Astreja: All tangled up in the roots of Yggdrasil

[Astreja]

My primary quest for this challenge is simple:  Exercise daily for 6 weeks without injuring myself.  I have a tendency to get carried away with goal-setting, refusing to back down once I've declared a target, so this time I'm not going to set any quantitative objective other than "do something towards the quest every day."  The exercise could be yoga, t'ai chi, Pilates, aerobics, or low-intensity weight training, as long as it can be done without causing undue distress to joints and muscles. (+WIS, +STA, +CON, perhaps +STR depending on what exercises I opt for)

 

Sub-quest #1:  Sign up for beginners' Pilates class and learn the basics. (+STR, +DEX, +STA)

 

Sub-quest #2:  Establish a daily meditation practice. (+WIS)

 

Side quest:  Read!  I have a number of partially-read books occupying prime real estate on my desk, including A Guide to the Good Life by William B. Irvine, a book about Stoicism.  The contents would do a lot more good in my brain, so I'm going to strive to read every day.  I was about to quantify the amount of reading, but caught myself just in time. (+WIS)

[Bekah]

Simple, Straightforward, Adaptable...sounds amazing Let me know how Pilates goes, I have never actually tried it. 

[kaelvan]

Tell me how A Guide to the Good Life is (when you finish it of course). Sounds interesting

[Ambisagrus]

The watchwords I learned are 'steady gentle pressure' (and all three matter). I think that might be from 'Born to Run' but I can't reach a copy to verify. Looks like a great challenge!

[LittleTurtle]

Hello and welcome!  

 

Exercising everyday is great, but don't forget to give your body a rest every so often.  

 

Pilates sounds amazing - I can't wait to hear how it goes for you!

 

As far as meditation - do you have a plan of action?  For instance, how long will you be meditating each day?  Will you have a specific time of day that you think will work better?

 

I can't wait to read your progress!  Good luck to you!  

[cavemom]

How's your challenge going so far?

[Astreja]

Three days in, things seem to be going okay.

 

Reading is fine; I've set an arbitrary target of one chapter a day, which gives clear start and end points.

 

With the meditation I'm going with the mindfulness/insight school of thought and focusing on whatever subjects or sensations come to my attention.  Currently I'm using a hard chair rather than trying to sit on a cushion, and when I lose the thread of whatever I was contemplating I turn my attention back to my breathing.  Rather than "following" a breath all the way down into my lungs, I'm concentrating on the point of entry just inside my nose.

 

I'm now registered for the Pilates course, which is starting on Saturday.  I'm also using my exercise bike, plus body-weight exercises and a bit of stretching.  The routine I have for the bike is fine, but I don't yet have an established routine for the other exercises and am trying various things to see what works.

[Astreja]

The Pilates course finally got started (the teacher was ill last Saturday).  Class is a mixture of beginners and veteran students.

 

What I've learned so far:  The breathing (drawing air in through the nose and expanding the lower part of the rib cage, then exhaling through pursed lips) is a bit tricky and is going to call for a lot of attention to get it consistently right.  We did a lot of work with exercise balls,  although it's a bit of a blur and I can't exactly recall any one exercise in great detail.  I'm going to read up a bit on the theory so that I can start to tell when I'm doing the sequences right.

[Astreja]

I think I'm finally making progress on the meditation part of the challenge.  What changed:  I got a bit stricter with the sitting posture, using a chair but not the backrest, and am building up the habit of just stopping and going back to watching my breath as soon as I notice a distraction.

 

The reading is also coming along nicely.  It looks like at least 2 books will get finished for sure, and there's 2 other incomplete reads awaiting their turn.

 

The only problem area is when I don't have an exercise class to go to, and don't feel like doing aerobics on my bike.  I do something or other, but when it's unplanned and has no particular limits, it doesn't feel like I did anything.  In other words, I'm devaluing the things that I am doing, and have set the bar for "enough" too high.  I suspect this lack of acceptance may be one of the things that have gotten me injured in the past -- Working out too hard because of an imaginary quota that I feel I absolutely have to fill, no matter how much it hurts. 

[Ambisagrus]

I've struggled with that sense of not doing enough, too. I can't remember where, but somewhere I picked up the habit of just doing something when I didn't feel like working hard, and that would invariably give way to trying harder. So I'd go for a walk when I didn't want to run, for instance, and then end up running. These days I tend to think of everything on a continuum -- walking is just really slow running.

 

Congrats on the meditation breakthrough!

[Astreja]

I like the idea of doing something rather than nothing, and maybe end up doing more.  At very least it would keep the exercise habit alive on days where the workout just doesn't want to get going.

 

Today was my second Pilates course, and it's starting to make sense.  We've only repeated a few exercises both weeks, and I suspect there are many more exercises yet to come.  I also went out and bought an exercise ball for home use.  I used to have a cheap one a few years ago, but didn't really know what to do with it.  (It was also a bit too big for me.)  Pumping up the ball this afternoon was a workout in itself.  

 

I've been using my battle log for daily progress reports but will try to at least write a weekly report in this thread.

[LittleTurtle]

Yay for your Pilates course starting to make sense!  I think you're doing great - keep it up, we're halfway there!  

[Astreja]

Made it to the end of the quest, and I'm giving myself 13.5/15 points, distributed as follows:

 

Main quest:   Daily, injury-free exercise.  100% compliance but minimal activity on some days, just doing something to be quest-compliant.  No points for strength, as I did minimal strength-building exercise except in the Pilates class..

• STA 1.5, CON 2, WIS 1

Subquest #1:  Sign up for a Pilates class.  100% attendance, plus a few exercises at home.

• STR 1, STA 1, DEX 2

Subquest #2:  Meditation.  100% compliance, 10 minutes a day on average.

• WIS 2, CHA 2

Side quest:  Reading.  100% compliance.  No stated goal other than to read every day, but I finished 3 books and am near the end of a 4th one.

• WIS 1

And my dragon buddy Glori would like to mention that he enjoyed the quest as well.

[Bekah]

wow! What an amazing job You and Glori really did fantastic

[Bekah]

I think I'm finally making progress on the meditation part of the challenge.  What changed:  I got a bit stricter with the sitting posture, using a chair but not the backrest, and am building up the habit of just stopping and going back to watching my breath as soon as I notice a distraction.

 

This works for me too, and focusing on trying to elongate my breaths as well (I tend to breathe very very shallowly)

I'm glad you are finding things that are helpful Its a little late but I have been finding this meditation challenge to be fun and helpful and it is helping make meditation a habit, plus its free, so I lose nothing by trying it out

[Astreja]

Bekah, the meditation challenge looks interesting.  Have bookmarked it and will see how the modules and I get along.

 

Mini-book review for Kaelvan on A Guide to the Good Life:  All in all, a very readable little book.  It gives a good history of classical Stoicism, but concentrates mainly on coming up with practical applications rather than theoretical philosophy.  Most important take-away, IMO, is to focus efforts and concerns in areas that we can actually control or partially control, and to avoid investing energy in things that are clearly outside our influence.  (Easier said than done -- I occasionally get wrapped up in following news stories and can get extremely upset, all the more so if there's nothing I can do to help.)