Good Start, Good Bird

First full week of this the 10th month of 2011. October is always a month of tectonic demand for our time, patience and sense of humor. Our family has six birthdays to celebrate, our kids make up half of them. Hunting season resumes so we have deer & turkey to harvest. The kids have school events to attend. Hockey season resumes so we have a Hockey game to go to. Tectonic I tell you!

In honest reflection of my mission here, it was this time last year my progress slowed to a point of inconsistent ups and downs beginning a string of months of clumsy maintenance. Was is the increased external demands of the final months of the year which contributed to that result? Certainly it did influence it, but, the result was something I allowed. Had I stayed sharp mentally and kept my mission prioritized properly the result would have been better.

That learned experience is a tool I now have to use my quest to emerge from the final months of this year healthier, happier and handsome. No tool is useful if not used, and proper prioritization of my own mission with all else October brings is the only way this quest will succeed.

Thanks to the challenges I've joined (Go The Distance and Fall 31 Day) I am off to a good start this month. Each of the first two days saw me get in a couple of miles of combined walk/jog activity. Yesterday I also put in an hour in the gym working on upper body pulling exercises.

Exercise is good, very good. But we all know sustained weight loss or maintenance is a combination of exercise & diet. So on the diet front I'm off to a good start too. I won't bore you (or myself) with a list of everything I have eaten. But I will share a dish I had fun with. We need to remind ourselves that when food is fun we use food more successfully. Oh, to be clear, having fun with food does not mean 'food-fight' fun, but rather using fun creatively and outside of the norms that most dull diets prescribe.

Saturday's dinner was Bacon & Apple Roasted Pheasant:

Raw pheasant ready for some loving attention...

Spices, soy sauce & water will become marinade in no time...

Two pheasants marinade the day away...

Each marinaded pheasant gets stuffed w/ apple & hit w/ apple wood seasoning...

Trussed, draped in bacon (I was told I needed to use more bacon), these are ready for bagging...

Oven roaster bags work on pheasants & birds of all kinds...

Ninety minutes later we have Apple/Bacon Roasted Pheasant...

And the final photo is the one way up at the top of the post, my dinner plate; Breast of Pheasant w/ Salsa Dressed Romaine Salad. A mighty tasty and healthy meal it was.

Are you off to a good start this October ?

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Stand Up To Success

Rain, it rained while we were attending our son's soccer game yesterday. It happens. When it does, you can break out an umbrella, hang in there & tough out that which would deter you, or, you can flee from that which is unpleasant. What would you be more apt to do?

Keep in mind I am talking about a rain shower, not a hurricane. Sometimes, you gotta flee! But do those of us who struggle to get fit, stay fit; do we tend to flee too easily in the face of difficulty?

A whole post could be dedicated to what "difficulty" means to us, and I may do just that near term. But let me stay focused on my point; why we choose to stand down in the face of difficulty.

This analysis could go in so many directions. There is the science of the flight-or-fight response, but I'm not talking about facing a momma-grizzly bear protecting her cubs. There is the quest for convenience and ease in life; but I'm not talking about using the remote control to change the channel versus getting up and using the buttons on the television console - want to have some fun hide the remote at a time when you know your kids will watch television; odds are they will flee for something else to do before they push buttons on the television.

Instead, I believe why we most often choose to stand down the difficulties of weight loss is really quite simple; we don't step up and make decisions before we act.

Over the past month or two I've had so many opportunities to exercise, but quickly if not almost instantaneously decided not to. No, that is wrong, it wasn't a decision, it was a reflex reaction made nearly unconsciously. Why do I unconsciously not do what I know I ought to do?

Where does that come from? I'm honestly not certain. But what I am certain of is that when I am on my game, I am consciously determining the pro/con of options and making reasoned decisions. When I am off my game, I've checked out in the decision making department. That inner-demon has checked in and unconsiously decides that I will watch tevelvision versus go for a walk.

To be successful I need to stand up to the challenge of making difficult decisions. For some of us, choosing 30 minutes of exercise over 3 hours of television is a difficult decision. Choosing 30 minutes to prepare a healthy meal over a 3 minute drive-thru meal is a difficult decision.

Success is recognizing when a decision is before you that will impact your weight.
Success is standing up, spending 3 seconds reasoning the options and before we act.
Success is making a conscious decision in the best interest of you, not your inner-demon!


Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 402 - Leadership 199 / Trait 6 of 14: Enthusiasm

Good Morning everyone. Hope Monday was a great day. If not, then you get to try again for greatness today.

Over the past couple of weeks we've been diving into the leadership traits we need to embrace to successfully lead ourselves to our goals. We've covered 5 of the 14 traits thus far. To catch up or freshen up on them, these links will help you do just that...
Leadership 199 / Trait 5 of 14: Endurance
Leadership 199 / Trait 4 of 14: Decisiveness
Leadership 199 / Trait 3 of 14: Courage
Leadership 199 / Trait 2 of 14: Bearing
Leadership 199 / Trait 1 of 14: Dependability


I can't wait to get on to the next one so let's not waste a moment and jump into our sixth trait…

Leadership 199 / Trait 6 of 14: Enthusiasm

Defined: The display of sincere interest and exuberance in the performance of duty.

Discovered: When starting a mission to get healthy most of us are stoked and full of enthusiasm. Sure, some start their missions less enthusiastically, under duress more likely, due to peer or family pressure, perhaps medical needs dictate lose weight now or perish. But for most, once we've mustered the courage and decided we're going to do this, we can't wait to get started and achieve our goal.

That rush of 'can-do', that desire to 'make it happen', that thirst for 'how to' knowledge; all of those highs we feel are brought upon us in that wave of enthusiasm we've embraced when we start. Some of us will recognize early on the role our enthusiasm plays in our mission and work just as hard to keep it up as they will at meal planning and getting in exercise. Others will not look that deep into what is required to be successful and likely wont notice the correlation in the fade of their results with the drop in their enthusiasm.

They key to enthusiasm, is your sincerity for what you want to achieve. Regardless whether your desire is for a need or a want, when you truly desire that something, the probability that you'll attain it increases 396 fold, or more.

Huh? That is crazy talk you say? Yes, you really do want to lose weight. You know you should do so, and you have a good reason why you want to? Great, so can I. Does that equate to sincerely desiring to doing it? Nope, it is the spark of enthusiasm, but it is not going to ignite into the fire storm needed to get this done unless we feed that spark.

Ok big boy, how do we do that you say? At least I hope that's what you said. Perhaps some of you chose to chuckle at what I've scribbled out here thus far and feel more like heckling in reply to my thoughts. If you did, bravo for you, this is your lucky day!

So many times I started an effort to lose weight, all of those times I figured I knew what I needed to do and success was just a matter of doing those things and that's it. Sound familiar? Someone who is supposed to know hands you a sheet of paper with a 1800 calorie a day diet on it, pats you on the head, and wishes you well; happened to me some fifteen years ago courtesy of a doctor who figured just because he is a doctor he had the answers I sought. Or, you buy an exercise video with a zillion exercises that will have you looking fine in no time, just so long as you do the exercises.

Ok, those failed me. What failed you? Better yet, why?

The answer for me, in large part, is that I did not sincerely want this. More specifically, I did not know that my building my enthusiasm for what I want is as important as doing the work to get it.

Sincerely defining a purpose, not just a reason, for this mission, amps up our enthusiasm.
Sincerely understanding what we need to do and how to do it, amps up our enthusiasm.
Sincerely believing in ourselves, seeing ahead to what achieving it will bring us, amps up our enthusiasm.
Sincerely acknowledging the benefits of success and the side-effects of  failure, amps up our enthusiasm. 
Sincerely celebrating accomplishments, tasting victory (not via cup cakes), amps up our enthusiasm.   

Da-Point:  Interest plus Purpose times Belief divided by Sincerity equals Enthusiasm.

Have you done the math on your mission?

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 398 - Leadership 199 / Trait 5 of 14: Endurance

We're you decisive yesterday? Not just yesterday but think big picture, have you been decisive about what it is you truly want to succeed at? Speaking for myself, I have decided I will run three miles by the end of summer. And do it in 28 minutes or less. That is going to be a challenge for me, but one I have decided to achieve.

If you missed our previous posts in this series on leadership traits do not cry out in agony, do not throw things, no no no. Simply click through the links below; easiest thing you will do all day...
Leadership 199 / Trait 4 of 14: Decisiveness
Leadership 199 / Trait 3 of 14: Courage
Leadership 199 / Trait 2 of 14: Bearing
Leadership 199 / Trait 1 of 14: Dependability


Time to tee up our fifth trait…

Leadership 199 / Trait 5 of 14: Endurance

Defined: The mental and physical stamina measured by the ability to withstand pain, fatigue, stress, and hardship.

Discovered: When we think of endurance we quickly think of a long and grueling physical challenge, e.g a marathon. A much younger version of myself would blurt out that a pub-crawl requires endurance. While fun, a pub crawl is not going to help us understand this trait. And neither is a marathon quite frankly. No one specific challenge is sufficient to understand the importance that endurance plays in our ability lead ourselves to success.

Our missions to get healthy are made up of many different challenges; challenges that will last our lifetimes. Lets look that deeper into that definition...

to withstand pain; what causes us pain in our mission? Exercise does. Or at least it ought to cause some degree of pain if we are properly breaking down muscle and burning fat in our quest to become stronger and leaner. Pain is not fun, I mean hello; it is called PAIN. Yet to succeed we have to lead ourselves to accept that pain will be there, that pain is part of the process, and that we can deal with it and overcome it's discomfort and the doubt it will try and have us believe.

to fatigue; so many aspects of getting healthy can get tiring. Sure, exercise causes fatigue; that's too obvious. What about doing the same thing day in day out? Eating the same 'healthy' meals, performing the same exercise 'routine'? Does doing the same thing cause you mental fatigue as the days become weeks and months? Oh it sure does for me. Call it fatigue, call it boredom. It wears on me, causes me to dull my focus and invite in failure. We have to lead ourselves to recognize that which cause us fatigue, and make changes necessary to maintain focus, maintain motivation to get up each day and choose success.

to stress; oh how we can put pressure on ourselves to do what we know we should. When we know we ought to exercise today, just knowing that can eat-away in the back of our minds until we do. And should we opt out, find an excuse not to do so, well multiply that eating-away by ten. Leaders know that we are our greatest stressors, and those tasks that stress us the most. Leaders also know that there if no way to relieve the stress of a challenge other than to tackle it, defeat it and remove it. You know you need to exercise today, do it now. Don't wait, get to it. Can't do it now because you are in a meeting at work reading my blog from your handheld, well good for you; now switch over to your calendar app and plan precisely what time today you can exercise and block that time off. Leaders manage stress, they are not managed by stress.

to hardship; why can't this always be easy? It is true, losing weight, getting and being healthy is not easy at times. As if the pain, fatigue and stressors weren't enough to overcome in our mission, we have a host of additional hardships confront. I could list 74 off the top of my head, but to keep this short and to the point I'll reference two. People, others around us make this harder at times. Well, they only really make this hard if we let them. They will toss a wrench on our well planned day at 4:29 p.m. when they come home and say, "can we order pizza and wings for dinner?" Or when they see what we are planning for lunch and say, "you expect me to eat that?" Ourselves, we can make this hard for us just the same as anyone else can. When you look in the mirror and see yourself, do you think to yourself, "wow, I am one gorgeous, healthy, amazing creature!" No, you don't. What do you say, something like, "ugh, I am a fat slob of a pig who needs to be skewered." Ever see youself in a negative sense and acknowledge it? If yes, you are making this harder than it needs to be. Stop looking at yourself and seeing what you are that you dislike. Start seeing yourself for who you are becoming.

Da-Point: Stamina is the bridge between succeeding today becoming victorious for a lifetime.

How heavy is the pain, fatigue, stress, and hardship in your life today?

And what are you doing to lead yourself to victory in spite of it all?

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 390 - Leadership 199 / Trait 3 of 14: Courage

Leadership traits were on my mind last night while attending Honors Night at my daughters High School. As many of these young women & men were being recognized for their efforts they had the opportunity to step up and exercise their bearing in addressing the crowded auditorium. I was very impressed with how they conducted themselves with confidence and courage in a situation, public speaking, which is a challenging opportunity for most.

If you missed our previous posts in this series on leadership traits be sure to catch up on them here...
Leadership 199 / Trait 2 of 14: Bearing
Leadership 199 / Trait 1 of 14: Dependability


Let us see what our third trait has for us…

Leadership 199 / Trait 3 of 14: Courage

Defined: The mental quality that recognizes fear of danger or criticism, but enables you to proceed in the face of it with calmness and firmness.

Discovered: To understand courage you first must understand fear. When we recognize danger, fear is our innate survival mechanism that kicks in and prompts us to flee from or confront the present danger. The use of the word danger is a bit misleading because fear does not come over us only when we are in situations that are truly dangerous to our well being. Fear is also present when we face challenges which we believe we are at risk of failing at.

For the purposes of honing our self-leadership ability into higher degrees of effectiveness let us focus on those challenges we face for bettering ourselves. Weight loss,... training for your first marathon,... the treatments and recovery that lay ahead to care for injury or disease,... going back to school to get that college degree,... employment search,... starting your own business,... and so on. These are just a few obvious challenges many of us are facing now.

What other challenges are you facing today which will require you to address your fear of failure to overcome?

Books large and small have been written on how to overcome fear. I promise that this post will not run on into book length. Therefore I must cut to the chase on what gets us over what we fear. Courage!

Courage, like fear, is innate; we have it with in us. The funny thing is fear just pops out quickly in the face of challenge. While for many the courage within us has to be poked, prodded and sometimes pulled out.

However it is that you reach inside and get courage to come forward, do it. Courage enables your inner strength, your ability to stand up for what it is you deem right and necessary. Courage applied to challenge brings discipline to the task, provides you the required calmness to control fear versus fear controlling you.

Our challenges do not come with certainty of success. To succeed we must function effectively in our mission no matter how long, how difficult it may be. Along the way set backs may occur, the difficulty of the mission may rise. Fear will attempt to take back control with such occurrences. Perseverance comes from courage, our ability to persevere will ensure we endure through to the missions successful completion.


Da-Point: Respect Fear, Embrace Courage, Achieve Victory!

Is it hard for you to bring the courage within you to bear on your challenges?

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 389 - Leadership 199 / Trait 2 of 14: Bearing

Did you get a charge out of Trait 1: Dependability? I know I got fired up writing it and reading your comments. Fired Up I Tell Ya!! No way I was going to have a bad Tuesday after the high I was on from writing that post. And a great Tuesday I had. Looking forward to Wednesday being just a great if not more so.  

Deep breath, clear mind, let's power ahead into our second trait…

Leadership 199 / Trait 2 of 14: Bearing

Defined: Creating a favorable impression in carriage, appearance and personal conduct at all times.

Discovered: Conduct, personal-conduct, is a noun in that sentence. Mrs. English, yes I really had an English teacher named Mrs. English, well she would not approve of this but I choose to see 'conduct' as a verb here. And if noun-abuse is not to be tolerated, then I offer another sentence...

Bearing is the manner in which you conduct yourself.

Just how do you behave in your mission to get healthy? Do you go through the motions of whatever program you are following while longingly looking forward to being done with what you are doing?

Be honest! If you answered 'Yes' to that follow-up question and that is how you conduct yourself some of most of the time, well then allow me this moment of boldness to say that your bearing is OFF.

You cannot lead effectively just going through the motions! 

Leadership with bearing is to...

• Arrive Alert in the face of your challenges & with Desire for the results you deserve.
• Stand Competent & Confident, that you have what it takes to succeed. 
• Conduct yourself so that you Control the motion that is your life.

Da-Point: Conduct yourself against the highest of standards. Never accept that behaving in a manner less than the maximum of your ability is acceptable.

  

Is your bearing up to the challenges you face?

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 388 - Leadership 199 / Trait 1 of 14: Dependability

Who is it that is in charge of leading you to accomplish your mission to get healthy?

If you answered that question with a name other than your own, PLEASE do comment below. I really want to discuss how it is that someone other than yourself is on the hook for accomplishing your mission.

I am my own leader. While my actions and outcomes may affect others, and while I may depend on others for input and assistance in my tasks; at the end of each decision it is "I" who must lead myself to success, or failure, whichever I choose to deliver.

Are we clear?

I am MY own leader!

You are YOUR own leader!!

Now for the real question: Am I (are you) ready to lead?

Leadership is an innate ability which can be honed into higher degrees of effectiveness with education and experience. Note I said 'and', not 'or'. You want to lead yourself to victory, then you have to 'do' it, not just think about it. For the outcome of what you do to be successful you need to first know the success factors of leadership.

These success factors, or leadership traits as I prefer to refer to them, were taught to me nearly 30 years ago. Learning them, and living them are two different choices. To get myself from here, to my goal of 199, I am going to have to live these traits each day along the way. On any given day where I can reflect and see that I have come up short, you can bet that I can identify one of more of these traits which I did not hold true to.

Let us get busy learning these leadership traits, there are fourteen of them. Yes 14; no moaning or sighs of hot air allowed! Anything worth learning is worth learning in detail. Therefore we are going to learn all 14 of them. To increase the potential of learning and retaining them so that we can put them to practice, we are going to learn them one at a time; one per day over the next fourteen days.

Without further introduction as to my intent here, away we go…

Leadership 199 / Trait 1 of 14: Dependability

Defined: The certainty of proper performance of duty.

Discovered: Duty, a very powerful word as I see it. When we have something to do, the degree of importance which we associate it with goes up if we accept it as our duty. If we associate it as something less, then I would suggest it is a 'want' and not a 'need'. Would you agree that getting healthy and living healthy is something you need to do? Myself, I do. The it is our duty to do just that, get healthy and stay healthy.

Certainty, a word that infers an absolute. This word, I like! Absolutes are empowering, motivating, as they demand accomplishment. "For my duty this day I will certainly exercise by running 2 miles and executing my push up & sit up routine"; if you see this as your duty you would proclaimed it just as I wrote it there. However if you do not see this as your duty, you probably have proclaimed it as follows; "I need to exercise today and will do so as soon as I can."

Da-Point: Your success is dependent upon your ability to perform your duty as required.

Can you depend upon yourself to do your duty?

 
Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 383 - Happy BDay Cathy

This week my wife has a birthday; Happy Birthday Cathy!

I wont say how old she is, but it is a milestone birthday and it may rhyme with 'orty'. That is all I'll say, don't want to give too much away.

There you see the flowers I sent to her at work this week. Those flowers are impressive if I may say so myself. But not nearly as impressive as her well organized desk.

You can tell allot by looking at a persons workspace, lets take a closer gander at her's shall we...

Photo's on the wall board, photos of 3 of our 4 kids. No photo of me, hmmm.... there is a photo on her desk too, a cool one. It is of her & her workmates standing with the Stanley Cup which visited her work place a few weeks back; so jealous I am.

Behind the flowers is a poster of Matt Kenseth, her favorite Nascar driver. My fave is Greg Biffle, the two are team mates so all is good there.

The wall calendar on the right is a Chicago White Sox calendar. She is a Sox fan, I am a Cubs fan. Somehow, we make it work. There is a desk calendar too, a page-a-day calendar; it too appears to be a Sox calendar. I should know what it is as I gave it to her for Christmas (I know, I am cutting edge when it comes to gift giving).

Stapler, appears to be a Swingline 747 classic model, good choice. Shows a sense of faith & determination, no?

Ream of paper at the ready, she either prints allot or is ready for the coming paper-shortage of 2011.

Is your desk/workspace as organized?

Myself, I can say that mine desk is as organized if not even a bit more so organized than hers. Organization is not always a sure sign of success however. Some of the most successful folks I know are terribly disorganized overall. But somehow when it comes time to perform at what is important, they excel like few others. I envy that mysterious ability. Simply for me, success comes from a organized approach

And enough of the organization sermon; all together now... 

Happy Birthday!

Oh, flowers were not all I got my wife for her birthday, recall this post in March where she got her other present a bit early.


Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 350 - Engagement + Opportunity

WARNING: Long Post Alert; I know the day after I mention I don't write long posts for a reason, I go ahead and write on. Feel free to curse me out as you read on, but do read on please...

This Thursday two of my boys & I visited Northern Illinois U, here they are...

Don't they look thrilled to be there on a nice day during spring break? It was a great visit all in all. I believe the boys liked what they saw and NIU will remain on their lists for now.

This visit was a reality check in a number of ways. Hopefully for them in some way it underscored the importance of taking time to be thorough in making the critical decision of where to invest their time (and our money) on their education. One can hope, although the 'sights' they wanted to see were walking all over the campus so not sure they came away with the same appreciation for the place I did.

For me, there were two distinct reality checks. For one, higher learning is a gift. Yes we pay for it, and pay allot for it, it is still a gift even though we buy it for ourselves and don't unwrap it on a holiday.

Just looking around at various kids deep in study, those focused on a professor working through a formula I long ago forgot, and that duo rehearsing their lines in hallway of who knows what performing arts hall we were in; they were engaged in something that can increase their opportunities for success. I say 'can' very purposely here.

Going to school and accumulating grades, class ranking, alphabet-soup test-score; these trophies of your academic career will do next to nothing to bring you success. Success does not come to you, so please do not wait for it to be brought to you.

Success MUST be achieved.

Success is achieved by PURSUING opportunity.

True, all of those things I just labeled as academic trophies, they can do something for you; just ONE thing actually. They can buy you opportunities. Or as I prefer to hear them referred to, 'tickets to the dance'. And we need opportunity, we MUST have tickets to as many dances as possible to succeed at that which we are passionate about.

So YES, go to college, graduate with the highest grades, class ranking & test-scores; striving for less from you're educational investment is to foolishly tear up dance tickets that are there to be had. Celebrate yourself silly when you graduate, celebrate like you've never celebrated before; you've earned tickets and celebration is in order.

When the celebration is over, you need to sit up & guess what, that degree you receive in the mail a few weeks after you walk down the aisle wearing that funny gown & cardboard hat, that envelope it comes in does not also have one ounce of success in it. Nope, NONE!

Opportunity is everywhere, degree or not; opportunity is there to be had by all. With degree in hand, much more opportunity awaits you and some will be amazing close too. But, just because you are at the dance does not mean you have obtained anything real, anything you can convert into the wants & needs your life craves. Nope, not just by dressing pretty & arriving at the dance, you still have no true success.

You want it success, you have to achieve it (repeating myself from above). You achieve it, by being engaged. The same way you engaged in school to earn your credentials, honor cords, and potpourri of awards. That same engagement, when applied to the opportunities you can now see... That same engagement, when performed for the dance partners that now recognize your presence...

That same Engagement + Opportunity = Success

 

For two, NIU reaffirmed that life is a gift. Sure, I acknowledge this is such a simple notion. And coming from one who is engaged in a battle with cancer, such a public proclamation of this notion is probably no surprise.

But it is not from my own walk which I refer to this notion. Some will recall that on Feb 14, 2008 a lone gunman (student) opened fire on the NIU campus and took the lives of 5 students. Another 21 people were injured in the tragedy.

The picture above is of the memorial that has since been erected to honor the victims of that day. Behind the brushed metal sculpture are five red granite walls (my cell phone camera could only fit in four), each wall features the name of one of the students whose life was taken that day.

Life is a gift, whether that life is short, long, or somewhere in between. Gifts should receive our earnest attention and be treated with our sincerest appreciation.

I can think of no better measure of attention and appreciation than the level of engagement we give a gift we receive.

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 334-335: We Deserve a PBR

source

For most of life PBR meant Pabst Blue Ribbon, good stuff if flavor is not key to your beer drinking experience. Oh, and NO, I did NOT pose for that photo!

Today & in recent years PBR is a popular acronym in the business world including I.T. (Information Technology) the industry I work in.

P-Plan, reduce time/cost associated with determining how to build what we've been tasked to build; e.g. physical vs virtual platforms, online vs nearline data storage, blah blah more i.t. speak

B-Build, increase throughput/capacity to deliver more builds; e.g. standard vs custom, pull vs push processes/methodologies, blah blah more flavor of the day speak

R-Run, reduce time/cost associated with keeping what we've built running; e.g. preventative vs predictive maintenance, system redundancies & availability, blah blah more captain obvious speak

This week I spent 3 hours at work immersed in PBR. During this time my mind wandered & began to ponder how PBR correlates to my health mission. Here is what I came up with...

P-Plan, Reduce my trigger-finger mindset to fire off excuses and increase my knowledge; learn best practices to lose weight & keep it off. In other words you can only do what you plan to do, don't leave success to chance or accident!

B-Build, Create a schedule & menu consisting of a variety of exercise & foods to build a healthier me. In other words create a healthy lifestyle to live!

R-Run, Consistently, one day at a time, Do what I know I am supposed to do; don't just want it, don't just plan it, DO IT! In other words maintain the plan which I have created changing the approach as needed to prevent slipping back into the days of excuses and complacency.

Hey, you deserve a PBR, now go get it!

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 290 - Anatomy Lessons Hurt

Strong, and Sore; Alert, and Anxious; this is how I am feeling coming into this new week. Nacho the cat you see there is not any of these things; he works out with me often and here you see him catching his breath between sets of leg-lifts.

Back to me; Strong in mind and body today, the exercise of late has had allot to do with this. I find success in exercise does more to boost confidence than success in eating. Do both successfully and we see both confidence and pride carry us to even greater success. 

Some soreness is with me from yesterday's workout. I focused allot on my back yesterday and I achieved that goal apparently as either my latissimus dorsi, infraspinatus, or both on both my sides are letting me know they had a 'great' time. Yes I had to look up the name of the infraspinatus muscle; getting an anatomy education as I get healthy here.

My alertness refers to my being very conscious at present that my expectations of myself are increasing. The last two months of 2010 I coasted to a very-very-very slow weight loss, almost could call it maintenance over some specific weeks. January 2011 ends today and it has been a good month. One where I picked up the pace a tick or tock but as I noted in yesterday's weigh in post while my pace of loss is slow and steady by design I am aware that it is slower than I'd like.

That is where the anxiousness comes in, I intend to kick it up a notch or skosh. To succeed I need to focus on more consistent eating, maintain my steam in exercise, and be certain to enjoy the ride. I know I can do just that, and I am anxious to see it through. A little anxiety is not a bad thing, it shows that the topic at hand has my attention.

Last week was a decent week and I believe in part due to my pre-planning last Monday. That helped me to set up myself for success. Now, in the end it was decent success, not great, because my execution was not as crisp as needed for greatness.

Building off that for this week we will again start with some pre-planning on this Monday. Here are my plans for the three balls I feel I must juggle weekly to have a great week...

Eat with passion! We have set up the menu for this weeks dinners. As well my breakfasts are ready to be had and lunches at the office cafeteria can & will be healthy. We've approached this weeks dinner menu with a passion for healthy foods that are also foods we love; a winning combo!

Are your meals for the week planned?

Exercise with purpose! This week will see me do as follows; WEIGHTS on Tuesday, Thursday, & Saturday. CARDIO on Monday, Friday & Sunday. Each weight session will be full body in general but have a specific area of focus as well. My purpose here is to learn more about what I get out of what I put into the exercise; I don't just want to do the exercise, I want to get to know it!

What is your exercise plan for the week?

Have fun with all I do! I am not fretting what the weather will be this week, or what deadlines loom at work, or what teenage drama will crop us at home; whatever comes my way I know I can not only handle it but have fun getting through it all. I am so done with dreading the realities of life. In nearly every pitch thrown at us fun can be had, that is if we have the proper definition of what fun really is. A topic worthy of more thought another day. 

Got fun in mind for this week?

 ENJOY!

 
Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 212 - Judging My SEE

Today is day-1 of today's mission to be healthier, tomorrow will be day-1 of tomorrow's mission. That is what I posted to twitter this morning. It is true as cheese tastes better than chalk. Success yesterday doesn't bring with it a guarantee of success today. Yesterday's success does provide reason to believe you can succeed today, but not a guarantee.

In kicking off today's mission I am looking to the word judgement. This morning I sit here reflecting and judging myself, specifically my success over the past few weeks. Yes, I have made progress; but not at the pace I desire. In my reflection I believe that I can and should expect to achieve at my desired pace. The reasons I have not come from honest judgement of my actions.

In weighing the facts of my actions I honestly cannot find issue with exercise, I am getting that done. The bottom line is that my eating remain inconsistent. I write this at the risk of sounding like a broken KC and the Sunshine Band record; awful broken or not but terribly annoying to listen to broken as it skips the same line over and over.

It does no good to judge through the facts, and then not decide on a solution. And I have that, I stated it two weeks ago when the month started and I scripted how I will SEE November. In judging myself here I struck-through the lines on my plan where I have not executed consistently. I need to look no further than them for reason and solution. Here is that plan...

Set for November if a goal to Weigh-In on Nov. 30th (a special Tuesday w/i for me) at 249.5 or less. My scale reads in tenths, but I record in 1/2 pound increments and I round the tenths up to the next 1/2, so 249.6 will not cut it, 249.5 it must be.

Establish a plan could be as easy as just doing what I have been, here is my plan...

1. No Fast Food, Candy, or similar food as poor in quality
2. Exercise 5x week; 2x Cardio & 2x Strength & 1 Flexibility Workout (that will be new for me)
3. Drink 2 liters, or more, of water a day
4. Participate in #NovGTD, log my miles and tweet it up each day
5. Calorie intake will be no more that 2000 calories and carb controlled
6. Avoid inducing fasting response, eat 6x a day; 3meals and 3 snacks
7. Eat breakfast at home to avoid skipping it
8. Take fruit to work for snacks to avoid grabbing poor quality snacks at the office coffee shop
9. Every other lunch at work will be a visit to the salad bar which is a treat since it is a good one
10. Plan out evening meals to avoid creating last minute high-calorie dinners of convenience

Execute the plan.


I do not need a new plan.
I do not need to reinvent how to get healthy.
I do need to execute the plan I have.
I do need to remember that I know how to do this and I believe that I can achieve my goals at I desire pace.

Today is day-1 of today's mission to be healthier...

 

What is your plan for today?

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 75 - Concentrate On This

Warning, I may be getting in over my skis here with this post, but my mind is here so here it goes. In pondering my performance (not progress) the past few days I have asked myself some questions which I'd like to share with you. Perhaps you'd like to consider them as well, your choice.

 1. Assuming I do have the capacity to perform at GREATER levels, how can I?

Operative word; GREATER. We all have bad days. Myself, yep I have them but on average during the past 75 days I've had mostly good days and some very good. On good days I eat well, I exercise, and I end they day feeling successful. But, was I really successful? Could I have eaten even greater? Could I have walked faster or longer, or lifted weights with greater form or weight? It would seem the obvious answer is YES. OK, if YES, then why don't I? Why do we settle for good and not something greater?

The real question there was "...how can I? I'll short cut my own self analysis and jump to a potential answer; my degree of concentration. What do I mean? For example when I am walking and finish 2 miles in 40 minutes that is good. But why not 39? What did I concentrate on during the walk? Was it the pain, or how much further I have to go or some other distraction that isn't key to walking with greater result? What if I had concentrated on my stride mechanics, or my breathing, or where my head & eyes are set? Would I have had a faster walk and / or one that may have been greater in quality e.g. burned more calories or strengthened my muscles more?

Another example for eating this time; it is lunch time at the office cafeteria and I know I need to eat. I choose a reasonably healthy salad and put a bit of dressing and other toppings on it, it was 500 calories and 45% fat thanks to the add-ons. Why didn't I make a 500 / 30 salad, or a 400 / 25; something with greater balance being my point? Was I concentrating on what I wanted to eat vs. what I ought to be eating? Perhaps I chose the salad bar because it simply was the shortest line compared to the fish line which was 10 deep. What if I had concentrated on each ingredient and its impact to overall portion & balance of the meal, or pre-thought about what lunch should be considering the breakfast & snacks I ate earlier today? Would I have eaten a meal that was greater in quality for fueling my mind & body?

Again, I warned you, this post is more serious or deeper than my usual...

There is a 'mental' aspect to being healthy, many here have acknowledged getting our mind set as a key to health success. A better attitude, a new confidence, greater knowledge; just some characteristics of a healthy mental approach.

Yet those seem obvious for transforming the old me into the new, for taking those first steps, for tasting some success. Which makes me ask, does the obvious gets us just so far? Perhaps the obvious is good for getting us to that first dreaded plateau where we flounder wondering what is wrong; why did the progress slow or stop?

Could GREATER concentration be the answer to GREATER performance? Again, that sounds too obvious, too simple; right? It probably does, but what is wrong with simple revelations? OK, I didn't just keyboard hunt & peck all those words to end by telling you, or myself, the obvious. Nope, I'm not convinced it is simple especially for the beginner to getting healthy from a non-healthy state.

Yesterday I put concentration to the test. My son & I walked my favorite 2.25 Mile Lake Andrea Loop. We walked it a week ago too and I posted my results and thoughts on how could we possibly ever walk it any faster, that post is here: day-68-acronym-love

Last week we walked that loop in 40:11 minutes and when we finished I had doubts we could do much better if at all. This week I wanted to challenge myself as to why I couldn't post an even greater number. Not just a second or two, but shave 10 or 15 seconds off that time.

I had come to the theory this week that if I concentrated more on what I was doing while walking that I could. So off we went. Form, I concentrated on picking up my knees and setting them down fluidly; not my usual slinging of legs forward one after the other. Rhythm, I got my arms into the act as synchronized pendulums setting cadence; not my usual hanging and flailing alongside for the ride. Vision, I held my chin up and looked straight ahead picking a target and walking directly towards it; not my usual zig zag of the paths width. 

Don't get me wrong, my concentration was not 100% dialed in for this entire walk. There was the good looking girl that jogged passed whom my son had to tug on my shirt for to be sure I didn't miss her. There was the fisherman who caught a fish just as we were abreast of him, oh it was a nice one. I'm not a robot, my concentration was not absolute; but it was far greater than any effort previous on this loop.

And for that we completed the journey in 38:10 minutes, shattering my desired 10 or 15 seconds improvement goal. Needless to say I was elated, proud, and inspired to wonder just what else can I do even greater if I were to just concentrate?

OK, I know I said I had 'some' questions but I'll stop here with just that one for now otherwise this post will grow much much longer and it is already way longer than the length I like to keep my posts at.

Final thought, that is my son Andrew in the picture. Before we started I told him I wanted us to concentrate on beating our previous time. Being the smart wonder that he is, he struck the pose you see there which I had him hold long enough to take the picture.

Responsibility 199 - Gotta Do It!!

Day 23 - Change #4

Hope everyone had a good weekend and a successful week last week. A new week is here, welcome to another Monday.


Monday's are change days for me in my mission. These have been the hardest posts I make each week. You would think it may be easy since I am in no doubt making many changes from the old-unhealthy me to the new-healthier me. When it comes to this post it is not just about changes, but about a sincere commitment to that change. As well they are meant to be beyond the obvious, e.g. eating better, getting in some exercise, etc. This is only my 4th change and identifying impacting changes that really define a new me are not no-brainer's, I take them seriously.

This week's change may not seem like a real change to some at first but instead a want or a goal, however it definitely is a change for me.

Change 4...

• REWARD MYSELF FOR SUCCESS

Huh... Reward myself? Yep, rewarding myself is not a behavior, or better yet not a discipline, which I have ever practiced genuinely when it comes to my health. In the past if I wanted something, I went and got it. Not much thought to whether I deserved or needed it. If I didn't want something then I avoided it. Not much thought to whether I might be better off for having it. Sound familiar at all? It sounds like my old eating / exercise habits to me.

What I've been missing is a discipline to identify that bridge between my health behaviors (good and bad) and which are in my best interest and that of my family both today and in the future. Rewards may be part if that bridge, that discipline, I'll need to sustain momentum and motivation through to the end of this mission and then maintain a healthy lifestyle forever onward.

Is self-reward really necessary? Can't I just get it done without a 'carrot' to chase? Perhaps, probably, or; maybe not. Let me try and add a hint of I am placing self-reward into perspective. Here I am talking about rewards for healthy behavior. What about my professional behavior? My career is filled with plenty of risk and thus plenty of consequence & reward is present. I've done well to attain much reward. Why? Because I've always known what my efforts can bring me if I work smart; the tangible financial gain and the intangible sense of being valued if not necessary. Knowing these rewards are there to be had, I've chased them. Same could be said for my behavior towards family and marriage. The tangible fulfillment of the want for love & companionship, and the intangible sense of pride from providing for the needs of those I love. Knowing these rewards are there to be had, I've worked smart at being a good husband and father.

So, what about being healthy? As all of us driven to lose weight have made the decision to learn what healthy behaviors are and finally acknowledged the tangible and intangible benefits of being healthy are there to be had if we want them. But, for whatever reason, as clear and righteous as those benefits are now becoming apart of us; we've really known them for years but ignored them until recently. For some of us decades of ignorance is in our wake. Together we could fill hundreds of blog pages listing these benefits. But listing them is not my intent here. My intent with committing to a new change weekly is to forge behaviors that will increase my chance of succeeding in my health mission so that my health becomes as great as the successes I have achieved in career and marriage.

I chose to see myself as victorious!

I acknowledge my accomplishments by celebrating my successes small & large in ways that motivate me to go on and achieve my ultimate goal.

I control who I am, I've acknowledged that several times in this blog. Part of that acknowledgement means realizing I control what makes me feel good and keeps me going for more.

There you have it, my change for week four; I will reward myself for success.

What about the actual rewards. Oh worry not, my mind is in hyper-drive working through that detail believe me. Those thoughts aren't ready to put on paper and share yet, but they will be very soon; later this week soon. I've all but decided to set up rewards as I achieve each 10% mark in my mission; for me 10% = 12 pounds. As I am close to that first mark now, I have to get this nailed this week. Stay tuned...

How about you, do you reward your successes and if so how?

Responsibility 199... Gotta Do It!!