Take... Fifteen? Twenty? I don't know, I've lost count...

[ffanxii4ever]

Hello Rebellion! The name's Alan, hailing from the ever exciting state of CT (okay, you got me; not many exciting things happen here), here to join in on all of the self-improvement fun. I'm a Junior/Senior/Super-Senior Mechanical Engineering Major at UConn (all depending on how you want to classify my standing) who's been overweight for most of his life; I can't pin down when I started to really gain weight, but it was probably somewhere between elementary and middle school. At my biggest (Senior year of high school), I weighed a whopping 280 pounds and was six feet tall. Needless to say, I was significantly overweight and I wasn't getting any better; most of Freshmen year of college I was quiet, subdued, and the only exercise that I ever got was walking to and from class, and even then I would take any opportunity to take the bus instead. I had sorta decided that I couldn't improve myself since both of my parents were severely overweight and I had resigned myself to following their footsteps.

At the start of my Sophomore year I started living with one of my friends from high school and hanging out more with people and I decided "to hell with that". I started to run in the morning and I joined a LARP-ing club which got me outside and moving around more. But like many things, I eventually stopped doing both for various reasons, the most prevalent one being "I don't have enough time"; so I decided to try calorie-counting to fix things and lose weight. But, like many things I stopped doing that too after a while. Fast-forward to the summer break between my sophomore and junior years. I actually managed to lose a nice chunk of weight over the summer, working out and watching what I ate and got down to about 230 pounds by the end of the summer. But then school rolled around, and I started to slack off again. I did join the Karate club for the Fall semester, so I was still getting some exercise, but between the stress of classes work and my lack of sleep, I got back up to 245 by the end of the year.

And now we're here. My mother recently had a number of healthy problems crop up (cancer) and I learned that I have a hitI've poked around online for tips and hints and I managed to stumble upon NerdFitness. All of the advice and information makes sense and is more than doable. I have a very close friend who is also trying to loose weight, and even though we live too far away to work out together during the summer, it is good to have someone there who supports what I'm doing and whom I can talk to and get encouragement from and give to (wow, that was a lot of "and"s...).

Now for my long-term goals:

1) Get fit and healthy. A little bit of a cop-out maybe, but it's a good, general goal.

2) Lose weight. For my height (6 ft) and age (21) that means getting a bit under 200 pounds; I'm trying to not focus on the exact weight, but rather a range; it seems more doable.

3) As for a profession to achieve/level up in, the idea of a Ranger/Assassin/Monk seems appealing. Ranger for the all-round fitness, Assassin because Parkour just looks too cool to not try, and Monk because in my brief exposure to Karate I decided that it is something that I would like to try to continue with, though I may try other ones (Kung-fu is another thing that looks too cool to not try)

4) Get out there (well, as much as a college student with extremely limited income can) and try new and interesting things. First up, Skydiving (UConn has a skydiving club; it seems like a good place to start)!

Short-term goals:

1) Get under 210 by the start of the semester; the skydiving is cheaper if you're under 210, so this seems like a good benchmark to make.

2) Get up to a full Paleo Diet; I've tried a few other diets, and after poking around, this seems to make a ridiculous amount of sense. I'm not going to jump right into it off the get-go, rather small incremental changes seem like the way to go. I've started already by cutting back on the grains; eventually I'll get rid of them all and them work on the diary (but I love my cheese...).

3) Be able to do push ups and pull ups. These are two exercises that I've never been able to do; now that I'm ready to start making serious changes, I might as well get able to do these as well.

So, here I am, ready to start working on leveling up my life seriously; I welcome any and all advice, tips, and hints.

FOR THE REBELLION!

[Eddard]

Welcome Alan! I'm new as well and also a bit undecided on my guild. Hopefully us newbies can stick together.

[Pat G]

ffanxii4ever, welcome to the Rebellion!

As for a guild to join, for now perhaps you could join the Adventurers.

Just to be sure you know, You are welcome to post everywhere even if you aren't in that specific guild.

Then as you pick up what you really want to do to get to your goals, join in with another of the guilds.

Get yourself a battle log or create a challenge thread so that we can hold you accountable and give you handy hints and w00ts as you go.

Peace