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Second challenge in four years. Last challenge, I did fairly well, but stopped posting here. So that needs to stay consistent throughout the challenge this time. I lost the ability to run about four years ago (hence my break) and I has taken this long to be okay with it and look for another activity that brings me joy and health. I'm hoping it will be swimming and easy hiking. ATM I am quite de-conditioned so it will take some time for the hiking, but I want to find a swimming hole this summer and go more than twice! My mental health has been reaching a new level of good. I can do more with my day and I rebound from stress easier if not too much faster. So I'm working on reacquainting myself with Time. What do I truly need for downtime to re-energize and start another action IRL? It's an ongoing question and will take some hardcore patience on my part. GOALS Self Care – Spa Days -- facials, foot care, nails, teeth, muscle massages, acupressure, moisturize parts/dry parts, and make cucumber, tomato, and butterhead lettuce sandwiches. (Partial habit already) Read Daily – relax! Getting to know the flow of time. (Need new habit) Exercise – Walk -- everyday, increase distance each week. (Already a habit) Counter push ups -- some each day (Need new habit) Core and Lower Back exercises -- some each day (Need new habit) Environs – Unclutter -- Everything needs a place in my home. Desk first week, drawing table next week, kitchen third week, and bathroom last week. (Need new habit) Week Zero, here we go! Cheers Trail head to Camel's Hump. My favorite mountain. Camel's Hump. Nuf said. Lake Elmore. One of my favorite swimming places.

Hey All, Wow, long time. Thanks to Love_of_Snuggles and Fearless 2.0 for bringing up NF recently. I really think this is good timing. I have been alone in my travels for years now and it's time to reach out and be a part of a community again. I can't imagine a better place than NF for such a place. Okay, theme is: Slow and Steady, fuck the race. I have spent decades trying to get to a good place and then be healed. HA! Doesn't work like that in life. So I'm trying a new approach. Not being a victim. I have PTSD from childhood and am now 54. I am just now being an adult in regards to taking responsibility for the whole of my mental health. I have come a long way so far to be sure, but laying down the crown of Victim is no easy thing. It's how I survived this long. And surviving was all I cared about as a kid. I didn't realize how much it would restrict my life as an adult. So staying conscious of when I use old 'unhelpful' traits and habits is the overall goal for the foreseeable future. This means be truthful with myself, my therapist, and you all here. My first goal is to check in here each day: 1 update post and 5+ reactions to other people's posts (these I take seriously so no quick click and off I go). My second goal is to do my exercise walk each day: at least as far as I'm going now and hopefully, but not required this time, longer. My third goal is to meditate for 10 minutes each day: I can use a vid, music, or PT exercises to accomplish this task. My forth goal is to reach out to people IRL via texts, zoom, and phone: I think for 4 weeks, I want to be able to do this twice a week (gaming not included). In order to succeed in this challenge, I need to accomplish an average of ~75% of each of my goals. Okay, well this is weird, but familiar! Have a great challenge everyone!

I got a little buried under work last time (or two... or three) I tried to do a challenge, so time to give it another try. It would be a lot to try to explain here, but long story short I went from functionally being the only person doing my job (it's a 2 person job and the other person wasn't interested in actually working) to literally being the only person in my job for a few months, which also meant I was pulling some crazy long weeks. This is thankfully no longer the case, and the person working with me now is doing a fantastic job so far and eager to help out, meaning I get to have a life outside of work again! (...now I just need to get my mind to understand that I don't have to work nonstop, because brains are complicated and annoying) Unsurprisingly, my main goal remains the same: RECLAIMING MY TIME (honestly most of this challenge is basically going to be a repeat of my Grumpy Cat one, hence keeping with the silly cat theme. There's also a lot of overlap of the quests because of their relation to time) Quest 1 : Sleep (4 points/wk) Kinda hard to claim time when I'm tired and want to sleep most of my not-work time. I went to a doctor last year right before things went crazy and he gave me some things to try to do to improve my sleep that I want to start doing this challenge: Going to bed near the same time every night (I'm going to be aiming for between 11:30 and midnight) Getting up at the same time every morning, when my alarm goes off - this one is DEFINITELY going to be a struggle, I tend to snooze and I absolutely hate getting up in the morning Exercising 4-5 hours before bed, this is the window the yoga class I want to go to falls into, and I can try to add swimming or walking on days without yoga too with my Y membership that I really need to use one point per day I'm up before 7:30am, I'm not expecting myself to be able to roll that back all days hence not doing 7 points on this one Quest 2 : Food prep (6 points/wk) I've had issues with eating a lot of fast food because I haven't always prepped food ahead that I can eat/want to eat when I've gotten busy, so I need to prep food ahead for both work and outside work so I don't wind up eating more Burger King due to lack of preparation. Get meals made ahead - lots of Instant Pot recipes left to try Make sure lunch and breakfast are packed ahead the night before a work shift (when I actually prep ahead, I throw a frozen breakfast sammich in my lunch bag and leave it in the fridge so I can just run in the morning) Reduce eating out to 1-2x / week, preferably an intentional meal rather than just hitting a drivethru because I didn't have anything better available. 1 point for packing ahead (4 work days/week, 'cause 10 hr shifts) 1 point for batch cooking ahead 1 point for staying under 2x eating out/wk Quest 3 : Schedule outside of work (especially exercise, 4 points/wk) (not Pusheen, but adorable and my cats would never let me do it) So... I'm still enrolled in that yoga class that I have NOT been able to go to for months, some of which was because of it being cancelled for a month because of lack of enrollment (I just had them roll mine forward a month each time that happened) and some of which was the fact that I was still at work when the class was happening. I do also want to get exercise in on other days as well per sleep doc's recomendation, not to mention it helps my ADHD as well and I would definitely get a lot of physical benefits as well. I do also want to get some other things I've neglected back on my radar as well, like crafting and gaming. Attend yoga classes (M,W) work on setting up schedule for exercise besides yoga (T,H,F) - likely swimming at the Y or doing a Zombies, Run! session as a walk set aside time weekly for at least one of the following: solo gaming, painting minis, knitting, playing music 1 point for making a yoga class 1 point for making a non-yoga workout 1 point for planning for and following through on one of the above activities Life quest : Japanese (2 points) Like most other things on my challenge, this got shoved to the back burner (and then promptly dumped off the stove entirely) due to lack of time and energy. Use Duo min 5x/wk Study 1 lesson/wk from my text books (I think I was on the second one when stuff went crazy? I'll be starting back at one though) 1 point for Duo 1 point for studying from the text books So, hey NF community, I've missed you folks. LETS DO DIS!

Finally deciding whether or not to buy an Xbox One S (or PS4) and would like to get some opinions from the community. I can guess the answer (given this particular crowd), but I'd love some honest opinions about whether or not I should sink a few hundred dollars into the current generation of gaming systems. So here's my predicament: I currently own an Xbox 360, a PS3, and a Wii U (plus, a decent PC w/ 150+ titles on Steam). I currently have a huge back-log of games to play. I currently DO NOT have a massive amount of time to play between work, kids, exercise, and life-in-general. I'm pushing 40-years-old and I can't stay up into the wee hours like I used to (read: limited gaming time). My kids are hogging all my electronic devices! My better-half is pretty particular about having too many large electronic devices (small ones are okay *snicker*), so we'll be fighting over the living room TV. All that said, I've truly been struggling with making a decision for weeks/months now. I keep thinking, "Wow, such-and-such title looks really cool and I think I'd love to play that!" But then, "Hmmmmm... I'm only half-way through the Mass Effect series and I still have Skyrim, Fallout 4, Bioshock(s), not to mention Divinity titles, ARK, Overwatch, etc... that I already own if only I could wrench my computer away from my kid and get some gaming time of my own but my wife finally put the baby to bed and I should probably spend a little time with her watching some Netflix or something cuz God knows I only get a couple hours with my family in the evening because I'm going to work for friggin' 10 hours a day and I hardly get to spend any time with them but I reeeeeeeaaaaallly want to play some games but I cannot in good consciousness play a Witcher game in front of my 6 year olds arrrrrgggghhhhhhhhh!" To make matters worse, I recently had an opportunity to purchase a system, plus 3 extra controllers on sale, which I did. So, $240 for a 500GB XBox One S Minecraft bundle, plus 3 Xbox One S controllers at $40 a piece ($120), for a grand total of $360 plus tax for the whole kit-and-kaboodle. My struggle now is whether or not to keep everything or to return it all. HELP! I don't want to waste money buying a system that is already several years old that I might never play. A lot of folks have commented on how great this system is as a media center, but I also hear that the Xbox One system is a minefield of advertisements and uncontrollable updates. I know there are a lot of neat apps that you can download, like Netflix, Hulu, and YouTube, but I hate losing control of my ad blockers to proprietary apps. Any thoughts fellow Nerds?!

As stated, this challenge is about starting again. Albeit a little late to the party compared to most people. I have neglected my health and fitness to focus on being lazy and eating a lot of rubbish, if not delicious, food. It has been a while since my last challenge and I have a habit of doing some challenges and then not doing any for a while. I think this just suits my life. As it stands, I was planning to get back into the swing of things tomorrow (26th) so this challenge is well timed. So today doesn't really count though my partner and I did do a meal plan for the next few nights (until our weekly veg box arrives) and went food shopping mainly in the vegetable aisles. I am going to focus on the following points: Exercise This one I haven't done too badly on recently. But I need to keep building on it. Go to the gym at least once a week Walk at least 10,000 steps a day (as measured by my fitbit) Do yoga once a week I think this is definitely achievable. Going to the gym once a week does not sound like very much but in reality it will just be one week that is like that; I should be going at least twice. I have an Atlas wristband to test out as well which has only had one gym use. So I will use this challenge as an opportunity to test it out and report back. Walking 10,000 steps isn't going to get me fit by itself but it keeps me active and is definitely more of a challenge on days off. So, at least for the rest of the challenge, I am going to get up and dressed to go for morning walks on my days off. I accidentally done this recently and made sure I got stuff done the rest of the day so I am going to mirror it this challenge and see if it helps. Yoga because yoga. It keeps me flexible and mindful. I definitely need to get this back into my routine. Diet This is one area that I have been doing pretty badly on. I have had some good days but then the next day I can eat a ridiculous amount of rubbish. Make lunches for work again. Cheaper and healthier. Track what I eat and make sure I am eating a varied diet (not just carbs unfortunately) Eat vegetables every day (that is a challenge at the moment) Making my lunch for work ties together my diet and life goals together. I do have to do some research and vary what I make though as I tend to make the same thing. I just want to make something the night before work that will keep for the next four days, is easy to make and has a good helping of protein. I don't ask for much, right? My diet recently has mostly just been varients of carbs for a while. I need to make sure I am sticking to my macros and not just eating rubish. Some rubbish is allowed though. I track with MFP with altered calorie goals; I may be small but 1450 cal is not enough for me. I am not too worried about going over as long as I am making better food choices. Life Money - don't spend any money on non-essentials for the challenge. Put spending on my spreadsheet. Writing - plan what I am writing for NaNoWriMo. Attempt to write every day. Time - spend my time being more productive and not just wasting it all on Tumblr or Facebook. I have been terrible with money recently and really need to get myself sorted. It means I can't go to the Edinburgh meet up despite wanting to. I am not going to buy anything I don't need. The only thing I am allowed to buy is a bluetooth keyboard for my iPad as I did buy one but Amazon failed to deliver it. It is for NaNo to enable me to write at work and such when carrying my laptop would be too much hassle. I also need to work a system out to deal with writing on a windows laptop and an iPad. I have my idea for NaNo and it is something I want to develop after NaNo and keep working on so I need to actually plan this one to a degree. I think that is fairly simple and should be able to actually stick to this one.

OK, so I've got more questions. Yes, I know I tend to post more threads asking questions than I do make posts responding to threads, but there are still things I want to know. So, as far as eating and working out goes, I've heard some people say that you need to eat before working out to activate your metabolism, and I've heard some people say that you need to wait until after you workout to eat so that your body is forced to use the energy it has stored up to do work. When I first came home for the summer and began strength training, I tried eating just one meal a day, but I found that not only would I end up finding myself eating a few things throughout the day, but I don't even have to limit myself to one meal a day. As a matter as fact, if you count pre-workout and post-workout supplements, I usually get about 5-6 meals a day, with a medium breakfast, a pre-workout energy drink, a post-workout protein shake, lunch, and dinner. So far, this *feels* like it's been working for me. I don't often feel hungry, I only get the urge to eat more when I had a small lunch (a protein shake and a PB&J sandwich), and it's pretty maintainable, as long as I can continue to leave myself time to make breakfast in the morning before heading out to the gym. Still, I'm concerned about the number of calories I'm consuming, and cutting out breakfast would save me some time. Also, I'm having a hard time leaving bread out of my meals. When I get breakfast, it just feels natural for toast to go along with my eggs and banana, and personally, I kind of like bread! By itself, it's kinda boring and pointless, but I always thought of bread as being like the Bassist of the food band. The backbone of it's music. So, would not eating until after my workouts (which would pretty much mean not eating anything until noon, for me) help me lose weight, or should I stick with what feels right right now?

What does everyone struggle with as their biggest obstacle to stay on track or to even start a fitness program?

My name is Zoe. I'm 20 years old, 5"3 and about 170 pounds. As you can imagine I'm here to trying get fit and gain better control of my body, not just lose weight. The problem is that often times I end up trying to work out and being met with millions of mixed messages on what to do. One week someone would say that I should focus more on cardio and then work on muscle exercises once I "slim down". Another week someone will tell me that I should focus more on weight training and that cardio is mainly for warm ups or strictly for persons doing marathons or other running events. Sometimes people say I should use machines, while others say I should stick to dumb bells and body weight exercises and the list just goes on... I would really love it if someone could just give me a program to start with. Or at the very least suggest to me where I could get one personalized for myself (hopefully online?). Note though that I seem to get muscle injuries easily so I can't push myself too hard or lift heavy just yet. I also have no idea where I'd fall in that career category so I'm hoping someone might be able to explain that to me too.

So, the basis for this is that I'm pelted with schoolwork, out of shape, tired, but that's not the point. The point is how procrastination and frittering away time bleeds into everything: I have something I need to do. Say, an assignment. Say then I don't do it, because I watched read-webcomics, watched youtube, [insert blank]. Then I start to worry about it, more and more. The constant worrying and procrastination kills productivity something awful, and the stress compounds. I felt a bit like crying at the end, just because I couldn't pull it off, because my time went all to the wrong places all the time. I don't want to keep doing this. My aim is to work a chunk at a time, focusing clearly on one thing, and not worry about it the rest of the time. 1) Set an amount, say 4 hours per day, stick to it, and during that time, do the work. “When walking, walk. When eating, eat. Above all, don't dawdle.†~Zen proverb 2) The Zen Habits 1000 cuts Fearkiller, on 26 Feb 2014 - 10:46 PM, said: 200 points, 3-4 things a day. 3) Find an half an hour for drawing every day. Basic shading excercises, drawing a bent wire, legos, wooden blocks, and basically just stuff all around me.

Sorry guys, TARDIS landed a week late (i.e. my computer died last Monday, so this is my first time heading to the library to catch some screen-time.) First things first - I'll put my challenge plan up, then tell y'all how last week went. Main Quest: Even in a time machine, I'm running late. Switching back to dayshift is awesome, but I need to be keeping up with everything through the next few weeks that I've let slide through my shift-transitions up till now, and that also means fewer "I'll do it later" excuses. SQ1 - Make timey-wimey, wibbly-wobbly stuff happen - be active, mentally and physically. If today is horses great. If it's not, make sure something physical happens - pull-up practice is always a quick option, right? Oh, and weapons training too! Let's face it, traveling with the Doctor is incredibly dangerous, so I need to be armed to the teeth. So yes, back to the studying. But some of it is physical studying - primarily the horses, where I'm learning better riding, how to drive, how to train, and new levels of horse body-language, and my martial arts that are rusting slowly in the corners of my mind. The Doctor may not approve of guns, but seems pretty ok with non-lethal force the rest of the time. Other aspects do need study though, so I'm going to try to keep a minimum (per week) of 2 hours MA training, weapons or non. 1-2 hours JPN 1 hour music 2-3 hours SCI At least 1 hour of riding/working with my teacher at the ranch/b&b. and going to add sign up to take my GRE early next year. None of this is master-level training, but it's better than nothing. SQ2 - Down to business. Exactly what it sounds like, I need to take time to build an income that doesn't involve me going to a job 40 hours a week that, while I'm blessed to be there, is not a place where I'm using any of my strengths. So I need to work on building a steady income doing things that tap those strengths; I have the opportunity, I just need to take the time and work on it. 'Cause sadly, these things don't work on themselves. SQ3 - Take some time out for me every day. 1 hour, I don't care if I'm gaming, reading, watching a movie. I get 1 hour of playtime minimum. LyfeQuest - Food prep ahead of time, with a menu of what I will eat when in the week. OK, and last week - SQ1 - Awesomely physical .Did quite a bit of studying, no music though mostly 'cause I kept walking by the music practice rooms where I work thinking how awesome it would be to bring in my old pieces and see if I could relearn them on my breaktimes. So bringing those with me. Got to play with a friend's double-bladed spear (HEAVY sucker!!!) SQ2 - ...yea, failed miserably. Had Monday set aside, was asked to go help one place, set aside Tuesday instead, then got asked to come in for overtime since we're short subs. So yea, that basically didn't happen :/ SQ3 - Did better on this later in the week, early in the week was just too crazy which is part of why I added this in. LyfeQuest - planning happened, followed the plan pretty ok, but it was only so-so healthwise. Sorry for the rushed post, I'm off again.

to put it simply my motivation is to walk from the set of Hobbiton in New Zealand to the mountain used as mordor. Goals- 1. run two miles 3 times a week 2. to gain about 3 pounds in muscle 3. to start attending my longsword classes again 4. follow to Paleo diet by cutting about roughly half the grains and dairy going into my system.

Hello.. um.. All? My very first post. Big Step for me. So.. First out the gate, I have lurked and received all the new emails etc from NF, attempted some of the beginner workouts and then I found my dragons. Coming in a stride behind, rounding the turn, and... smack right into the dragon, not even half way down the backstretch. In case you can't guess, yep I love horses, of which I have two (one being the rideable full sized version, the other the mini party fun sized). Now to describe my dragons.. they are the big intelligent fiery reds, or the more seductive and elusive blacks. I recently (and FINALLY!) was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis and Fibromyalgia. This process start to diagnosis took YEARS because I don't present typically for either condition and throw in some hypermobility of the joints, yep just a bundle of contradictions. Throw in a divorce in the middle, and fast foward to now (age 29). At first I thought I could just workout and maintain fitness or more precisely get back to a good level of fitness, now that is MUCH harder than I believed it would be (slaying the dragon?). All that being said, now for the wisdom requirement.. Does anyone have suggestions on workouts? I can't do high impact anymore, I do like yoga, but not into the whole technical side of it in other words, I understand child's pose not vinyasa something or other, and I did try the beginner's workouts/hotel workouts, but squats/lunges seem to put fire into my knees. I am limited on the arm/wrist/hand movements as my joints bending too far will not let the muscle take the brunt like it is supposed too. I am limited time wise to my lunch hour or whatever time I squeeze from not working with my horses (one I ride the other I taught to pull a cart) in the evening. Thanks all, and Happy Trails.

A restless night, followed by a hollow day... I live in an island paradise for which many a queen would lay aside her crown. I command the loyalties of free men and women such that no empress could compel. Yet I look across the sand to a clear, cerulean sky and vivid turquoise waters and I am only aware of the dark storm brewing within my mind. I have fine ships and treasure aplenty, and yet... And, yet. What has it gained me to have escaped the confines of that narrow life reserved for so many others of my sex? I pursued freedom on the high seas and won it, only to realize that I am still in chains. My days pass in an endless stream of responsibilities and tasks. There are so many that I must provide for and watch over. Even my twin loves of the sea and of the art of the sword are fading. I no longer take joy in plotting my attacks, nor in my daring escapes. Would that I could find again that glad simplicity of my younger years... But, wait! Have I grown so weary as to have forgotten the simple truth that once filled the sails of my ambition? It is my choice and my choice alone that steers the ship of my future. Dare I take my sword to those things that grind down my days and steal the precious hours of my life? Will I make my fears and failings my new enemy and win my way to freedom and joy once again? Do you dare to become the Pirate Queen of your own life, to cut away all that stands in your way of epic awesomeness? How many ships can you realistically command, anyway? What is your joy? Where is your freedom? What is your true treasure? Ahoy! I'm ShadowLion, and I started this thread after reading a conversation between Starpuck and Wufkar. Their discussion contained this, among other wise and useful insights: I realized how hard it can be to make the sorts of choices that would simplify our days, allow us to take back our freedom, and live life on our own terms. Come on up the gangplank and let's plan our adventure over some rum laced with tea...

Bonjour I'm a bit nervous and excited about posting, as ideally this is the start to something that could be an extraodinary part of my life/future. Currently I'm 165cm and 56kg~ and looking for a huge change in my life. I've always loved running and the outdoors- but being so inclined towards videogames, computer learnings, and other such indoor activities, paired with a sort of growing anxiousness towards strangers - it's stopped me from pursuing those activities. Because of that I've lost a lot of my athletic ability, and I've gained a bit of weight as well (having been 52kg previously). When I was a little kid, I used to be quite fat, and I remember how much it sucked - luckily when I went into my teens I changed naturally into average size. However the recent weight I've gained makes me scared that I could revert back into that stage of my life, which would not be preferrable. So I want to stop before I get too sucked in, and make myself better than I ever was! My main quest is to be able to run 10km, and so will be taking up long distance running 2x a week at first, and then progress from there. Human - 165cm 56kg. Desired class - Scout.

Hi there! I'm just beginning my fitness journey (just finished week six!) and I want to test to find my max reps on body-weight squats, lunges, step-ups, push ups, and sit ups (any other essential moves you suggest testing, too?). I've been doing fasted workouts in the mornings, but I didn't know if it was a better idea to shoot for maxing out after eating something, as my body has yet to be put under that much stress (I've only been working out as much as time allows for). Or would it be safe, or even better, to do this when fasted as well? Also, since I tested a few before I thought of asking this question, I noticed that after doing squats, i was too shaky to test my other leg workouts within the hour. Would food fix this? If it's not a matter of diet, how long do you suggest waiting before testing the others? Because I wanted a fair shot at every move, I decided to do one leg move and one non-leg move today and I'll do the same pattern (but different moves) the next time I workout (which I've start off with doing a M/W/F schedule). But I'm still asking because I might like to do the it differently next time I test them. TL;DR: What protocol do you suggest for testing max repetitions? Thanks so much for your help!

Ok so I am new to Nerd Fitness Forum, but not totally to NF. I have 2 jobs, work 65 (give or take) hours and find it hard to "Balance" my time to get everything in. I am 90-100% Paleo, I try to get 1 hour worth of WOs in a week on one night/weekend day off. At this point I know I have to start getting up to do my exercise because there is really not other time to fit it in and two days a week just doesn't sound like enough. But is there any tricks people have besides walks during break? Or fitting it in on your only day off? My day starts at 6:40am and ends at 11pm. Now sleep is somewhere in between that. As it is right now, sleep is lacking and less then the required amount. So I have issues there. So I ask again... any tips?? I don't want to have excuses in this, and I am at a point where I have sort of stopped loosing. So something somewhere has to change. Thanks in advanced!!

Help me out, my friends. Time often gets away from me because I have "nothing to do," and I wind up filling it with something pointless such as video games or window shopping. So, suppose you have 60 minutes to do something productive. I'll leave the definition of "productive" up to you. Assume further that you are at home in a small apartment and have access to the usual stuff one can find in a small apartment, except there is no TV. Also assume that by the time the hour is over, you have returned to your baseline state, which is clean and dressed (so workouts, baking projects, etc. that require time to clean up must take less than one hour). Projects that take less time are okay. What would you do? Help me make a big, big list! The more the better. Try to think of awesome things (I know my list so far is mostly chores, which are not that awesome but can lead to greater awesomeness). I plan to choose my favorites and make one of those word cloud posters to stick on my wall, or possibly a checklist. 1. Workout for 40 minutes (shower for 20) 2. Bake brownies (and wash dishes) 3. Learn 20 new words in a foreign language 4. Clean fridge, wash dishes, and vacuum 5. Read 1 chapter of a textbook (but not enough time to do homework problems) 6. Listen to a podcast lecture 7. Go for long walk 8. Call grandparents (yes, this takes a while...) 9. Plan a weekend trip and buy tickets 10. Warm up, do 4 sun salutations and stretch 11. Make tea and say prayers 12. Do the laundry 13. Take bubble bath and groom thoroughly 14 ....?