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I picked this theme (not because of the TV show) but because the newest addition to this world is coming out the 23rd! I cannot wait to read it. Eeeeew! This is a book series which is very complicated, long, and was written/published out of order! So for more information on that. You can read in the second message if you're interested in the book series. Create a Different Path "She thought of it, and her stele began to move the way a dancer begins to move when the music starts." Goal: Create a 4 hour work day, finish my first original video, read a chapter of Harry Potter every night, and name my target buyers. (5 points) Bonus: For completion or extra hours of work. Train to Become Stronger "Shadowhunters: Looking Better in Black Than the Widows of Our Enemies Since 1234." Goal: Keep on progressing MWF (5 points) LINK Bonus: For leveling up Hunt the Demons "Nobody calls me 'blondie' and keeps their kneecaps." Goal: Stretch M-F (5 points) Bonus: For leveling up Learn New Things "Mark, looking beatific, took the dispenser of maple syrup off the table and upended it over his strawberries. He picked one up and put it in his mouth, stem and all." Goal: Learn and make 4 new healthy recipes. Bonus: If I eat a veggie, fruit, and only when I'm hungry. Listen to a Higher Power “No one is ever the villain of their own story.” Goal: Listen to each week's Church sermon. (10 points) Bonus: Extra reading, conversations with God, or copious notes. Read with Passion "It was books that made me feel that perhaps I was not completely alone. They could be honest with me, and I with them." Goal: Finish Queen of Shadows by Sarah J. Maas and Lord of Shadows by Cassandra Clare. (%) Thrill of the Game “The nod means 'I am a badass, and I recognise that you too, are a badass.” Goal: Work towards TLoU Plat and play through Borderlands (%) _.-*-._.-*-._ Trophy Goals: Azarath Metrion Zinthos | Don't You Two Read? | Better in Black Since 1234 *Art by Cassandra Jean on Tumblr

"How fragile we are... Begone fear!" - Dwarf Fortress Last year I was making fairly good progress on learning Italian and Irish, having fun dancing, and working on a one-hundred pushup challenge (I made it to 47 at a time). Then, in October, a surprise encounter with a newsstand led to a very serious concussion. Fun fact about concussions, they really mess with your co-ordination (as well as make it pretty much impossible to read or use the computer for a couple of weeks). Due to a series of unfortunate accidents, horrible DEX fumbles (that stacking head-injury penalty really sucks), and/or possibly pissing off unknown forces, I ended up with no less than four concussions within a 30 day period. I do not recommend it. Apparently it's really hard to move with head trauma, as well as, ya know, breathe. Or eat. So I ended up bored out of my skull and basically unable to do any form of exercise for a month or two. Add on to that the general despair from the brain scramble and losing almost all the progress I had made, and well, it was not a very happy time. A littttttle bit more backstory real fast. I am not a skinny person. I have never been. When I was in high school I weighed 170 pounds and could bench 185 [for the record I am a woman]. I was very fond of weight lifting for several years. In college I crept up to 210 pounds. After bailing out to help family stuff and pick up a job, I hung out around 250 pounds. And then 250 became 260, and 260 became 270. It was very, very frustrating. I would swim three miles, I would bike for 90 minutes, I would count calories and lift weights and yet despite it all I weighed somewhere between 250 and 270 pounds and not one thing would change that. In 2011 I managed to make it down to 237.25 before spiking all the way back up again. The worst part was it never, ever, looked like I was making progress. I always just generally looked the same. In 2012-2013 I pretty much just gave up. After all, nine years or so is quite a bit of time with nothing to basically show for it (in my magazine-conditioned brain). I stopped lifting. Then I stopped biking. Eventually I even stopped swimming. I would still walk, but the walks got shorter and shorter, and farther between. In early 2014 I decided I was being an idiot. This might have coincided with not being allowed on a particular fairground ride *cough*. Alright, so I hated calorie counting, fine I'd cross that off the list. And I'm not very into social media, so Fitocracy wasn't very effective. But I do enjoy games. I love games. So, as a fun exercise, I decided to stat myself DND-style and give myself quests. Write everything up in a Quest Log/Journal with very epic sounding accomplishments; "cleansed the dinning hall of vile filth" sounds way better than "cleaned the dishes." The two year lapse meant I was basically at ground zero, complete with the "holy monkeys on a unicycle I cannot do a single push up" moment. I made about seven months of progress (Italian! Wii Just Dance and Zumba! Push ups!) and then BAM! Concussions, apply directly to the forehead (and the sides of the head, and the back of the head for good measure). Bed rest. No exercise. Oh no, all my progress is ash on the wind. Over-the-top dramatics. And then, on November 29, 2014, I found Nerd Fitness. I could finally stand to be on the computer (for very short times) and was looking for inspiration on stating myself, again, since I was basically back at the start. Behold! I found the wonder that is the post on Paleo *insert heavenly choir*. I read all about it. I looked it over. I looked at it again. I said screw it, why not? I took photos (the world will never see these, at least not until I have cooler comparison photos). I started that day. I also decided to stop drinking Diet Coke on the same day. Ahahahahah. Oh the withdrawals. The post about becoming your own super hero really, really helped. Lady Aern does not drink Diet Coke! Because there is no Diet Coke in Faerûn. Two days in I convinced my Mom to join me (on Paleo, not on the Diet Coke). We stopped eating bread, and rice, and pasta, and microwave dinners. We stopped baking cookies and pies. There was a lot of chewing involved, so much chewing. It's been two and a half months now, and we're still going strong. I can see my ankles, my elbows, I can feel my spine and my hip bone, I can see my muscles all over my body in the weirdest places. A lot of medical stuff has cleared up. I now drink water, very small amounts of tea, and nothing else. I'm just now starting yoga with very, very simple routines since I'm still a bit medically fragile. I waited this long to post an introduction because I wanted to make sure I could actually stick with it. So here I am, hello everyone I'm Lady Aern, pleased to meet you! Game Over -- New Game? [Y/N] Y ================================================================= Initial Stats Started: Nov 29th, 2014 Gender: F Height: 5'4" Weight: 272 Size: 26 Current Stats Date: Feb 15th, 2015 Weight: 258.5 Size: 20/22 ================================================================= Primary Goals Achieve 170 pounds. Learn to parkour... and become decent at it. Secondary Goals Achieve size 12 clothing. Achieve 100 consecutive pushups. Achieve 10 consecutive pullups - it's been a long time since I've done those. Improve flexibility via yoga.

nightlight does...life. Clean slate. I haven't been able to stick with a challenge as of late because things keep happening. The things that keep happening are life. SO this may be a little bit of an un-challenge. I want to just try and get my life back together. Lose the 20lbs (seriously) I've gained since November. Goal 1: Pick Things Up and Put Them Down Liftin' and liftin' and... Follow my 4 day a week WL plan. I've created my own 6 week program based on something JDanger gave me and changed up with some stuff I learned from Ursula and some things catering to my weaknesses. THe plan could compress to 3 days if necessary, not going to sweat that part. There are also accessory movements built into the program. Goal 2: THE OPEN Do work. Complete all 5 open WODs. Goal 3: Ruck. Ruck 1 day per week. I'm not going to go full ruck-tard on this yet. This is more of a side goal, since it's open season and I'll be spending more time at the box since I'll have to judge. That said, I would love to get in one long ruck a week. Starting at 30 min, working up from there. It'll be good, and my challenge is coming up fast: April 25. Side Quest Diet/Lifestyle: Eat to Perform Track it! Part of my neurosis are definitely related to body image, weight, size, etc. The main goal is not necessarily to lose weight or inches, however I will be tracking those. The main goal is to feel good about myself. Feeling good about myself is wrapped up in these neurosis. If I feel good about what I eat, I will feel better about myself. I will achieve this goal by tracking what I put in my gluten-free pie hole. I will be following Eat to Perform for this 6 week challenge. (THIS GOAL FROM LAST THE 2 CHALLENGE STICKS!) I also need to make sure I'm getting enough protein, fish oil, ZMA, and BCAAs. I'll be following this loosely: (or not so loosely) TDEE: 1,974 calories P: 155g C: 170g F: 75g First point is to get enough protein per day. Then make sure my fats are in line, then carbs. Making sure I get proper pre-post wod nutrition also. ** tracking here: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/needanightlight Side Quest/Life: UFYL Unfuck MY life! I'm thinking about something like this. 30min per day, 5 days per week, spend 5 minutes on some of the following: UFYH - cleaning the apartment putting things up for sale on eBay practice guitar reading through my feedly of health and fitness articles studying for CSCS writing blog posts Basically, I want to spend a half hour, 5 days per week, doing something that will make my life and surroundings better. Current strength footnote: Back Squat: 190 Front Squat: 175 Deadlift: 235 Clean: 130 Hang Clean: 115 Jerk: 130 C&J: 130 OHP: 90 Bench Press: 120 Snatch: 105 all in lbs

Main Quest (for this challenge): "Get Myself Together" This is part 4 of my main quest. Overarching goal is Be Brave. Last challenge I lost my way a bit. I think you all can see more growth in me than I can see in myself, but my eating went out of control and I stopped working out because I was paralyzed by anxiety. I got the news this morning that Asshat will no longer be around. Neither will BoCM. My head says WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. My heart hurts and I feel a little dizzy. However, I know this is for the best. My box. My life. Mine. NOTE: this is a 5 week challenge for me. I'll be away from Feb 6-14. (on a boat.) This challenge, I'm back with the Rangers. This challenge isn't really a formal challenge for me. There's going to be no grading. No stress. I will have mini goals that I'd like to meet. But at this point, any expectations that anyone puts on me, I can't commit. Any sort of expectations (by myself or anyone else) is just too much to have right now. I need to pull myself together. Small steps, big changes. From you guys? Just some support. Sounding board, as you've always been. Some of my goals below might be a bit nebulous, but I sometimes don't meet my goals, because I'm afraid people are expecting me to. Which leads me to the thing I wrote two challenges ago that still sticks: After the last challenge kind of face-planting in a number of ways, I really have to vag up, and be brave. It's not about showing anyone else how I can be. It's about letting myself be ME. And not being afraid of that. I have two horrible paralyzing fears that I haven't talked to you all about. I don't actively think about them, but they sabotage me everywhere I go, everything I do. So, here goes. I'm really deathly afraid of success. I don't do the things I'm good at and make excuses on why I don't do them, but the real reason, is because I'm afraid of being recognized. These things are music, writing and photography, for example. The other fear revolves around weight. I've always been heavy. Pre-8yrs old, I was super skinny because I was on medication that killed my appetite. As soon as I went off, I got fat. My highest weight in high-school was 174. My all time highest was probably around the time I moved back to the city, ~185lbs. I've always used my weight as an excuse as to why no one wants to date me. It was just easier to hide behind that, than deal with my own body image and inter-personal issues. I've been told that I keep people at arms-length all the time. And I do. I'm really scared that if I inhabit the body I want, people will see that... and... I don't know how to describe it, but it's scary. It's scary to have to let someone in. Especially after I have tried so hard (Asshat) to do that, and been shut down. The attention is scary. Right now, I feel like this: I want to feel like this: Goal 1: Get back to the box. 3 WODs a week. I absolutely LOVED working on JDanger's cycle. LOVED LOVED LOVED. But because of some other stuff, I feel the best way to get myself back in the game is to get back to my roots. Which is doing the work. Being a part of my box community. I've also been thinking a lot about the Open. Even if I say I'm not going to compete, I will. So, I should prepare for it. I know I am strong enough. I need to do some skill work (see below.) But what really needs work? My motor. What's going to get that better? Doing the work. Goal 2: Skillz bro. 2 Skill days/WL days per week: I want to keep making progress with weightlifting. I'm going to take elements from JDanger's program and elements from some other things and piece together a two day a week WL program. I'll post that once I figure it out. I also need to do some skill work specifically for the open. Ring dips/C2B pull ups, specifically. Goal 3: Maintenance Keep it up, yo!: I need to get back into rehab. Reverse Hypers. Lots. Side Quest Diet/Lifestyle: Eat to Perform Track it! Part of my neurosis are definitely related to body image, weight, size, etc. The main goal is not necessarily to lose weight or inches, however I will be tracking those. The main goal is to feel good about myself. Feeling good about myself is wrapped up in these neurosis. If I feel good about what I eat, I will feel better about myself. I will achieve this goal by tracking what I put in my gluten-free pie hole. I will be following Eat to Perform for this 6 week challenge. (THIS GOAL FROM LAST CHALLENGE STICKS!) ** tracking here: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/needanightlight I also need to make sure I'm getting enough protein, fish oil, ZMA, and BCAAs. Side Quest/Life: UFYH Unfuck MY habitat! 5 min per day. Apartment clean up. Current strength footnote: Back Squat: 190 Front Squat: 165 Deadlift: 235 Clean: 130 Hang Clean: 115 Jerk: 130 C&J: 130 OHP: 90 Bench Press: 120 Snatch: 98 all in lbs