Work in Hatcheries and Conditioning

[Bernard Marx]

A new year is soon to begin. 

 

In that vein, I've chosen a new username and am starting a new battle log.

 

2016 went well for me. Despite the ups and downs, I've netted 15 lbs of progress toward my goal. I'll start this thread by listing the good things I've accomplished so that every time I visit I'm reminded of the momentum I carry.

• Completed my Bachelor of Science, graduating at the end of the fall semester.
• Trained for and ran my first 5k in just over 29 minutes
• Completed a nutrition support program at work with a total weight loss of 20lbs from start to finish
• Improved biometric screening markers from last years physical. Biggest improvement in LDL, small improvements in HDL, triglycerides, blood pressure, and A1C. (All numbers still within 'normal' ranges, but improved within the normal range. LDL had been almost low enough to fall out of 'normal' range now firmly in the middle)
• Doctor officially cancelled pre-diabetic diagnoses from my medical records due to two years of sustained improvement in A1C.
• Got a big wage increase at work and have controlled spending, resulting in a positive savings rate
• Paid tuition in full for both semesters and paid down debt

 

Despite these successes, I'm coming back to start logging for the Rebellion to see, and obviously there must be a reason. I mentioned ups AND downs and the astute reader would notice a net of 15lbs lost this year despite 20lbs down during the program at work. If I add up all my yo-yos in my weight chart for 2016, I actually lost a total of 35 lbs over various periods of time and over other periods of time I gained a total of 20lbs. Consistency and long-term sustainability are the devils I struggle with now. Here are the challenges I saw during the time periods of my biggest weight gains through 2016:

• Spring and Fall semesters. I gained about 5lbs over the spring semester and 15lbs during the second half of the fall semester. It seems when I get busy and stressed I fall off the wagon.
• Sugar. The holiday season has been killing my progress and self-esteem. I gave away as many sweets as I could get out of my house, but whenever I've had any in the house, I have zero self control. Cookies, fudge, kringle, cake... I've eaten too much of all of it.
• Work stress. The most stressful times for school have also coincided with busier times at work. I've found myself caving in to the siren song of the vending machines too often.

 

I'm still trying to plan out my goals for 2017, so I intend my next post in this thread to flesh out those details. In the meantime, here are some of my level 50 goals:

• Kids grown up into well adjusted adults with good parental relationship
• Financially independant
• Good all around physical fitness/health
• Have completed or am actively completing 1 or more long distance trails in the US (either thru or section, in order of likelihood/desire) IAT, JMT, PCT, AT
• Minimal participation in consumer culture, few possessions and only those that add significant value
• Composer working with musicians interested in contemporary modal works

 

My progress toward these things so far:

• 3 year old and 18 month old. They're both happy, healthy, and full of life so far.
• Positive savings rate of about 11% of income.
• Currently 6'3" and 229lbs 22.4% body fat (impedance measured at health clinic, and down from 26.3%) healthy biometric results
• Have done about 30 miles total of sections on the IAT
• Implemented household rule for waiting period on new purchases which has resulted in either my wife or myself talking ourselves out of purchases like: fitness trackers, new computers, and excessive clothing. 1-in-1-out rule has helped prevent proliferation of things in our house.
• Have only intermittently played any instruments over the last year and not written anything in several. My oldest child is interested in music and may help catalyze my return if we start doing piano lessons together.

[Bernard Marx]

Ok. I think I have a rough idea of my 2017 goals mapped out. I tried to keep them somewhat aligned so that each of this year's goals support one of my level 50 criteria. One of my fitness goals is a carry over from last years goals (I kind of last minute replaced some of the strength training goals with running because I wanted a more social experience with my workouts). I will continue to review my goals, define how I will measure them and determine success. So far, I have 10 goals, three of which will be year long overarching goals, and the remaining 7 are things I should be able to work at sequentially and check off throughout the year.

 

1. I do not raise my voice in my home. 
   • Young children can be challenging, but they need patience and understanding
   • When I raise my voice, I upset them which hurts our relationships
   • I feel guilty after I do it, and feeling guilty increases stress, which I've found degrades my health/wellness goals
   • This will be a hard goal to measure
2. I will save at least 15% of my income
   • This is about a 33% increase in my savings rate over 2016.
   • This fits in my ten year plan that has savings rate increasing annually up to 50% at year 5
   • Maintaining a 50% savings rate for five years plus the savings from five years of ramping up will hit my definition of financial independence
3. I will lose and maintain an amount of weight loss sufficient to reach a body fat percentage between 15 and 17
   • According to a few online calculators based off current weight and BF% I think this will be around 25-30 lbs
   • Ballpark goal weight should be about 200
   • I will need to make more specific nutrition goals to support this
   • The specific target is somewhat flexible because it's hard to calculate BF% exactly. I may define success based on how I look/feel rather than hard numbers
4. I will run a 5k with an average pace of 9min/mi or less.
   • I did about 9:40 min/mi in my first race after only 11 weeks of training from non runner
   • This supports my lvl 50 hiking goal as running and hiking fitness are complementary
5. I will run a 10k
   • There are plenty of programs for walking up distance after a 5k over time
   • Need to be sure not to add too much too fast to avoid injury
6. I will do a freaking pull up
   • This goal carried over from last year.
   • I gave up on strength training because I didn't have anyone to do it with me and I was tired of working out alone
   • I have some ideas to improve my chances when I try again, but I need to map it out into a clear plan
7. I will perform a full depth Grok squat and hold for 60 seconds
   • I do not have the hip or posterior chain flexibility for this because I sit too much
   • I will stretch and practice regularly to get my hips to sink deeper and my heels to stay on the ground
   • This goal should help facilitate injury prevention as I work through my other fitness goals by improving my ROM
8. I will clean out my basement and garage of any and all items stored and not used in 2016
   • It doesn't matter if I sell them, give them away, recycle, or worst-case trash them, they will be gone
9. I will go through my closet and ask the becoming minimalist's two questions for every item of clothing I own
   • Do I need this?
   • Why do I have this?
   • Goal is to remove at least 15 items based on the answers. 
10. I will reconnect via Facebook with at least one musician I met during my previous major and attend at least one of their performances
    • In order to get back into composing and getting performed, I will need to make an effort to network with performers.

[Bernard Marx]

Happy New Year everyone. I've decided to start by subdividing my goals a bit. I fully appreciate the concept of breaking down large overarching objectives into quickly winnable and measurable bites of progress. In that vein, here are my goals for January that will support my goals for the year. I intend to document my progress at least three times/week as I work through this.

 

1. I will not raise my voice at home. I will record in my log any instance that I fall short of this goal as well as documenting a way I could have handled the situation better for my future reference.
2. I will not purchase anything from the vending machines or my work cafeteria. This goal is clearly defined and easy to document failings. It will support both my financial goals (items in vending and cafe are marked up and constitute wasteful spending) and my health goals (when I consume unplanned food items, I tend to choose unhealthy options, and consume excess calories). 
3. I will spend at least 10 minutes per day engaged in healthful physical activity. At the moment, I've been doing a simple evening yoga session combining sun salutations with a few restive poses to get ready for bed. I will document any days I fail to meet this goal.
4. I no longer have the excuse of school so I will return to cooking dinners regularly, preparing menus based largely on vegetables and minimizing breads and pastas.

By the end of the month, I will consider myself as having been successful in a goal if I miss it fewer than 3 times.

[Bernard Marx]

So far so good. It's always easy to stay with things right at the start though.

 

I haven't raised my voice at home (although I haven't had any particularly frustrating situations yet either).

 

I haven't spent a single red cent in the cafeteria or vending machines at work, I've been brewing my coffee at home and bringing it with me in a thermos in the mornings, then drinking tea and water throughout the day.

 

Monday night, I did some light yoga poses before bed. My wife and I have both been trying different ways to get physically active, so we decided Tuesday that we would start doing the beginner body weight circuit 3x a week and did the first one, so we'll try again tomorrow night. (the dumbbell rows should help me toward my pull up goal, and I'm looking at things in my house scheming for an option to do bodyweight rows later on).

 

Monday we had veggie quesadillas with zucchini, onions, peppers and plenty of cheese. Yesterday was a fattoush salad with pita and hummus. I've also worked through a few stages of my favorite black bean burger recipe, getting everything pureed last night. Tonight I'm going to make veggie stir fry, and get the burgers finished and frozen. Just need to add some breadcrumb and egg to bind the puree before I throw them in the skillet to brown. Tomorrow is going to need to be a quicker meal since it's the day of the week I work late, so probably going to throw together some lentil taco 'meat' and do those, then Friday I'm going to make a big ol' pot of chili.