Weakness, I abjure thee!

[strider]

Hey all! - New recruit reporting for duty!

 

I wear quite a few different hats (figuratively speaking - in reality I only wear one; a black fedora. Geek cred, right?): I'm a biology undergraduate, a karate student/assistant teacher, an amateur cellist, and a few other (decidedly less illustrious) things too. Trouble is, I'm not doing a particularly good job at being any of them at the moment, nor have I for a while. For you see, ladies and gentlemen; I have a Problem. In much the same way as the Tin Man lacked a heart, I must confess a gigantic lack of self-discipline.

 

Now, Tolkien may well have been right when he wrote that "Not all who wander are lost", but I've been wandering long enough to work out that I while I'm nowhere near as lost as some, I'm moving in the Wrong Direction far too often. I have had opportunity after opportunity set before me, and I have wasted almost every one, through a lack of focus and discipline.

 

For instance, in recent times:

 

- I started running, and began to (very slowly) work towards a marathon, but gave up a month before the event, without properly thinking about it.

 

- I have started the "One Hundred Pushups" program five times over the past two years. Each time, I gave up shortly after hitting the 50-pushup mark.

 

- I have started blogging eight times. Each time I have crashed and burned within a month.

 

- I failed to build anything resembling a work ethic during high school, and I barely scraped in the marks for university entry. Now I'm in the science program of one of the best universities in the southern hemisphere, being taught by some absolutely brilliant people, and I'm (just) keeping up a credit average by cramming for quizzes the night before.

 

Sensing a theme yet?

 

I did, almost six months ago, but I have done nothing about it until now.

 

Q: Why?

 

A (all together now!): Because strider has no self-discipline!

 

Then today, out of idle curiosity (rather than any purposeful intention), I opened the Nerd Fitness newsletter "Why You Should Join the Next Nerd Fitness Challenge".

It was to me what an enzymatic catalyst is to the Krebs cycle.

I came across the blog, and signed up for an account on the Nerd Fitness Rebellion months ago. Characteristically, I have done nothing with it. Until now that is.

 

To set me on the analogous Yellow Brick Road to giving spinelessness the gyaku tsuki it deserves I'm going to be participating in the June 3rd Six Week Challenge.

 

Really looking forward to getting to know the rest of you Rebels! (people with willpower are like superheroes to me).

 

 - strider

[strider]

Okay, I think I got a bit too enthusiastic while writing that last post. I managed to leave out almost anything to do with fitness, goals, and all that other froody, useful stuff.

My state of fitness at the moment is "okay-ish, but not really good enough for an active teenager":

 

- I do karate training for 3-4 hours a week,

 

- I go hiking whenever I have a free day

 

BUT

 

- I can barely run 5 km, and I can't run fast for any reasonable distance,

 

- At most I can manage sets of 30 pushups

 

- I find myself short of breath after three or four flights of stairs (and my bag of books is never that heavy)

 

- I don't have any steady fitness routine - I'm moderately active, but I don't actually exercise - not seriously, in the sense of "working out". I have never set foot in a gym - I can't afford it, but there are bodyweight exercises aplenty, so I really have no excuses.

 

Goals (tricky things, those - this is by no means an exhaustive list)

In the relative near future, I would like to:

- Grade to shomokuroku (the old-fashioned name for 1st dan) in karate

- Do sets of 100 pushups - standard, knuckles, and fingertips

- Run a half marathon quickly and comfortably

- Learn to swim again (I haven't been swimming in about a decade, so at the very least some stroke correction is in order)

- Swim 500m

 

I'll post my Six Week Challenge goals asap (ie, as soon as I can decide on them).

 

[Kyourhy]

Deer lord, this introduction is BEAUTIFUL

I have kinda the same problem, so i understand you a lot xD i'd advise you to read a book i recently discovered, which is "self discipline in 10 days", it could prove useful to you :3

Enjoy the community and all that, i'm New too

[Kyourhy]

how are you progressing in your goals?