Post: #101

Hi Moira <3

Im glad you gave us an update! I agree, I think you should hold off the yoga until your bf leaves. Or there is the possibility of him attending class with you?
Im sorry to hear about your car troubles, that must be really frustrating
It's my dream to live within a walking distance to everything too! I LOVE walking. Once I have a job and family I want a house where I can walk to the market, to my work, to my kid's schools, ext. I hate cars lol.

Post: #102

I have been off for a while now, guys. I must admit that I have not done my yoga on a regular basis in probably a month. I feel sluggish and unmotivated and I know if I just started doing my yoga daily again, I would feel better. I've also been splurging an awful lot lately. I don't believe in a life with no splurges, but I have definitely gone overboard. I have eaten a lot of stuff that is definitely not good for my body.

I have, however, been trying to turn this around. I am on day four of no sodas or energy drinks, which cannot live up to daily practice of yoga anyway. I am on day three of drinking nothing with caffeine in it at all. I love coffee and tea but I have been relying too much on outside sources of energy lately and I needed to put my foot down. If I am to be energetic, it has to be my own energy shining through.

I think I am about 5-10 pounds heavier than I normally am and I am really tired of this yo-yo effect.

So I have outlined a workout plan and some guidelines to follow in regards to my diet. I am hoping to limit the amount of days slipping on my workout plan to only four times a month. Considering I plan to go back to doing yoga every morning, I figure that four out of thirty days is a reasonable amount. I also plan to add running and some other cardio to that, hopefully three times a week. I am sure my splurge days will more often fall on the running rather than the yoga. I am hoping that the more I force myself to do it, I will find that I enjoy running as I have seen so many people do the same.

I have also decided that in the eating and drinking arena, one day a month is an appropriate splurge. I have been awful about eating fast food lately. I often have a half hour lunch and the only thing close enough to eat is Burger King, which is frankly disgusting. I have been doing that to my body on a somewhat regular basis now and it needs to stop. However, these future splurges, I hope to be something really enjoyable rather than a fast food splurge. I want to think of my eating splurge of having a lovely bowl of fettuccine alfredo or some creamy risotto. (I know many of the people here are vegan and probably think that sounds awful, but I'm quite fond. I don't think I could ever give up cheese and veganism is really not for me!)

On an update note, I still have not managed to fix my car problems. I am hoping to get that settled sometime this week. The whole situation is driving me crazy and paranoid.

Post: #103

Quick update:

I did about ten minutes of yoga this morning and went out walking this afternoon. I was going to try to do a walk-run combo to work on my stamina but it was awfully hot out. I have been invited to go running this evening but I do not think I am up to it after the walk.

I've been sticking to my eating guidelines today. I have been drinking a glass of water about a half hour before I eat and if I am still hungry, I eat enough to fill my stomach. Then about a half hour later, I drink another glass of water. This may be a little much on the water, though, because my glass is really my refillable bottle and it holds about 20 ounces of water. However, I did get somewhat dehydrated quickly when I went out walking due to my living in a semi-desert climate. So we will keep an eye on that and keep adjusting. I do seem to be getting hungry every two to three hours but I've managed to stretch it out a bit. I am okay with eating five times a day as long as they are all small meals. I've been judging my meals today on the size of my fist being a somewhat decent measure of how big the stomach is.

I have learned that I am not good at telling when I am full naturally, which has been a lot of my problem lately. I've been listening to my taste buds rather than my stomach. This is something that I need to work on but I am hoping with consistently smaller meals, my body will get used to it and realize it is full then. I have decided that if I decide that I am actually hungry after the post-meal water, then I will eat again, but not before. This has not happened today, or else I am just being stubborn.

Post: #104

Hey Moira! I just wanted to post a message to congratulate you on your yoga and also sticking to your eating guidelines yesterday! You're doing such a good job so far, so don't let a short period of non-yoga or fast food splurges get you down. These are just there to help you learn more about yourself so you can improvise your plan moving forward, which you are already doing.

For me, I found the best indicator of whether I've had enough is caloric estimation vs. my daily needs (when I roughly meet that for the day, I'll stop) plus also nutritional content of the food vs. my daily needs. It's the same as what I wrote in my post-fast logs. Secondary indicators are how full I feel and satisfied I feel, but even then these are quite grey for me. While it may sound somewhat technical and even laborious, I realized that after I followed through my caloric plan for a couple of weeks after my fasts, they became normalized into my subconscious, natural behavior. Nowadays I have a good idea whether I'm on track/off track, and I'm also naturally inclined to eat the food I want to eat, start when needed and stop when I've had enough.

I think that you're doing a great job figuring when to start/stop based on your logs, so go with what aligns best with you! I often have smaller meals myself - when I have a single large meal, it makes me feel somewhat sleepy after that.

"If you want to get something you have never gotten before, you've to do something you've never done before."
Personal Excellence - For people passionate about achieving excellence in life

Post: #105

Thanks, Celes, for the input. I like to hear another point of view about it as well. I know before these last few months where I have been swinging from eating normal and splurging, I have realized something. My normal eating behavior is actually probably less than normal caloric intake. I think that is why I end up eating so much when I binge. When I have counted calories before I often had trouble meeting a caloric intake goal of around 1,200. Well, at least on average days. So I am trying to find a happy medium. Hopefully with more vegetables.

As an update, I did yoga yesterday and followed my diet guidelines fairly okay. I probably had more Chex Mix than I should have, but it's really addicting. (And not quite as bad for you as chips!) I probably shouldn't have bought it, but I was stuck at work and hadn't eaten in about five hours and it was a slightly better choice than some of the other stuff.

I've already done my yoga this morning as well. I woke up naturally - without my alarm - at 3am this morning, which was a bit earlier than my intended 4am. However, I like waking up naturally because I feel I have better days when I am not jarred awake with alarms being the first thing I hear to start my day!

Post: #106

Hey Moira! That's interesting that your normal eating behavior is usually less than your required caloric intake. Do you know why? Like do you feel full easily? Do you also know what triggers your bingeing behavior?

I realized that the fundamental trigger for my bingeing behavior boils down to when I do something that I don't want to do (I wrote about this in my post-fast log for my third fast I believe). So when I stop going against myself and instead let my natural self take over, that voice/trigger wanting me to binge/eat food that my normal, conscious self wouldn't want to eat disappears altogether. Might sound somewhat up in the air, but it's true. I realized at the end of the day, all our goals and whether we achieve them/or not is all linked with our mental thoughts/subconsciousness. In that sense, after a decade (or two) long of emotional eating issues and having a love-hate-relationship with the act of bingeing, it's interesting that it has now become my ally in a way, in that when I feel the need to eat (more than I require), it's a sign that I'm forcing/pressurizing myself again, to do something I don't want to do. And when I stop that altogether, the trigger disappears. It's quite funny as I feel I've reached a point where I'm largely in peace with food (finally). There are kinks here and there, mainly challenges because the mainstream society doesn't support the kind of diet I envision, but it's more a cue for me to look for new creative solutions than being a blockade.

"If you want to get something you have never gotten before, you've to do something you've never done before."
Personal Excellence - For people passionate about achieving excellence in life

Post: #107

Hey Moira,

I am going to agree with Celes on this one. I usually end up binging/overeating when I have to do something I dont want to do. You are like me, I had many days were I would eat 1000-1200 calories then more days were I would binge over 2000 calories a couple times a week. I think that my huge binge this past 1.5 weeks was due to to calorie restricting for several weeks before hand, I have been consuming 4000+ calories a day! No joke. 2 days ago I ate a whole tub of icecream in one sitting :0 And I dont even like ice cream...

Normally, 1600-1800 is enough calories to maintain weight for an average female (considering she isnt very active). Have you tried consistently logging in your calories and making it reach about 1400- 1600 a day for at least 30 days? (that way along with the calories burned from exercise you should lose at least 3 lbs a month) I think this will help you out. Even if you log in your calories and you find that you are short 200 or so, then go eat 3 dates!! Like i said before, they are very low in volume and high in calories which can help you out. I think if you keep doing this for several weeks it will become a natural habit and the yo-yo effect will be gone for good!! like any other habit, it will require work and alot of discipline at the beginning though

Post: #108

Honestly, the days I have to work to get to 1200 calories, I am not actually restricting myself. It just happens. So it's not like I am binging because I restrict my diet, though it may have something to do with something else psychological. I am not sure what though. That would probably take a lot of searching to figure out on my part.

I have counted calories in the past and I am honestly not too interested in doing so again. It's especially difficult because I do a lot of actual cooking in my house for about four people. It's kind of a pain in the behind to figure out the total of a whole dish (ingredient by ingredient) and then divide it. Like recently I made an amazing pot of spicy, citrus black beans that we are still eating from and there is no way I could figure out the caloric intake from what I consider to be a serving of that, which is much less than the recipe considered a serving. (Also, it's a wonderful vegan/gluten-free recipe if anyone is interested!) It would be much easier to track if I ate more raw items such as you and Celes, or processed foods that have the calories on the box. The latter obviously being something I do not want to do. They don't really make calorie counting easy for people who prepare their own home-made meals.

Post: #109

So today I woke up, did my yoga, showered, wrote, and had time to snuggle with my honey for a bit watching the news before I headed off to work. I got home and did upper arms and shoulder weight training with my sister, baked some cookies for a BBQ we're having at work tomorrow, and then went running. I officially ran 3/4 of a mile and walked 3/4 of a mile in 1/8 mile intervals. I am feeling pretty exhausted right now but in a good way.

And I also got through my disk of West Wing while waiting for my cookies to bake. So all in all, quite the productive day.

I did, however, sample a few of the cookies that seemed to be falling off the plate so I had to save them by eating them. Hah! So my diet was a little bit off today, but not too much so. I think I only had three cookies over the hour and a half it took me to bake all 72 of them.

Post: #110

Moira great job!! eating only 3 cookies out of 72 is quite an accompishment
And good job on your workouts Thats alot for one day!

Post: #111

Boy, I sure am feeling it today. I did ten minutes of yoga when I woke up this morning but I doubt I will do anything else. I would normally do weight training on non-running days but I did that yesterday and my muscles need a day of rest (as do I!) So today is definitely a lazy day. I think I'll curl up and read in a bit; I have about five books I have yet to read on my shelves!

Post: #112

Hey Moira - Great job on doing your yoga when you woke up! What are the books you're planning to read today?

"If you want to get something you have never gotten before, you've to do something you've never done before."
Personal Excellence - For people passionate about achieving excellence in life

Post: #113

I'm currently reading a fantasy book by Terry Brooks called First King of Shannara which is a prequel to his major fantasy saga. I have never read the saga at all and I am afraid the prequel is a bit slow to get in to. I probably ought to have read the series first so I would be more excited to see how it started. However, I managed to get to some more of the action bits and it seems to be getting better. This is a bit of a break from a lot of heavy historical fiction and non-fiction I have been reading lately.

Like I mentioned, I have a pile of books in my To Read pile right now and I have two more on the way from Paperback Swap, which is my favorite internet site ever. Trading books for more books after you read them is all sorts of awesome recycling and not keeping books you may not read more than once!

Right now my pile is all over the place though; it kind of looks like this:

Pale View of the Hills by Kazuo Ishiguro
Maximum Achievement by Brian Tracey (I have never read any of his books)
Becoming Madame Mao by Anchee Min
Silmarillion by Tolkien
The Tale of Genji by Murasaki
The Upanishads

And I have a book called Too Perfect by Jeannette Dewyze and another book about a Saudi Arabian princess on the way. Most of the time it takes me a good half hour to figure out what to read next because I keep ordering more before the pile goes down too much. I really ought to get it down to two or three before I order more.

So many good books, way too little time, especially since I am going to be picking up more hours at work now that my boss has finally given birth and will be out on maternity leave for at least a month, maybe the full two she is entitled to.

Post: #114

You don't want to overwork yourself. Especially when it comes to exercise, you need to give your muscles time to rest. I hadn't heard about Paperback Swap. I'll have to check it out. Have fun today.

Follow my progress on my blog
Life After Ex~ A website for singles looking to live and love again after dealing with a destructive relationship.

Post: #115

I don't think I overworked myself and I gave myself a day of rest before I am going to be doing some running this evening, I think. I might get some more weight training in over the weekend as well.

Paperback Swap is amazingly awesome. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

Post: #116

Quick post birthday update:

Didn't do anything interesting, but I did go swimming with my sister and one of her friends. Her fiancee made dinner for us and they baked me a cake. My diet was not too strict today but I think I will forgive myself especially since I did get up and do my yoga at 4am still.

My arms are still really sore from the weight training the other day too. It may have been a little bit too much; I will wait for it to die down to a more tolerable ache before I try it again. About to head off to bed because I have work again in the morning, something that kept us from going to the movies tonight. Oh well. I don't really see myself having a day off for at least another week, possibly longer. Not too excited about that but I will keep on chugging.

I have my second interview with the company I mentioned before on the 12th of July. I am looking forward to doing some prep and acing that.

But for now, sleep.

Post: #117

I've still been doing my morning yoga routine every day. It's only ten minutes long but that is really all I have time for in the morning and I am getting up and doing something to start my day in an active manner. So I am awfully proud of myself for getting that back on track.

I only went running twice last week, not the three times I had intended but that is at least better than the non-running I was doing before. I will probably go out tomorrow as Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays are my not too strict days for that.

My diet has not been that great over the weekend but hopefully I will get it closer to how I want it this coming week.

I am currently reading Maximum Achievement by Brian Tracy, which I know many of you here have read. So far I am enjoying it and it is reminding me that I need to be more positive and optimistic. I think I should give The Secret a read sometime soon as well. I am going to give that a try and keep reminding myself to be more positive.

On the plus side, I do have a positivity buddy at work. Anytime I say something negative Angela will call me out on it and tell me to take it back. Her views are much more religious than mine are but I think we're in the same place and I appreciate it. She won't let me get away with being angry or overly frustrated at work!

Post: #118

Hey, Moira. It's great that your reading often. I really should read fiction more often. I have 4 or 5 unread books on my shelf and I kind of feel guilty having them their.

Too bad you didn't have your birthday off from work. At least you got to go swimming and had some cake. That's nice. Do you have today off? I'm actually working today from 3 to 12:00 am so I will miss the fireworks.

Great job with the exercise too. You'll begin to really enjoy weight training eventually. After a couple months you will get a feeling of being stronger. You muscles will feel tight and firm in a really good way. You might even notice yourself flexing your pecs, abs, and biceps when nobody is looking

Your friend Angela sound's awesome. People at my workplace can be very negative sometimes so i'ts nice that you have somebody who can help keep you positive.

Post: #119

I think I had mentioned earlier that my boss went into labor so I am covering her shifts as well at work. Normally I am the part time office associate but with her gone, I am now on a 11 day run of working every day. The other associate who is coded to do my job is currently on vacation and won't be back til this weekend so I am afraid I don't really have any time off. At least my shifts are short because they do not want me going over 40 hours. I did work this morning, but I was off before noon. I am contemplating going to see the fireworks as my boyfriend wants to but I have to be up at 4am and not sure if that is too good an idea.

I'm getting a bit run down and would love a day off. I supposedly have Thursday off but I am not sure who will be in the office so I am more than half afraid that they will call me in. Well, it is what it is and at least my paycheck will be lovely.

And I have a job interview next Tuesday. So that could work out well, since training wouldn't start until my boss is back from maternity leave anyway. We all win. I like it when situations work out like that.

I have been enjoying my reading. Like I mentioned before, I use an awesome site called paperback swap and just switch out what I have already read for something else I am interested in and I now have an endless supply of books. It's made me read a lot more than I have in my past having so much at my fingertips.

I have participated in a 50 books in a year challenge several times but I always stop counting after about 12 or so and never really know if I made it (but I seriously doubt I did!) I think that this year, I probably will even without the challenge.

Post: #120

I'm still doing really well with my daily yoga and writing; these are things that as long as I don't allow myself to cop out of a day, I can easily keep up. I haven't been running since last week though because work has been all sorts of hectic lately. I find myself turning into a nap person. I haven't taken naps since I was in Kindergarten or something similar so this is definitely odd for me but I find that a half hour or an hour after I get home actually keeps me going until around 8pm when I finally turn out the lights. I assume it is what my body needs because sometimes I just pass out when I sit down to watch a documentary or something.

I have been watching a lot of documentaries. I have to say that I did not care for the Transcendent Man documentary that someone here suggested; I believe that was Matt. I did, however, love another documentary about another futurist called Future By Design. This is typically after my nap and then reading in the afternoons after work. I should be adding running to that mix again, but today was an awfully physically demanding day as I spent several hours in a hot loft in the stockroom moving boxes of old paperwork to be shredded. Lots of boxes with paperwork from 2003 and earlier!

I have been trying to eat better. I have taken to eating a bigger breakfast in the morning after my yoga and writing and a mug of hot water. Typically this is toast and fruit or some oatmeal. Then I eat a couple times after I get off work, usually once around noon, another time around 3 (Usually this is a bean burrito or a small bowl of pasta with vegetables and sauce). Then a couple hours before I lay down to go to bed, I have been having a salad to make sure I get enough vegetables and the proper vitamins and minerals that I need.

That's pretty much how almost all of this week has passed. So I think I am landing more on the positive side of things and moving closer to my goals.