretty arrogant about how this kind of thing works for me. I'm used to planning out chapters in fanfic style where you can build this episodic approach into things. It's not exactly how it's done in novels, though. There's a definite aspect of scene to scene to scene, each of them meant to build toward something. It's a different approach, and I need to be willing to try new ways to get there while at the same time acknowledging that it might take a while and that I might need some help. Beyond that, though, I want to plan out at least one scene a day. More is permissible. Less is inexcusable. GOAL 4: CLEAN Taking my time with the cleaning is making it happen, but that doesn't mean it's done. Keep going. ... And, that should do it. Cool. Let's empty our cups that they may be filled again.

Last month was my warm up. I'm feeling pretty good about stuff. Let's do this. MOVE: Same as last challenge. Sun Salutes: first thing in the morning, BEFORE breakfast. It is five minutes, no excuses. Kettlebells: Keep on Simple & Sinister program for now. (If the gym thing happens, I'll reevaluate.) Program is a short warmup, 10x10 swings, 10 getups. 30-45m. Currently solid on 35lb swings and 20lb getups, so a few sets are now 50lb swings and 35lb getups. I've got video! EAT: One balanced meal. Goal for this challenge is to have ONE meal a day loosely follow the Precision Nutrition guidelines. Despite their name, they don't advise anyone besides weight-class based competitive athletes and serious bodybuilders to actually weigh and measure food, and then only for a limited period prior to competing. ("Unless someone is paying to see your abs, it isn't worth it.") But it is easier for me to eyeball actual units, so their standard guidelines work out to about 1c or 1/2lb meat, 2c veggies, 1c starch or fresh fruit, and either ~2T fat or 2oz nuts/cheese. For the rest of the day, just make mostly reasonable choices, eat when hungry, etc. I'm still carrying a little more weight than I like, but I'm trying not to worry about it. WORK: Daily check-in AND weekly review. My partner and I work together, travelling and from home. We've got a lot to keep track of. I'd fallen out of the habit for a while, but what keeps this running smoothly is that each evening we check the calendar for tomorrow, and make a list of any appointments and what I need to get done. I did pretty well on that last challenge, but I want to keep it up. Also, my partner is generally good at keeping all the longer-range planning in his head, but he's got a lot on his mind lately, so a weekly review would help things from falling off the plate. Review would usually be Tuesday, to prep for weekend events, but Monday or Wednesday is fine. SPIRIT: Get out in the woods every day, and do prayer beads at night. Same as last challenge. Scoring as usual, passing score is 5/7. (7=A+, 6=A, 5=B, 4=C, 3=D) 15 PREVIOUS CHALLENGES:

Hello all! This is going to be a stressful challenge for me work-wise, because I'm going to be taking on quite a bit of work from a coworker who's leaving, at least for the next month or so, so I'm sticking with a format that has worked for me last time, points! I'm going to do a Monday start for this challenge and run for (almost) 5 weeks, starting today. This time, I want to earn 150 points and have switched up my goals a bit. Things that can earn me points: Doing a workout (S&S, yoga, long walk/hike, exercise bike, etc) +2 Doing my evening mobility routine (focused on hips, shoulders, and spine currently) +1 Logging into NF and posting on my thread and one other) +1 Sweeping the kitchen floor +1 No alcohol day +1 Spending 15min reading (and understanding) math (I'm working on a new project with an old mentor and I want some motivation) +1 Doing an adult thing I don't want to do (can earn one per week, last time this got me to get a lot of stuff done!) +5 Finishing a color stripe of knitting +3 Things that will lose me points: going over my calorie goal for the day -1 spending money -1 per $1, rounded as one can expect, but min 1 point lost if any money spent (other than exceptions below) The ones that probably need explanation are my knitting goal and my $ goal. The no-spend goal is inspired by KJ and I'm excited! I'm not going to spend any of my "personal" money during this challenge. So expenses with my husband like groceries, eating out, etc are fine, this is really just to reign in my own spending. The one exception is that I have a work trip the first full week of April that is extending to a trip home as well, as it a conference in my hometown. So I'm allowed to spend then, especially because it's also my mom's birthday (perfect timing!). Other exception is the weekend when my sister-in-law is here, the first weekend in April, as something may come up then as well. Also, full disclosure: there is about $25 on my starbucks gift card that I'll be allowed to spend The knitting goal is to get me to finish my baby blanket I'm working on. I have a friend who's due in the first week in April, and i'm nowhere done! It has a grey to yellow ombre, and I have 6 colors to create the ombre. I currently only have 1.5 colors done. So every time I finish a color, I get 3 points. I haven't quite picked out my reward for this challenge yet, or a theme, but I'm here!

Hello everyone! So I kinda just gave up on having a January challenge. My mom was in town for the first week, and then I got sick for another week, and then work got crazy because someone took medical leave, and the idea of writing a challenge just started stressing me out, so I decided to give myself a cycle off. Unfortunately, I took the cycle off from basically all fitness stuff, so I really need to get back into it; my body is unhappy and so is my mind. I liked my points format last time, so I'm trying it again, only I'm adding in negative points as well, to up the difficulty level. I'm also running this one Sunday-Saturday, since I'm going out of town the last weekend of the challenge and I want all the time I can get, also this will motivate me to get moving tomorrow! Things that can earn me points: Doing a workout (S&S, yoga, long walk/hike, exercise bike, etc) +2 Doing my evening mobility routine (focused on hips and spine currently) +1 Logging into NF and posting on my thread and one other (gotta get back in the habit) +1 sweeping the kitchen floor (a new habit I want to build) +1 no alcohol day (I have a bad habit of a daily beer/glass of wine) +1 standing for at least 1 hour (cumulative over a day) at work at my standing desk +1 Reading (and understanding) one page of math (I'm working on a new project with a new mentor and I want some motivation) +1 Doing an adult thing I don't want to do (can earn one per week, last time this got me to get a lot of stuff done!) +5 Things that will lose me points: going over my calorie goal for the day -1 watching a youtube video (this is a bad habit I have and there are much better things I can be doing with my time, like reading math, or listening to my backlog of podcasts, the one exception will be if I'm reading an article that links a video and I want to see that video as part of the article) -1 Points goal/reward If I earn 150 points over the course of the challenge, I can buy the fancy tea maker thing I want, guilt-free. (I've been debating it for a bit, but the cost and guilt from not needing it have held me back) Let's do this! I have no theme, so I'm going to go with cute animal gifs, those are motivational.

Hello All! I'm trying something new this challenge (inspired by @ixaera, as many of the things I do are ) My mother is visiting the last week of the challenge, and with holidays etc, my schedule is not fully predictable, so my standard weekly goals I don't think will work, nor will they be rewarding. So I'm trying out a points system. I want to earn 100 points this challenge (I reserve the right to revise this goal if I need to, because I'm not sure how this points thing will go). I'm starting points earning immediately and running it through the end of the challenge. So I need to average about 25 points a week, but I definitely want to front load that so I have a holiday cushion So I have a series of things that will earn me points: Working on yoga poses/transitions for at least 10 minutes for the pvp: +2 Simple and Sinister: +2 Sticking to my calorie goal (or at most 50 cal over): +1 Squatting training from Move your DNA, at least 10 min: +2 Adulting task (only earnable 1x/week): +5 Mobility work before bed: +1 So I'm keeping it basic, we'll see how the points go! Tomorrow I'm going to attempt my first adulting task, negotiating with the internet company

Last challenge I started on S&S and I'm really enjoying it, so I want to keep that up, but make sure I stay true to my assassin roots . I'll run my challenge Monday-Sunday like I usually do. I'm excited to go beyond what I did last challenge. Goal 1: Do S&S 5 days a week. I'm aiming for 6, but 5 is my goal. I want to start working up to the full 100 swings and doing more one-handed this challenge, so I'll work on ramping those up. I also want to work on perfecting my TGU form. Goal 2: Spice it up 2 times a week - I want to add some other kettlebell exercises into my workouts at least two times a week. I'm still working on the details of the programming, but I'm excited to do some fun stuff Goal 3: Get bendy - 4 times a week I will work on my splits. I'm so dang close and it should happen this round. Goal 4: More bending! 2 times a week I want to do yoga (probably a video). I miss the meditative awareness of my motions, and the flexibility work, so I'm bringing it back! I want to also pick out a new fancy yoga pose to work on. I've done crow and side crow, and I'm not sure where to go next. Any suggestions? Unofficial goal: participate in the mini challenge! I didn't really do anything with it last round, and that made me sad. Not this time around! I really wanted to do a GBBO themed challenge, but I can't find enough consistent gifs to use So I'll sprinkle them in randomly!