a keen life

Dear Self,

So, I guess you’ve been falling a bit short of your exercise goals? You’ve been tired ever since you stayed out late at the Opera last Tuesday, sabotaging your sleep for Wednesday Yoga. A tiny sleep deficit combined with a little run of hot weather toward the end of the week resulted in Crazy! Schedule! Crankiness! No exercise since Yoga six days ago, now that you think about it!

Isn’t it funny how a tiny change can throw you off so easily?

On the plus side, your plan of delegating some meals to your sweetie worked really well — you had some yummy meals that were fairly nutritionally balanced, and you didn’t have to use a single neuron to think them up, since someone else was in charge. Brilliantly executed plan!

What happened with exercise, though? Wow. First off, props for avoiding the sun and painful sunburns, but also, hey, the sun won’t kill you! Sunblock is effective for short periods of time! Here is your complaint summary for the last six days of no exercise:

1. Too hot!
2. No clothes!

Solutions: buy sunscreen, and invest in some new workout gear. I know you would like to believe you don’t need either one, but waiting for your old sunscreen to magically appear from the messy bathroom is not really productive. Also, pretending you like your old ratty workout clothes is not a good way to love yourself!

Here’s the thing: you need to get what you need to get the job done. If you want to exercise every day, you can’t deprive yourself of 2 necessary ingredients (sunblock, clothes) and then whine endlessly about why you’re not exercising! This is going to require a small amount of shopping. Recognize that this is also going to require not feeling comfortable the first time you step outside to walk or bike in your new clothes. It’s okay not to feel comfortable! (Most people don’t care, and the other people are stupid, so ignore them. )

Also, sometimes you’re not going to be able to breeze home from a perfectly productive day of work with a magical burst of energy and waltz out the door for your hour-long walk like a bird on the wing. Sometimes, you’re going to be a bit cranky, but you’ll learn to do it anyway. You’re in it for the feeling you get when you give yourself what you need. You’ll feel better if you take a walk! The television will not explode with interesting content while it waits for you, and dinner can wait another hour.

Get this — you are not a hostage to your routines if your routines aren’t working for you! I know, crazy. You can make your life better by deliberately deciding what you need, and then going out there to get it for yourself.

Okay — now do it!

Love,

Your self.

Okay, I have been in a food funk and it hasn’t been fun. Two weeks ago I decided to hold a Vegetarian Experiment. I bought tons of dark green veggies to anchor my meals, plus whole grains and vegetarian protein sources. I renewed my commitment to bringing yummy healthy lunches to work, and healthy snacks to avoid afternoon hunger attacks. That first week, I was doing great!

Then for some reason, last week, I arrived home and promptly threw a week-long Kitchen Tantrum. Have you ever done this? For me, it usually takes the form of coming home hungry, looking at all the tasty food in my fridge, and declaring that I refuse to eat any of it! I grump around refusing to cook and getting hungrier by the minute, until I annoy my husband and he promises to get take-out food for us, if only I’ll make an order and stop whining.

Ha! Good plan, Jesse! So how did that work out for you? Oh right, it didn’t. I ate too much, felt too full of delicious yet unhealthy food, and felt guilt gathering like a storm cloud above my head. And then, shockingly, I did not lose weight! (Ha! However, I didn’t gain, either. Though I did go back up to my original bodyfat measurement, negating the bodyfat loss I begrudgingly celebrated in my last entry.)

I’m not really clear on what was the purpose or cause of this little freak out. During my second “vegetarian” week I sure did eat a lot of meat in those take-out meals! But was I craving protein, or Chinese food? Was I too tired to cook, or was I sick of eating healthy foods? Either way, it’s too late. I could go around in circles forever trying to answer these questions.

Fact: It was all delicious but it didn’t feel good: this is a new week and I want to feel good about eating dinners again! I could make falafel again (and bake it this time instead of frying), roast some balsamic broccoli, do veggie skewers on the new grill, melt some mushrooms a la Julia Child, make another quiche.

Here are some eating solutions I am going to try:

1. Ask sweet darling husband to be in charge of making two dinners, thus absolving myself of part of the mental burden;
2. Commit to waking up 15 minutes early to eat breakfast at home instead of at work;;
3. Stock up on pre-made frozen dinners;
4. Buy 100-calorie pudding cups for guilt-free PM chocolate cravings;
5. Buy those damn chocolate Clif Bars if I love them so much, and keep them at work for REAL snacks.

On PEERtrainer, where I still sporadically track my food intake, I sometimes glance down at my Personal Notes section, where I wrote a long time ago, “To reduce weight, aim for 1500 calories per day, and get at least 45 minutes of exercise per day.” That amount of calories is right around where this Recommended Daily Calorie Intake Calculator says I should aim for a 2lb/week loss. Counting extra fuel for exercise and occasional treats, it might be better to aim for 1700-1800 instead.

Blah, blah blah. Listen to me babble on! The point is that I am NOT EXERCISING DAILY, nor am I really hitting anywhere close to that calorie range. I am not dedicating enough energy to my plans, or I am rebelling and deliberately sabotaging myself. So that 1500 cals/45 mins goal is off in some perfect world, and here I am doodling around and getting nowhere fast.

If I do nothing else this week aside from take a forced leave from take-out, I need to focus on exercise. I went to see a new physician last week (a small personal victory I’ll have to write about one day) and when I told her about my changes in diet and exercise, she said that the most important thing I can do is exercise whenever possible. Screw dieting, screw losing weight — just exercise, often, and don’t stop. I think I can live with that. It reminds me of my favorite food advice from Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food, “Eat Food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”

So to match with my plan above for better eating habits this week, here are a few things I am doing to remedy the lack of daily exercise in my life:

1. Buy new sneakers so I don’t fear plantar fascitis on long walks;
2. Attend yoga at work every Wednesday (new session starts this week!);
3. Join the weekly walking group at work, too;
4. Do one-hour walking route at home twice a week;
5. Bike rides twice a week in the evenings.

If I have two days of exercise at work (yoga and walking group) that will help me fill in the rest of the days without getting overwhelmed by routines. I have other rumblings of ideas (including but not limited to the Gym At Work and Wii Fit) that will have to wait a little while. For this coming week, however, here’s hoping that I can incorporate new ideas and renewed courage and confidence with my plans.