forkboy presses reset

[forkboy]

Well, it has happened again.  I have let life's stresses get in the way of my goals.  Every time I fail I learn something new.  The question is will I ever truly internalize the lessons I have learned.  I had a goal of completing 8 consecutive challenges.  I held strong for 6.  I went from 210 lbs. to 175 lbs.  My BF was finally starting to get where I have wanted it to be my whole life.  I rewarded myself with a new major tattoo.  I was so excited.  Then, what happened?  I am not quite sure.  My progress slowed.  I upped my calories a little in preparation for a lifting competition.  I moved from a home I had been living in for 10 years.  The purchase process was grueling at times with one home falling through at the last minute.  The new home has had a number of problems.  I am still not settled.  The old house is still hanging around my neck.  Work became extremely stressful at the same time.  My solution?  More food and alcohol.  My weight didn't really tick up very fast though, just a few pounds here and there.  The new pattern sunk in.  I was not used to eating and drinking and then before I know it I have been away from the community for 4 months and I am back up to 190 lbs (well 189.5) as of this morning.  So sad!  What have I learned?  I don't do well with ambiguity.  I need hard rules and these challenges help me with the hard rules.  So here they are, the usual.

 

1) Macro precision.  2k calories on workout days with 150g of protein and less than 65g of fat.  1,700 calories, same targets if I take the day off from running or lifting.

2) Workout 5 days a week, sometimes 6.  I lift  3 days a week still (that never really stopped).  I will run again 2-3 days.  I haven't run since February.

3) Curfew, off to bed by 9:30p on nights I work.

 

That's it.  No rewards, just looking for As this challenge and to get back into the habit of posting, reading, being accountable, you know the jam.

 

Monday G1 0/1, G2 1/1, G3 0/1

Tuesday G1 0/1, G2 0, G3 0/1

Wednesday G1 1/1, G2 1/1, G3 TBD

 

So my eating has not been horrible this week, but I didn't bother or manage to reach the macro targets Monday and Tuesday.  I have worked out twice.  I have been to bed super late.  No time like the present to turn this shit around.

 

Glad to be back!

 

[Stronkey Kong]

Bah!

I shot up about 30 since the holidays.

Let's rock this shit!

[forkboy]

Bah!

I shot up about 30 since the holidays.

Let's rock this shit!

 

Thanks man.  On it!

[forkboy]

Hit Curfew Last Night (2/4 total, goal is 27/30 so not much room for error at this point)

Macros on Target (2/4 total, goal is 38/42, already chewed up half of my outs)

Ran Today (3/3 total, goal is 27/30)

 

I didn't really start the challenge until yesterday, so I may be being a little tough on myself, but the more I can hit the more likely I will get back into habit mode.

 

My new running trail near my house is through a big city park.  It is a nice change.  My old trail was in the suburbs and through the desert, which I liked, but after having run there for 10 years I am glad for the change.

 

With the Journey to Degobah over I need to go searching for a new profile pic now... Hmm... either back to the original or thoughts on a new direction... See what I can test drive...

[Harihead]

Forkboy! It's so good to see you. 

 

I'm sorry about life knocking you around; life stresses just seep in, like water, and before you know it your foundation is soaked and your metaphorical house gets all wibbly. Mine does, anyway. 

 

That said, I'm getting better at failure. I've been doing about 1 month on, 1 month off, but I didn't shoot up in the "off" months like I did before. I kept the weight gain around 8-9 pounds, which is about half the gain after my first experiment with "maintenance" mode. 

 

I had a real hard time getting my head into this challenge. I got cranky and rebellious. But I think I chose my goals wisely, because wine is a very easy on/off switch-- just don't drink it! And all those extra calories go away. 

 

What I'm really liking is the going to bed early thing. I expected it to have a positive ripple-through in so many ways-- more time for fitness in the morning (which is my preferred time), more rested which helps with EVERYTHING, and setting a solid routine for my body clock. 

 

I'm thinking this is going to be good, Forkboy. You and me, we had a few rounds out, but we're coming back and it's going to be awesome.

 

So great to see you, buddy. Let's rock!

[Swampling]

Forkboy! You're back!

 

[forkboy]

Forkboy! It's so good to see you. 

 

I'm sorry about life knocking you around; life stresses just seep in, like water, and before you know it your foundation is soaked and your metaphorical house gets all wibbly. Mine does, anyway. 

 

That said, I'm getting better at failure. I've been doing about 1 month on, 1 month off, but I didn't shoot up in the "off" months like I did before. I kept the weight gain around 8-9 pounds, which is about half the gain after my first experiment with "maintenance" mode. 

 

I had a real hard time getting my head into this challenge. I got cranky and rebellious. But I think I chose my goals wisely, because wine is a very easy on/off switch-- just don't drink it! And all those extra calories go away. 

 

What I'm really liking is the going to bed early thing. I expected it to have a positive ripple-through in so many ways-- more time for fitness in the morning (which is my preferred time), more rested which helps with EVERYTHING, and setting a solid routine for my body clock. 

 

I'm thinking this is going to be good, Forkboy. You and me, we had a few rounds out, but we're coming back and it's going to be awesome.

 

So great to see you, buddy. Let's rock!

 

 

Forkboy! You're back!

 

 

 

Thanks guys, good to be back!

[forkboy]

Week 1 Summary:

 

Curfew 3/5 (started late and finished strong)

 

Macros 4/7 (again, started late and my son had a birthday sleepover that I did not plan for well, didn't go ape shit, but also didn't hit my targets)

 

Exercise 5/5 (solid)

 

I am off to a good start this week too, so feel optimistic.   Still working on a new theme/direction...

[forkboy]

This week is off to a strong start.  I have hit my macros 3 days in a row.  I have exercised three days in a row.  I have hit curfew three days in a row.

 

That said I went back to my charts and graphs I am so fond of only to be disheartened.  I have put on soooo much fucking weight and so quickly.  I thought, can this be right?  So, I decided to take some photos this evening to compare against my journey.  Sure enough, I look like I did last September/October.  I have undone like 90% of everything I worked so hard to accomplish.  I am pissed at myself.  I am saddened.  I am in disbelief that I let it get this bad this quickly.  Fuck!  No time like the present I guess...

[Stronkey Kong]

Remind yourself of that strong start and don't frame your journey with the negative. Life happened, whatever. Pick up and carry back on.

And if it's any consolation, since new year i gained 30 lbs... While on a cut(or supposed to be). Wtf was that shit?

[forkboy]

Remind yourself of that strong start and don't frame your journey with the negative. Life happened, whatever. Pick up and carry back on.

And if it's any consolation, since new year i gained 30 lbs... While on a cut(or supposed to be). Wtf was that shit?

 

Thanks man.  I appreciate the encouragement.  Sometimes I need to throw my diaper-baby tantrums before I can move on.  Behind me.  Moving on.  Thanks!

[forkboy]

So I had a revelation of sorts in the shower this morning.  In 18 months I will be 40 years old!  When did that happen?!  I think my next journey will be to frame that 18 months, to quantify it, to kick its ass.  A fellow rebellion member used to talk about giving 40 the finger.  I too need to engage in my journey to give 40 the finger.  I think I have the broad outline of what I am doing, now just to work on giving it some context, milestones, goals, a theme, etc....

[forkboy]

Some math... It is 574 days.  82 weeks.  How to divide this quest....  Into challenges, into one major challenge, into a handful...  10x 8 week sessions seems to have a nice ring to it.  Maybe.  Hmm...

[forkboy]

A journey of 7s perhaps.  If I do a 10 week challenge, then take of 2 weeks and repeat 7 times I will arrive at my destination.  This does not fit neatly into the mold of the rebellion's 6 week efforts with periodic one and two week breaks.  I do like the idea of going a little longer like 10 weeks and always taking a little longer of a break.  I am mindlessly rambling at this point.  Just excited.

[Stronkey Kong]

I think you and Ihave similar Achilles' heels.

1) numbers: we focus on numbers to much.

2) reductionism: we think we can figure or how to reach our goals by understanding all the inputs and outputs

3) micro/over managing: thinking we do/can understand everything, we try too hard to optimize by picking apart the details and adjusting every little parameter to a very specific plan.

4) when the plan isn't perfect: we crumble

How to fix:

1) The numbers guide us, but you also have to feel.with your gut. Weight goes up... Do you feel like a sick blob of fat? ... No? Keep going you might just get stronger. Wait you actually feel good, like you sleep well and can move easily, then keep at it.

Shedding body fat and trading it for athletic ability feels good always. Period.

2) The body is a complex system and sometimes the effects mismatch the limited lists of known causes we have. A bad day can happen even when you do everything right. Give your plan some time and look for consistent good and bad trends.

3) Follows from 2, use the broad strokes and keep it simple. Don't run 1 mile in six minutes, or squat 225# 3x5.

Just run till you feel like you shouldn't anymore.

Just squat till you only have one good rep in the tank.

4) If the plan fails, the plan is a failure, not you. Change something and keep going.

You already know this, and I'm pretty sure now I'm projecting my own problems and need to take my own advice.

Most of this comes from reading Squat Everyday by Matt ... H something. Good book about training and recovery. And has some good lessons for everything else. It really changed my perspective and approach to training.

[forkboy]

I like and appreciate your assessment.  I do have to say though I am not sure I follow its relation to my path.  I actually feel like my micromanaging and tracking of inputs and outputs worked rather well.  I saw consistent weight and fat loss and increased muscle mass and strength in my lifts over a period of 8 months.  I have issues I think living in ambiguity, which may be another way of stating what you have listed.  This is how I see my my recent failure playing out, as a series of missteps...

1) My coach and I decided I could compete in a power lifting meet and that in order to prep I could increase my carb and calorie intake a few hundred calories to see bigger lifts over a 4 month horizon.  I started adding more calories.

 

2) My weight indeed did not go up much, just a couple pounds.  I was at 175 before and then my weight ticked up to 178-ish over several weeks.

 

3) I decided I was too busy to post daily on NF and would move to weekly.

 

4) I decided I was too busy to read on NF others threads.  If I am not going to "participate" I thought, why would I write shit on my own thread.  A community does not work if I expect others to read my posts but I don't bother checking in on them.  That is just selfish.  I have my own spreadsheets and lifting logs, so no need to share.  There is a fine line here as it relates to accountability though right?

 

5) I moved while work got crazy simultaneously.  I started drinking at night to deal with the stress.  Entering 21 oz of wine in MFP and calculating my alcohol at sometimes 30% of my daily calories was discouraging.

 

6) The stress continued to mount and I continued to take the wrong way out.  Pizza, beer, the usual suspects.  I gave into stress not really an acknowledgement of a lack of continued success at all.  My weight ticked up a bit again, now I was in the low 180s.  Still  I could eat pizza and drink beer and just lift 3 days a week and stay in the low 180s?  Why not.

 

7) I stopped NF altogether.  I stopped recording calories.

 

8) Bad habits returned.  If I am not accountable.  I don't have any defined parameters and I am not checking my caloric intake.  Results?  Total fucking shit show.  Who knows what I was drinking and eating.  I woke up to read 189.5 on the scale.  

 

And I am back.  To be clear this was not intended to be more whining, more of a chronology and a documenting of the slippery slope.  I think the simple act of tracking and reporting on my tracking to others periodically is really all I need.  If I let those two things go I have a hard time.  I can still drink beer sometimes, but if I never record it and see that 1000 calorie spike it is like it didn't happen.  If it didn't happen then I don't see my body changing.  Anywho.  My two cents at this point.

Thanks for the tip on the book.  Is it Matt Perryman by chance?  Amazon has a kindle addition I may check out.

[Stronkey Kong]

Hmm... Yeah I'm probably just seeing done common ground in our approach which is failing me. Not you perhaps.

I also have that habit of when things aren't going well i disappear for a while. I think that when i stick around, it's less for the accountability and more for the social interaction that encourages me to lift. Few people in my real life care how much i can deadlift. Also they can't help me or guide me in any way.

Anyway, that's a good breakdown of your path. I either forgot some points or missed them.

Yes, Perryman. I think i got an H in there because a friend of mine is a Matt H.

Now go crush it!

[forkboy]

k, so along the theme of my need to track things I understand I am not in control and the need to feel like I am may not be productive, but alas, I do it anyway.  I have a new daily tracker to get me to 40.  I am putting to rest my Degobah weight chart below and have started a new one.  Too depressing to always see where I was in late Feb and early March.

 

[AshPS]

Hello my friend!

I'll be tagging along.

Kick butt my friend!

[forkboy]

Hello my friend!

I'll be tagging along.

Kick butt my friend!

 

Hey Ash!  How you been?!?  Got a thread I can follow?

Thanks for stopping by!

[AshPS]

Hey Ash! How you been?!? Got a thread I can follow?

Thanks for stopping by!

Just hanging around my battle log this round.

But i was super happy to see you back.

(Particularly with boomsticks and chainsaws in hand. :triumphant: )

always my friend!

[forkboy]

k, so I am back into the swing of reading up on nutrition in some of my free time.  I believe I am like the classic yo yo dieter and I have been killing my metabolism over the years.  I basically have this pattern where I am either in consistent deficit and losing weight or eating like a total fucking asshole with very little in between.  I have a bit of a conundrum now though because I am not happy at my current weight.  I think if I can drop the last 12 lbs I gained that I might best be served by staying there for awhile, slowly working on increasing my maintenance calories.  If I could keep my BF and weight where I am comfortable and work on increasing my capacity to take on more calories then go on a cut again, rinse and repeat I would slowly build the metabolism and the body I want.  This is more like a 5-10 year project, even longer than I had been planning recently.  Just an observation worth sharing.

 

I missed my macros a little on Saturday, not too too bad, but a miss.  I was on target Sunday and yesterday though.  I have been pretty well on track with curfew and exercise.

[forkboy]

recovered from my weekend miss on my macros.  i gotta say i think i really prefer this daily metric better than the 6-week challenges.  debating whether i want to give up challenges and just go back to my long ignored battle log.  i am not really grading myself over 6 weeks.  i am not tracking anything for role playing purposes.  i have not created any rewards for myself.  i am not sure this is the best method to approach my new tack.  more to contemplate...

 

[Harihead]

> This is more like a 5-10 year project, even longer than I had been planning recently.  Just an observation worth sharing.

 

It absolutely is. I think that's what calmed me down lately. I was secretly hoping to be one of those NF poster Rebels, who does this amazing transformation in a year. That was not to be. On the other hand, I've done a good, solid start.

 

My one-year anniversary is coming up this week, and I'm down about 30 pounds. Not bad for a year! I've had my setbacks when I went all crazy (euphemistically called "Maintenance mode") and then recovered and went on. So, good solid progress overall, but still not near my goal. But thanks to NF I'm a whole lot nearer!

 

I think the battle log is a good idea. It's too hard to sign in to the computer every day, but I have a little notebook I carry around with me, and do my daily tracking there. Right now I'm logging food, my challenge stats, and sugar grams (target <45). It's the daily thing that keeps me on track. The challenges are nice if I want to establish a habit, because it gets me past that 3-week thing and into a routine. But long-term progress, that has to be daily, baby. One freaking day at a time. That's how Frodo and Sam got to Mordor. I have a whole new appreciation for that now.

[forkboy]

> This is more like a 5-10 year project, even longer than I had been planning recently.  Just an observation worth sharing.

 

It absolutely is. I think that's what calmed me down lately. I was secretly hoping to be one of those NF poster Rebels, who does this amazing transformation in a year. That was not to be. On the other hand, I've done a good, solid start.

 

My one-year anniversary is coming up this week, and I'm down about 30 pounds. Not bad for a year! I've had my setbacks when I went all crazy (euphemistically called "Maintenance mode") and then recovered and went on. So, good solid progress overall, but still not near my goal. But thanks to NF I'm a whole lot nearer!

 

I think the battle log is a good idea. It's too hard to sign in to the computer every day, but I have a little notebook I carry around with me, and do my daily tracking there. Right now I'm logging food, my challenge stats, and sugar grams (target <45). It's the daily thing that keeps me on track. The challenges are nice if I want to establish a habit, because it gets me past that 3-week thing and into a routine. But long-term progress, that has to be daily, baby. One freaking day at a time. That's how Frodo and Sam got to Mordor. I have a whole new appreciation for that now.

 

You are so so wise.  I agree on all points and feel like you are speaking with my voice.  Love the "maintenance mode" comment, that is totally what happened for me too.  Agreed on the challenge creating a habit.  I think I will stay on this thread for this challenge and then move back over to the battle log.  I think another good thing about the battle log approach will be that I won't feel like I have to get on and post and keep the challenge thread going.  I can and will post, but just as I need to and want to.  Then I am free to just stalk and read up on how the rest of the rebellion is doing without feeling the pressure to stay on top of it all.  Too many threads move too fast for to feel like I can participate meaningfully.  The battle log will give me the freedom to just drop in and out all the time, more my style anyhow.