Perseverance

I was not quite sure what to title this post, didn't have much time to think about it and have chosen the first word to pop into my head... perseverance. It is appropriate. That is what I am doing, persevering and not giving up.

This journey of mine to find balance, joy and my long lost cute backside has turned into something bigger and more difficult than I ever thought possible. It seems as though something gets put in my path to trip me up at every step of the way at the moment... actually it has felt like that for years. Right now there is only one thing I feel like doing when I read or listen to self development material and I am told that 'challenges are put in our life for a reason'... it involves my middle index finger! Unfortunately that is the only way I can look at it or I am sure I would crumble and give up completely. I can't for the life of me figure out what those elusive 'reasons' are yet but I guess I will in time. Every time I think I am getting it figured it out another challenge comes along and knocks me back down again. That is where perseverance comes in - it gets me back up again. I have had to reach deep within me to continue persevering and and not give up. One tool that I have found really helpful is an audio book that I listened to a few months ago called "A Guide to Perseverance". This book takes you through the different areas of your life and show you how perseverance can be the key that sees you succeed and how the lack of it is often the key that sees you not meet your goals. A great book!

TT Challenge III: Week 3, Day 3

Conspicuous by my absence! Fair to say the past five days have not been as good as they should have been. Think all the recent happenings in my life caught up with me, plus a little family thing, and I had a 'moment'... that went on for several days of not so good eating and no official exercise. I knew setting up my business and doing another TT challenge was going to be... well, a challenge! I should be able to catch up with my workouts if I do another on Friday and then Sunday. Will do my first workout for next week on Tuesday and by the end of next week will be back to Mon, Wed, Fri. Don't really mind which days I work out, as long as I actually do three a week plus a few walks/yoga etc.

After two weeks of TT beginner to 'warm me up' I have move to TT intermediate. I have done both these programs already earlier in the year so am a bit board with them but want to take it easy to avoid aggravating my back. It did twinge a bit this morning doing a couple of exercises but I was careful.

I have a confession. I have always said that I love exercise and working out... but it has been a lie. I confess. Deep down, I really don't enjoy it. Never have. Just know I have to do it as it is good for me. Sometimes I have 'moments' when it is not so bad. I sometimes enjoy parts of the resistance work outs and I enjoy walking (sometimes) and when I am fit I love the feeling but the thought of having to exercise everyday, at least three times a week for the rest of my life literally makes me feel sick sometimes. I just try to push the thought out of my mind before it gets in too far. It is more that I am always thinking of 'all the other things' that I need to be doing or want to be doing. It's all in my mind. I know that. But no matter how hard I try, how much I read, how much I persist the fact remains that most nights (actually every night) before I am due to work out the next morning I get a sense of dread. If I don't have a workout scheduled, I am up and out of bed like a rocket, scoffing down breakfast, jumping in the shower and getting stuck into whatever it is that I have to do. No problem.

I have another confession. The thought of eating 'the right' food for the rest of my life (when I let it get into my mind too far) almost makes me want to cry. I get that sick feeling of dread again. Don't get me wrong. I love fresh fruit and vegetables. But I also love muffins, McDonalds every now and again, a nice warm steak and vege pie every now and again - or a couple of pieces of toast with butter and jam on them for breakfast instead of protein shakes or oats (actually I prefer that every morning). I love nice warm, stodgy steam chocolate puddings with vanilla ice cream and carrot cake with cream and a nice hot long black every now and again. And... even worse, my every now and again is probably more like weekly (or even daily sometimes!).

When I do it long enough and try hard enough I do start to 'accept' it and it is not so hard for a while but it never lasts. I always end up going back to what I was doing before - because I simply find it more enjoyable. Food (yummy, naughty food) is where I obtain some of the small snippets of pleasure I crave during my otherwise routine day. Exercise - well, if I was a zillionaire and had all the time in the world I think I would enjoy it but to me it mostly feels like something I 'have' to do, an interruption to my day that I just want to get over and done with so I can start my day. And when things go badly in my life - well, it is a big enough challenge doing the right thing when I am feeling great, when things are shitty...

So there. I have said it. Don't worry, I am still going to work my butt off and push myself as much as I can, for the rest of my life, to maintain a regular exercise routine and eat healthily. I am also going to continue to try and 'change my mindset' and perhaps one day 'it will happen' and I will look back at what I have just written and laugh at myself. At the moment is is a Yin and Yang thing.

TT Challenge III: Week 2, Day 3

I have made myself sit down and write something today. Have been really busy trying to set things up for my business so just have not had time. Here is what I have been up to lately:

Week 1, Days 6 & 7

It was the weekend but I worked most of it putting together my business profile. I went for the most beautiful walk/run on Saturday. The sun was out, birds were everywhere, I sat (yes, I know - was suppose to be moving!) for a few moments when I got to the end of the peninsula where I live and watched a big bird flying around and diving into the ocean to catch fish. The ocean glimmered and sparkled in the sun light. After that I didn't feel like moving fast so I strolled slowly back home and took everything in around me.

Fathers day on Sunday so dad came for dinner Saturday night. Cooked a healthy chicken roast. Yum. We cook it in a covered roasting dish with a rack at the bottom. No oil. I just eat the white breast meat of the chicken and leave the rest to my husband. We don't eat the skin. The veges are pretty much steamed I guess as they go in after about an hour. We usually have sweet potato, pumpkin, carrots, onions, garlic and peas with home made mint sauce. My husband usually has gravy from a packet as well. The best thing about this meal is that if we get a big enough chicken and put HEAPS of veges in we can have it three nights in a row and sometimes even for lunch as well.

Week 2, Days 1 to 3

Did both my scheduled workouts on Monday and this morning. Have felt quite tired the last couple of days and it is only because I am not working an was able to sleep in an extra hour that I can say I enjoyed the workouts when I finally did them. My upper back as been quite sore - it feels like there is a whole lot of tension in there that I just can't seem to get rid of. Yesterday was the worst. I gave up trying to work towards the end of the day and had a spa but even that didn't help.

I did a short 20 minute yoga session yesterday morning to try and relax my back a little. I think that made it worse! Downward dog can be quite hard when you have not done it for awhile!

Yay. My sacroiliac joint has been holding up pretty well. A little tender every now and again but seems to right itself pretty quickly. Still being very careful.

Nutrition has been ok. A bit frustrating at times when I really feel like something healthy like tomatoes, grilled fish etc and because of our limited budget all I have available is bread and tinned tuna. I actually really like tuna but I also like variety and prefer to limit food from a can.

I have a confession. Alllll day yesterday I wrestled with the thought of having a kitkat! I think it was because I was sore... anyway, in the end I gave in and drove to get one. Changed my mind and brought a fruit and nut chocolate bar... when I got home I thought. NO! I will not have this now. I can at least wait a couple of hours and share it with my husband. Now here is where I am suppose to say that is what I did. Hmmm. Nope. That thought was gone as quickly as it came. I almost felt like I was going to cry I wanted that chocolate bar so much! After justifying myself with thoughts of "I have had a rough few months one teeny tiny chocolate bar isn't going to hurt, I deserve it... I am sore and feel yuk... it will relax me... I just want it... I am denying myself so much at the moment... stuff it... I am having it". The world didn't explode and it was rather nice so I am not going to be too hard on myself.

Breakfast this morning was a bit of a surprise. I decided to put a bit of time into making a healthy breakfast. Here is what I had:

Scrambled eggs (with veges) on toast with freshly squeezed orange juice. Sounds healthy doesn't it. Well it might have been healthy but when I entered my food into DietController (after I had eaten it I might add) I got the fright of my life! These were the ingredients:

Eggs x2
Rocket (about 3 large leaves)
Coriander (handful/fresh)
Cheese (approx 50g grated - see below... wrong move to have this in it)
Chili powder
Carrots (.25cup grated)
Bread (1x grain)
Butter (not even half a tsp)
Tomato sauce (1Tbsp - umm, yes - a weakness of mine, have it on everything, use the light variety. It was only 22 calories)
Non fat milk (approx .25 cup)
Freshly squeezed orange and grapefruit juice (off my tree and the neighbours... they gave them to me, I didn't pinch them!)

This added up to... da da... a massive, whopping 732.6 (DietController is very exact) calories! Bugger is what I first thought when I realised. The two things that really topped it over were the cheese and the fruit juice. I wasn't even going to have the frigging cheese. I talked myself into it by saying that I need more protein and the breakfast was not going to have many calories so I should really have it. The fruit juice I don't mind so much as it always leaves me feeling lovely and refreshed for several hours afterwards.

So there you have it. Another few days in the exciting life of me. Now I am off to do some work.

Week 1, Day 5 TT Challenge III

Was sore from my workout on Wednesday (and possibly my yoga session yesterday) but once I had warmed up I was fine. Still feeling a bit flat, particularly when I first got up. To sum up how I was feeling here is a copy of what I wrote to one of my best friends this morning:

"This morning I woke up and reality hit. I thought "What the hell am I doing - starting up a business during an economic downturn with a huge mortgage,  which, if I don't make this work means we will lose the house, the thing I love the most in the world (apart from Jason, my puddy's, friends and family!)... and coming up to Christmas which is a particularly quiet period for my industry... I can't even afford a website, marketing material or advertising! I am going to have to go out there and cold call to get my clients, which seemed fun a few weeks ago but now that the time is looming when I actually have to start doing it doesn't seem that much fun...." - negative nelly's were flying in from all direction. I slumped up the stairs to my computer carefully balancing my coffee and tomato on toast (the very last tomato until we go shopping next week - a few weeks ago I would have just gone down to the diary and brought a bag...!) and there I saw it... the little stone that you gave me with 'believe' on it. All the little negative nelly's exploded and disappeared."

Here is a pic of the stone...

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I do my cardio in our upstairs room which has the most beautiful view. We are pretty much up amongst the birds and this morning I was able to watch as Tui after Tui flew past the window to land on the neighbours Kowhai tree. Below I have included a pic of the view I enjoy while exercising and a pic of a tui in a Kowhai tree. They are the most awesome birds! They fly like little torpedos.

Week 1, Day 4 TT Challenge III

Felt a bit flat today. Had a sense of longing for something... bad food... wine... secure employment!!??? A little overwhelmed at how much I need to get done before I can get my business up and running properly.

Had a bit of an achy back from being on the computer all day so had a float around in our spa pool which was looovely!

Nutrition

Nutrition was ok. Too many starchy carbs again and not enough veges. I felt 'nibbly' today. Kept thinking... hmm - what can I snack on now. My snacks were healthyish.

Breakfast: oats, milk, sultanas
Lunch: Mountain bread, chicken, alfalfa sprouts, tomato, cucumber
Dinner: fish, sweet potato, spinach, cauliflower
Snacks throughout day: Almonds, dried dates, apple, banana on toast and a piece of mountain bread with peanut butter an da green tea.

I was under in my calories

Exercise

30 min yoga session

Week 1, Day 3 TT Challenge III

Have had a busy few days organising things for my new business. Has really helped keep me on track with my nutrition... too busy to think about food! I guess it has also been a bit of a negative as today I had to compromise a bit for lunch by throwing together a sandwich instead of the huge salad and mountain bread I had planned.

Yesterday was a bit of a negative, self-doubt, what am I thinking starting a new business at the moment kind of day. I think mainly because I was just totally exhausted from the the happenings of the past week. This morning I woke up and felt wonderful mentally. Still a little tired and run down physically but there is improvement! In part I have a fellow TT member, Kali, to thank. She mentioned an awesome visualisation concept called Mind Movies which I checked out straight away and was so excited by it!

Week 1, Day 2

Rest day. Felt really, really tired, run down and negative today... also had a headache most of the day. I think my body was in shock from the exercise and good food!

Nutrition was pretty much the same as day 1. Didn't do any exercise. Muscles (all of them!) sore from day 1.

Week 1, Day 3

Felt great today! Did TT Beginners B and Beginner Interval on cross trainer. Interesting to note that even though I have been doing only light exercise for the past few months... since the end of the first challenge pretty much... I definitely felt stronger than I did when I started the first challenge. I have been pushing myself more than I did during the first challenge and so far all is good in the injury department. I am being careful though as back a bit iffy.

Nutrition was not what I had planned but I was still happy with how things went. Had a bit much starchy carbs; 2x toast/tomato for breakfast and sandwich (2x bread, chicken, salad, sprouts) for lunch. Went to my uncles for a visit and had no problem sipping a nice cold water while he and Allison, his partner, enjoyed a wine and beer. Just didn't let myself think about it.

Week 1, Day 1 TT Challenge III

Today went really well. Am pretty tired as was rushing around quite a lot. I have not been sleeping that well lately and I just knew that on the one morning I couldn't sleep in I would want to. Sure enough. Was exhausted when I woke so gave myself an extra hour in bed (ha ha - I can do that due to having my own business!) and felt great when I finally got up.

Workout:

TT Beginners, 3 sets
Cardio - bike

Really enjoyed my workout. Felt strong and full of energy. I really thought I would struggle this morning as have not done much in the way of exercise for a few months - just walking.

Nutrition:

10.25am - oats, milk, sultanas
1.00pm - almonds, apple, banana
2.30pm - chicken, stirfry veges, 1x mountain bread
4.00pm - tuna, grilled and steamed veges, feta cheese
7.00pm - chicken, stirfry veges
7:30pm - 1x bread, butter, honey, coffee

Guidelines (will adjust as necessary):
• Use The Diet Solution as my general guideline to nutrition. Nutrition will have to fit in with our budget until I get my business up and running.
• Eat clean 90% of the time (no more than 4 cheat meals a week)
• Abstain from alcohol.
• Drink green tea regularly.

These guidelines are a little broad as I am exhausted and brain not working. Am going to bed!