The Shadow of the Past... Calanthia Cobbin joins the Assassins!

[Calanthia Cobbin]

  Good evening fellow assassins! I had originally intended to wait one more challenge and join the adventurers while I built some new habits, but since they created their own guild of explorers, I decided to fast forward my plans and join the assassins!

 

​Epic Quest!

 

  At 4'11" and 150-ish pounds (specific measurements coming... tomorrow), I have always been pretty hobbit-shaped.​ I was always built slightly rounder than the girls in my class, and I was dismayed to realize that I stopped growing in the sixth grade. I lacked confidence to put myself out there, and up until I met my husband, the boys weren't interested in the small creature that they tripped over between classes, so I buried myself in books and video games. After some time, this contributed to my obese BMI score. Over the next 6 or 7 months, I hope to reach 120 pounds by my birthday in July, so that I will be considered at a "healthy" BMI. Considering that BMI has a tendency to be inaccurate, and since I also want to put on some muscle between now and then, I also plan to reach a body fat percentage of 25% within the next year or so. As part of my epic quest to the new me, I have been slowly building a habit of walking on a regular basis through the Walk to Mordor Challenge. Since I didn't make it to Rivendell by New Year's like I had hoped, my current goal is to simply make it to Rivendell, and then I will plan more timely goals from there. Also, in the midst of all of the changes I hope to make, I also want to be sure that I learn to love the current version of myself while still taking steps towards the healthier me.

 

Challenge Goals!

 

 â€‹With the recent changes to the levelling system, I plan to do my best to merge the new and the old systems to the best of my ability. I will use the Epic Quest system in combination with the attribute points in my signature. XP and attribute points will be earned based on the percentage of completion for each of my goals. Each goal will also be for 5 days out of a week, with Saturday and Sunday acting as "extra credit" and "makeup" opportunities.

 

​1. I will drink 2L of water 5 days out of the week. I tried and failed this during my last challenge, so this is my chance at redemption! Successful completion will earn 10xp and +3 CON.

 

​2. I will go on an intentional walk with my dog 5 days per week. In the event of inclement weather or "snowmageddon," I may replace some or all of these walks with another activity such as yoga or a bodyweight workout. Successful completion may result in up to 10xp and +3 STA.

 

​3. I will complete the Nerd Fitness cooldown/stretch routine 5 times per week. This should help increase my flexibility and will hopefully also help to relieve some of my constant back pain. Completion of this goal will earn 10xp and +3 DEX.

 

​4. Life Quest: I will establish and maintain a morning and nighttime routine (5 days per week minimum). I will post a more specific routine list another time, but for now this means that I will read a book before bed instead of looking at my phone, I will actually brush AND floss at night (instead of just a quick brush in the morning), I will follow a skin care routine and actually remove my makeup at bedtime, and on weekdays that I don't work I will still be showered and dressed before 9am. I always feel better when I am taking care of myself in these ways, and I'm hoping that it will boost my confidence. Therefore, successfully completing this goal will earn me 10xp as well as +3 CHA.

 

I am so excited to finally be joining the assassins! Stay tuned for measurements and the story of my alter ego, Calanthia Cobbin, tomorrow!!!

[Calanthia Cobbin]

As promised, here are my start of challenge measurements. As I suspected, I backslid over the holidays and gained a few pounds :/ But that's okay, It's time for a new start!

 

height: 4'11"

weight: 150 lbs

 

Neck: 14 in                                             Chest: 39.75 in                                            Thigh: 25 in                                         BMI: 30.29 - obese

Bicep: 13in                                             Waist: 33.5 in                                               Calf: 15.25 in                                       Body Fat: 38%

Forearm: 10 in                                        Hip: 40.25 in

Wrist: 6.5 in                                             

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Challenge day 1:

Morning and night routines- got off to a slow start this morning as my husband and I both slept through our alarms, so I wasn't ready to go by 9am. BUT I did manage to complete my nighttime routine, so I'll give myself partial credit for that goal today.

Water goal- success! Though I feel like I'm drowning with 2L. I need to do better at spacing it out over the day...

Walk- almost forgot about this one until my husband reminded me that we needed to walk the dog! We went on a nice brisk walk with coffee to warm us and it was lovely

Stretching- nearly forgot this one as well, but managed to squeeze it in before bedtime

Overall a pretty successful day! I'll talk about the Calanthia Cobbin alter-ego tomorrow until then, here is assassin kitty!

[Solunaria]

I love your layout! Keep it up, and keep updating! Your Bard is rooting for you. <3

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Challenge day 2:

Routines- morning again was thrown off by oversleeping... I may adjust this one so that I just can't turn the tv on until I'm showered and dressed or something like that because I don't necessarily want to punish myself for getting extra sleep... Idk yet

Walk: today was my turn to remind the husband that we needed to go for a walk there is a path by our house that leads up a long hill and I am actually starting to get sore from it!

Water: almost forgot and chugged the last liter of water within an hour of bedtime... Not my brightest idea but I made my goal! My Plant Nanny app told me to chill out though hahaha!

Stretch: successfully completed and felt soooo good after all my push-ups the past few days for the mini

I keep promising to post about Calanthia and I keep running out of time. I WILL do it soon because I need to get my motivation and vision for the future me out there

Good night!

[Solunaria]

You're RIGHT! You do need that motivation and vision, to bolster and herald your future!

 

So I, for one, will be sitting here FORLORNLY all day waiting for a certain Rogue of a certain Adventuring Party to tell me more about the great Calanthia Cobb...

 

Feed your fans!!! Feed them!!  <3

 

Much love, support, and total belief in you,

~ Sol

[Calanthia Cobbin]

As promised (Especially to you Sol), I introduce to you, Calanthia Cobbin, the embodiment of the future me  . She is the type of hobbit/person that I want to be!

 

As a hobbit, Calanthia Cobbin was born with a natural enjoyment of all things comfortable and cozy. As she grew however, she developed a longing for adventure, and began to make small changes in her life.

Calanthia is physically strong despite her size. Although she still considers herself a food connoisseur, she understands that her naturally short and wide hobbit stature makes her more prone to obesity, which would act as a hindrance to her adventures, and uses her healthy relationship with food and her constant adventuring as a means of staying fit, energized, and prepared for any situation. She can push herself further than even she realizes, and can recover from illness and injury quickly.

She is also emotionally strong. She is of stout heart and strong determination, with the courage and boldness of a person twice her size. As with most other hobbits, she enjoys simple pleasures in life and has a generally positive outlook on life. She views challenges and setbacks as an opportunity for growth rather than allowing them to hold her back.

Calanthia is mentally strong as well. She regularly completes mental exercises to keep her mind sharp and alert for any situation. She prefers to keep her home and work spaces tidy to help promote organization, but not so tidy as to become stifling of her creativity and general enjoyment of life. She has an excellent memory and is able to solve puzzles and recall information in record time.

Finally, Calanthia has strong social bonds. As is typical of hobbits, she excels when it comes to small talk with both friends and strangers. She also has the capacity for deeper connections with others and tends to those bonds often. She knows that she can trust and rely on others, and others often come to her for support as well. She gains strength from her friends and family, and her resilience provides strength for them in return.

 

(Not sure why the picture is so big, but this is Calanthia heading off on another adventure! Also this is not my picture, it was plastered all over tumblr with no clue as to the identity of the artist except for some initials at the bottom)

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Challenge Day 3:

 

Routines: once again, unable to get my morning routine down... I'm not sure how I should go about this because it's usually due to me not waking up early enough to be ready by 9am, but today I woke up super early and still was just too sluggish to shower and get dressed until noon. Maybe I should just start with making sure I actually get dressed at SOME point during the day? At least my nightly routine seems to be sticking

 

Water: LITERALLY finishing up my last few sips right now

 

Walk: Didn't go today, it was super cold and my husband didn't want to go and I got whiny and just didn't go :/

 

Stretch: I'll give myself  half credit for today. I did some stretching but didn't go through the full routine.

 

Didn't give it my all today... Played too many video games  I'll try harder tomorrow!

 

[Solunaria]

As promised (Especially to you Sol), I introduce to you, Calanthia Cobbin, the embodiment of the future me  . She is the type of hobbit/person that I want to be!

 

As a hobbit, Calanthia Cobbin was born with a natural enjoyment of all things...

 

 

I LIKE Calanthia! She's very good at the balance between health and vision and the enjoyment of life!

 

I'm sorry you had such a rough day. But what a great chance to snap back and do PERFECTLY tomorrow! I believe in you.

 

~ Sol

[annyshay]

Lovely write up and excellent vision for the future Calanthia!  Hope today is going perfectly.  

[Calanthia Cobbin]

So.... This weekend my husband went 5 hours away to Nashville for drill, and it was gloomy and cold outside. THEREFORE... This was me all weekend: 

 

 

Didn't do too hot on my goals, which I figured was going to happen which is why I planned in Saturdays and Sundays as my "bonus days" where I make up any lacking points from the rest of the week. 

 

General Goal achievement for Friday- Sunday:

2L of water/day: opted for coffee and tea instead due to cold weather, but got some in today

Go on a walk: Took my dog on a walk on Friday, and neither of us have left the house since... 

Stretching: Nope. Nada. Too busy being a hermit and not leaving the couch.

Morning and Night routines: Did I even shower this weekend? That's probably something I should work on. At least I brushed my teeth and took my pills! I think... 

 

So, I have a tendency to lose motivation over the course of each week and basically by Friday I end up resembling a certain mutual friend of ours... 

 

 

But on the plus side Mondays tend to be my rallying cry of the week where I somehow pull motivation out of thin air and start all over! So I'll work on some willpower issues this week and check back in on that. 

 

Happy Adventuring this week my friends!

[annyshay]

Looks like you know your struggles well.  Got any ideas of how to improve one (notice, only one!) of them this weekend?

 

Also, your use of GIFs makes it clear that you are in the right guild.

 

[Calanthia Cobbin]

I managed to improve my water-drinking this week and actually achieved that goal! So assuming that I can maintain that through this weekend, then the next two days I plan to work on ACTUALLY waking up at a decent time and completing my morning and nighttime routines! I have a really hard time getting going in the morning and that determines whether or not I am productive for the entire rest of the day. This week was also really wet and rainy and/or super windy, which led to no walks with my dog. However I did manage to replace those walks with other activities such as the squat mini-challenge. 

 

I finally got Steve's book! So I plan to use that as a manual for the new epic quest system, which will HOPEFULLY help me figure out a reward system, as well as what I should be making a priority in my life. Maybe that can help me get my goals settled. Any other ideas? 

 

PS this was my face while unpacking Steve's book from the Amazon box:

 

[Calanthia Cobbin]

So I would say this weekend has been pretty successful. I typically reserve weekends for extra credit/freebie days (because I know I'm not perfect) so I took this time to try and get my goals as perfectly as possible to make up for my struggles this past week. I even felt motivated and got some extra cleaning done!

I've been looking some of the other posts and realized that I am not completely going all out with the role playing aspect of this and I would really like to! So to kind of test the waters with this, I'm trying to start by making my quest names more interesting. I would love to make them all LOTR related, but I'm having a hard time thinking of some relevant quest names. These will do for now. Tell me what you think and if you have any suggestions!

Drink 2L of water per day = Drink from the Fountain of Youth?

Stretch Daily = pre-adventure stretching?

Walk my dog daily = Walking to Mordor!

Establish and maintain a morning and nighttime routine = Making Hobbity Habits ?

I'm not very good at this...

Finally, I'm while reading Steve's book I'm realizing that, although I will always want to primarily hold the assassin way in my heart, I don't want to be limited to it. I have found more and more that I am more of a hybrid of some sort, though I don't know what to call myself. I basically want to do ALL the things and train in a variety of ways. The problem is that I no longer know what to call myself. I was trying to look it up and found this website about multiclass archetypes. It didn't have Assassin so the next closest class I could find was a Rogue? But I don't know how accurate this is. If I were to go based off of this page then I guess I would be some kind of Blackthorn?

Except that only has Rogue and Druid, but doesn't include others like Monk, Adventurer, and Ranger. I'm not sure what to call myself and I may be overthinking this, but it would be kind of cool to not be limited by my class and train in each group for a short time. Anyway if any of you have any suggestions or thoughts on this then I would be super grateful!

Goodnight all

[annyshay]

Drinking water goal should totally be: Ent Draughts.  The others sound like a good start!

 

I would not stress about what to call yourself.  Lots of people are just Assassin/Druid/Ranger/Whatever else hybrids.  It's also totally cool to jump from guild to guild based on challenges, whims, etc.  You can take that name while you're there... or not...  

 

Basically, be your own special snowflake!

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Ent Draughts sounds exactly like what I've been looking for! Thanks!

And yeah I may do something along the lines of "Assassin at heart, training with the..." For my class haha

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Finally got my Epic Quest character all set up! I modeled my quests off of the format in Steve's book for now, though I will likely change some things around and re-categorize them. I'm thinking of having a category for each of the classes in Nerd Fitness since I want to do ALL the things and then I'll probably have bigger quests worth more xp followed by smaller breakdown quests that are worth fewer xp. I'm not entirely sure what amounts of xp to give everything, so I estimated them by relative difficulty/time involved for now though that may change... any suggestions?  

[Elastigirl]

Love your Epic Quest! Great job on keeping up the walking. 

[annyshay]

Ent Draughts sounds exactly like what I've been looking for! Thanks!

And yeah I may do something along the lines of "Assassin at heart, training with the..." For my class haha

I really like that phrasing, actually... may steal in the future.  

 

Also, your character and epic quest are... well... Epic.

[Calanthia Cobbin]

I've been doing decently with my goals so far this week, though I haven't taken my dog for a walk for a couple of days. We had a snow day today and already have one for tomorrow, so I need to make sure that I stay motivated and keep up my goals. I've been getting all 2L of water each day, and I have been stretching (although I forgot to yesterday due to an impromptu Star Wars marathon!). With the snow day I didn't wake up on time and get ready for the day, so I'll have to do extra well on my nighttime routine tonight in order to get partial credit for that goal today. I also need to do some kind of replacement activity since I haven't been walking my dog with all the snow on the ground... But overall I am no longer slipping and have at least gotten ahold of a couple of my goals, which I consider to be a success. 

 

I've been thinking a lot about the next challenge (even though we are only halfway through this one) and what sort of goals I'm going to have... which I'm going to start calling quests btw. I've been talking with the legendary Bard of SEWTPE, Solunaria, lately and we are both on the fence about switching guilds for the next challenge. I personally want to maintain my overall status as an "Assassin-at-Heart," while perhaps training with other guilds to widen my skill set. The next challenge will likely be about mindfulness and self-control (since I have none), which means I may likely be training with the Druids next month. I've found some good quest ideas while looking around at other peoples' quests, and I'm thinking along the lines of food tracking, no screens while eating, more stretching, and possibly some form of meditation, since I tend to be stressed for no reason. Any other ideas? 

 

As always, thanks for those of you who are reading and may your roads go ever on and on  

[Solunaria]

Well, if you want to stride purposefully with the "Training with the Druids" aspect, you could put in something about getting outside every day. That can be super amazing for stress.

 

Whatever you choose, I'm sure it'll be fantastic! You have SO been killing it with these goals.

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Well, if you want to stride purposefully with the "Training with the Druids" aspect, you could put in something about getting outside every day. That can be super amazing for stress.

Whatever you choose, I'm sure it'll be fantastic! You have SO been killing it with these goals.

Getting outside is a good idea! I live in an area that has pretty nice weather for most of the year (except for the 5inches of snow we have right now), so I have no excuse to be a hermit!

And thanks! I've been pretty impressed with how you are doing on your goals as well, considering all the craziness in your life right now!

[Calanthia Cobbin]

Well ladies and gents, this challenge has come to a close and I would say that it has been far more successful than my first challenge! Though maybe not as successful as I would have liked... I'll blame the blizzard So without further ado: 
 

Challenge Wrap-up!

 

Drinking the Ent Draught: 116.67% = A+ = +3.5 CON and 11.7 xp!
    I got extra credit! I provided leeway for myself on the weekends to "slip" a bit, and I didn't on this one! I think I have fully established a habit of drinking more water. I noticed after a while that my body began to CRAVE water and if I didn't have water first thing in the morning I could actually feel myself getting dehydrated. I'm finally taking baby steps to listening to what my body needs and following through with it  
 
Stretching for Battle: 30.56% = F = +1 DEX and 3 xp
    I definitely could have done better on this one. I realized that I spent most of my evenings relaxing by playing video games, when I probably should have done my relaxing stretches first! I will most likely be repeating a version of this quest in the next challenge (which is what I did for the water quest in this challenge) so that I can try to truly vanquish this beast! Perhaps next time rather than putting off my stretches until the evening, I can do them when I first wake up or when I get home from work? 
 
Walking my dog to Mordor: 66.67% = D = +2 STA and 6.7 xp
    I know that I can very easily blame the blizzard here for my inability to walk my dog... but I even gave myself a way out in my original post! I had stated that: 
 

"In the event of inclement weather or "snowmageddon," I may replace some or all of these walks with another activity such as yoga or a bodyweight workout"

 

   I gave myself no excuse, and therefore I must accept my grade of a D on this quest. My dog still needs walking and I am still on my quest to walk to Mordor, so I will continue working on this (just not as part of a challenge).
 
Making Hobbity-Habits: 81.39% = B- = +2.5 CHA and 8.2 xp
   The primary purpose of this quest was to make me get up out of bed and get myself presentable in the morning, and then actually remember to go through a nightly routine so that I can sleep better at night. I was successful some days, and other days I was a bit lazy. Overall I am satisfied with my B on this quest, as I know I could have done better but I also had quite a few lazy snow days in there that I don't feel bad about at all  

 

Overall Challenge Grade: C = 69.31% 

This is a huge improvement over my first challenge (let's just not talk about that Fail) so I am satisfied  

I am slowly building up habits and gaining discipline, and I'll shoot for an A or B next time! 

 

For the next challenge, I will be taking a short vacation to the Druid camp so that I can continue the process of becoming more "in-touch" with myself. I shall return soon however, for I will always be an Assassin-at-heart! 

[annyshay]

Strong work! Have fun sneakily blending in with the Druids!