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I had a good run and still am feeling mentally and physically well. But there's things I want to build up better again: get back into running after 6 months of injury. have a 12 week running plan I want to follow. Its pretty daring to start in October when the wheather gets real shitty, but it would be nice for my mental and physical health as well as the dog-childs happiness. Have looked at lots of plans and will only run twice a week plus a third day with a short bodyweight program. my budget has been so small that I asked friends for help often. its slightly better now with my project friendship point income but still!! I want to learn to live within my budget even if that means I cant eat keto! Last month I spent 40Euro on vitamins alone and even if I felt awesome thats just not acceptable. Either I can dial down my keto costs or I have to try other forms of healthy eating after all. experiments are needed. This time I will try the 4 envelope strategy of putting my weekly money in 4 envelopes and only using the money that is in there. maybe I can set apart a "fun fund" of 50 euro to do spontaneous stuff. also my goal is to save 30 euros in October to build a emergency fund. prep food on weekends. I dont feel like cooking healthy meals every day. next possibility to prep is on Tuesday when I get paid. do sober October. I have had drinks again and am fine with that but would love to try a whole month sober. If thats too hard I will aim for maximal dry days. I started a great online meditation course and didnt have time to follow it really. ist a 21 day course Want to use the next 3 weeks to build in meditation and the audio listening into my morning routine. seems like a tall order for me to get this done. Its 3 weeks only and I can try out what sticks. There will be no self punishing! Only honest effort and self love! I missed you! ❤️

So, here we are again. I should be sleeping, but I couldn't. I have let my last three challenges or so trail into the oblivion due to lots of different things. But mostly sloth. All things considered, 2020 was "good." My relationship survived, and even thrived in many ways thanks to extra time to be together; I taught in every different conceivable mode (virtual, in person, hybrid, synchronous, asynchronous, on zoom and in person at the same time) and only contemplated throwing in the towel a few times; both of us kept our jobs, and my family and his family are all healthy. There were lots of things I could have done...that I wanted to do, that I beat myself up over not doing... but that's really why I'm here...again, facing off against the oblivion: to remind myself what matters. So, that being said: The challenge will be broken into three categories: Need, Should, Want NEED: the "put your own air mask on first" category Take meds Drink at least 80 oz water Relationship therapy goal Get 7 hours of sleep with phone plugged in across the room SHOULD: the "things I struggle to do after work" category Make healthy meal choices: namely: eat a vegetable or eat a reasonable portion Clean or organize something in my home Workout Read WANT: the "gets lost in the endless hours I spend pretending to watch Netflix while I look at my phone" category Working on writing projects Duolingo Learning to play PC games (hubs has been wanting me to do this for years...I'm horrible, but I like shooting things) Experiment with baking So, we are aiming for it to look a bit like this daily Need: 4 Should: 2 Want: 1 But really the main goal is to So, here we go

For this challenge, I am keeping the same four big goals from my last one, but I have adjusted to allow more flexibility where I need it. My last challenge was rigid and quantifiable (I even had a spreadsheet that never got filled out, ha) but what I’m finding is I need a plan that is flexible in positive ways and allows me to work around weeks where I have tons of grading, lots of stress, or a million things come up. I need the challenge to work for me and to help me achieve things, and I think my goals in the last challenge were a bit lofty and rigid. The big change for this challenge is after 0 week I will have worked up to the proper dosage of the medication that has been prescribed to me for both my ADD and my anxiety, so part of this challenge will simply be observing the impacts of that. Instead of continuing the circus theme (because I am hoping life will become less of a circus) I have decided to call upon the Fellowship to get me through this challenge, because let’s face it, I need all the help I can get. Goal 1: Eat Like A Hobbit Hopefully in this one I will be channeling more of the home cooking of Samwise and less of the “I ate three lembas” of Pippin. Will there be second breakfast? YES. I am going back to the idea of small meals all day because that seemed to work really well in the first challenge, and skipping lunch makes dinner a binge and I just feel gross all night. GOALS 1600-1800 calories a day (5/7 tracked) 4-6 smaller meals every day (5/7 completed per week) Plan out lunches a week in advance BONUS: Cut down coffee creamer consumption by half by the end of the challenge, eat my lunch every day for a week, drink 2 full water bottles during the school day Part Two A: Lift like a Dwarf Calling on Gimli for the Strength portion of this challenge. I truly love Body Pump. Hubs jokes and calls it lifting Zumba (truth) but I can’t help myself. And while I eventually want to branch into just lifting, I think my love for this class is what keeps me in the gym despite all the stress and crazy that is the rest of my life, so we are just going to stay the course. Will also attend kettlebell/bootcamp when my schedule allows. I am also adding the choice to get up and do an in-home bodyweight workout (darbee: Athena’s Playbook) for days that I need to be at school earlier than 7:45 but want to get a workout in (usually why bootcamp gets skipped). Part Two B: Gain Elven Endurance Legolas is my inspiration for this portion of the challenge. I need to get on the bike. I need to start training for my ride this summer, but instead of setting a mileage goal, I am going to set an activity goal of 5 active days per week, including the biking, classes, and body weight workouts. 2 days a week must be weight training, one must be a bike ride, and the other two are up to me whether it be biking or whatever. I will be aiming to go a little farther each week. I was able to do 5 miles in 30 minutes last time I was out, so that will be my baseline. GOALS: 5 Active days per week 2 BP, 1 biking, 2 my choice BONUS: Go up in weight on any BP track, bike three times in one week Part Three: Plan like A Ranger Obviously couldn’t do a LOTR challenge without Aragorn. But seriously, he is fearless in the face of stress and a great strategist-- just what I need! School and my issues with organization, efficiency, and stress management are not going to go away, so this piece of the challenge needed to stay on the table with added flexibility to accommodate the ever changing needs of my schedule/classroom. I am not limiting grading days this time because in the next month I will have 90 essays to grade (⅓ 2 pages, ⅓ 3-5 pages, ⅓ 6-8 pages) so a little every day is the plan GOALS: Create a grading schedule for SR and JR papers and stick to it. Weeklies: Lesson plans, grade book Organize Cartlos and my corner once a week BONUS: Organize my file cabinets, pass back any assignment within 48 hours, grade something the day it is turned in to me Part Four A: Healing with Arwen Every Fellowship needs support, so for my mental health category, I called on some supporting members to get me through this challenge. Sometimes we all just need a river full of raging water horses to wash away our troubles, hence I called upon Arwen here. The meditation will continue, and meds will be taken daily. Journalling will accompany what will hopefully be daily updates. Also adding sleep to this one this time as I have been getting less and less lately. Part Four B: Relaxing with Bilbo I really miss writing, so who better to call on than someone who has finished a book! Ha! I also want to cut down on my netflix consumption and go on a few more mini adventures with hubs during this challenge, so he seems like the perfect fit. GOALS: Finish reading the book I started at the beginning of last challenge Meditate x10 across the challenge Write once a week Take meds daily (I had to set an alarm on my phone...there is a reason my birth control is an implant, ha) Start a journal beyond NF to track how the meds are working Date/Adventure Night! x3 across the challenge Average 7 hours of sleep a night. AAAAnd here we go... Happy Challenge Everyone!!!

Hi all - My name is David... "HELLOOO DAVID!!" ...and I am a nerd. I work from home and most dinners are late night take out with streamed reruns of Star Trek: TNG. (I just started watching Voyager, and if anyone can convince me to like it, because I really want to, I'm all ears.) I'm really here because I want to start a discussion regarding the benefits of exercise and diet when it comes to dealing with depression, mood disorders, anxiety disorders and the like. Is that the main reason you started exercising, to battle these problems with or without the help of medication? What's your regiment? What kind of success have you had? I'd love to hear from other Rebels interested in this topic. We can swap tips, cheats, and hacks, and maybe get to the bottom of my deep distaste for everyone on Voyager except the Doctor (and Kes is ok too)--though he's no Beverly Crusher. Let the forumizing begin!