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Challenge #8 The struggle for order in a chaotic universe Sorry, no Firefly images. I can't quite settle on a character. Teirin talked me into joining the Monks for this challenge. I like the theme. 1. Imposing order takes energy. The first part of having energy is getting enough sleep. For me that means 8 hours a night. In bed by 10:00pm on week nights. I'd like to shift that to 9:30 because one of my neighbors has frequent car alarm problems at 5:45am. A = 8 hours, B = 7.75 hours, C = 7.5 hours, D = 7.25 hours, F < 7.25 hours weekly average +2 STA, +1 WIS 2. The second part of having enough energy is eating healthy food. I did well with losing weight when I cooked food I like involving meat and veggies. I want to eat sugary things when I am stressed. My goal is to stay ahead of the curve on having healthy food prepared for meals. A fridge full of raw meat and veggies is not food. Grading: -1 for each meal where I look in the fridge and say "there's nothing to eat". Choosing to go out with friends is fine. Getting take out because I don't want to cook is not. Percent of 126 meals. I can miss 12 meals and still get an A. +1 CON, +1 STA 3. Deal with the chaos in my environment. My house and garden are full of things that need to be done. I don't want to make a list because it will be overwhelming. Instead, I am going to do at least one thing every day to make my environment better. On days when I leave the house at 7:15am and don't get home until 9:30pm it will be a small thing. On days when I am home in the evening it will be a bigger project or several smaller things. I will repeat "all the small things make a difference" until I believe it. Grading out of 42 days. Extra things do not count because entropy is a continuous process. +2 STA 4. I will give myself the time to do fun things. Just because I could spend six weeks straight getting on top of the mess at home does not mean that is a smart way to spend my time. I will take time to do creative things. I will not hide in novels I have already read to avoid doing chores. Stress is part of entropy. I will remain calm and relaxed and make good choices on how I spend my time. Yep. Just like I stay calm and relaxed at practice. I will keep doing it over and over until I catch on. Grading: Good/meh/bad per day. +2 WIS 5. Entropy has gotten into my joints leading to a loss of flexibility. I will do hip stretches (Cheechoe's from the last challenge) and shoulder stretches at least 4 times a week. Keeping entropy at bay, I will do upper body strength training twice a week and at least 1 hour of knee/core exercise a week. I'm staying at an average of two aikido classes a week. There are two weekend aikido seminars coming up in the next six weeks. My focus is on keeping in good enough shape to attend and enjoy them. +2 DEX, +2 STR 6. Keep my mind flexible by reading about new things. I have three aikido books and a book on knowledge management to read. +1 WIS, +1 DEX I'm cutting this short for now so that I don't start the challenge short on sleep. More details later. Edited to add grading 7/29