A 365-Day Transformation?

On days such as this (my birthday), I find it hard not to evaluate the year that was, and the potential of the year to come. Unfortunately - and only due to a result of my own efforts - I haven't seen much progress in the health & fitness arena since I turned 27 last year. But I'll get back to this in a second...

The rest of my life, however, has changed quite a bit! Back in September of last year I married my wife and best friend, and in March I started my first, official full-time job in downtown Chicago (after a few years of freelance/part-time gigs). Even scored a new car last month! Just about every other aspect of my life has improved since my last birthday. So why not this last part?

Now don't get me wrong - this isn't me lamenting about how bad my life is AT ALL. I am so happy for all the blessings I have received between 8/6/2011 and 8/6/2012 and I wouldn't go back and do a single thing differently. As far as weight loss goes, the past is the past - and now it's time to only look at today and set goals for this next year of my life.

My primary verse for the next 365 days

I'm a big fan of Chris Powell and his show Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition on Sunday nights. Instead of a 'ranch' format of group training a la Biggest Loser, he takes on a client one-on-one for an entire year to completely transform them. Now I'm not looking to lose half of my body weight (thankfully I haven't let myself go THAT much), but I am going to aim for my goal weight by my birthday next year - so I have 365 days to do so.

So beginning tomorrow, I will weigh myself, take pictures and measurements and establish my official "starting (over)" position. More details will come in tomorrow's post pertaining to my plan on how I will approach the next 365 days.

Let me know what things have worked for you that you think I should include in my plan!

Out With the Old - In With the New!

If you follow me on Twitter, you may have seen some of the recent pictures I posted about some some of the latest changes in my life - some small, some large - but all exciting! So let's walk through some of them, shall we?

1. New Glasses

Don't be decieved by the handsome decent picture on the left, but there is only one "ear thing" to those glasses and they're balancing on my nose. They were a couple of years old, falling apart and they'd fall off my face if I looked down. They were light as a feather, got broken quite easily and my astigmatism had already rendered them obsolete. It was time for a change - and I'm happy with the results (as you can tell by my smiling face on the right?)

2. New Running Shoes

This is a change I'd wanted to make a few months back, but I just had to wait for the right time. Every July, the local downtown area (it's a suburb, so downtown is relative) holds a Sidewalk Sale, and lots of the shops have some really good deals! So I visited the local running store ("Running for Kicks"), got fitted for some shoes, and came out with some sweet Mizuno Enigmas 20% off! I've only worn Mizunos since I started running in Jan '09, and I wasn't about to buy the Brooks that they were also offering me! And plus - who doesn't like a nice, flashy shoe?

3. New Car!

Alright, so this change is on a totally different level - we got a new car! Ok, it's pre-driven, but it's new to us! Unfortunately, I don't have a corresponding picture of my old piece of junk, but it's a black, '99 Nissan Altima with a roughed up head gasket, tires that need balancing (it shakes fiercely if I dare flirt with 60 mph) and A/C that only works at Level 4 (gale force winds) while Levels 1-3 don't deliver as much as an exhale. Either way, we needed the upgrade!

4. New Mindset

For these last three + years, I've always tried to convince myself that despite 'off' days, weeks or months, that I can always knock out my goal in a few months "if I just really went to it." Well obviously that's not the case.

With weight loss, it doesn't matter what you 'could do' - it only matters what you DID or ARE DOING. Nobody cares what you're going to do next week, they want to hear what you did at the gym this morning. So statements like "I should be 15 pounds lighter by my birthday next month" is worthless unless I can stand there on my birthday and say, "I just lost 15 pounds!"

Anyway, what I'm trying to drive at is that I'm abandoning my false pride about my ability to simply lose weight at will. When writing out weight loss goals, I would usually plan on being able to lose 6-10 pounds a week - HA! So the new mindset is aiming for 2-3 pounds a week and being ecstatic if the scale shows me more than that.

Once I get back from a week-long, outdoors vacation (filled with walking, swimming, canoeing, etc) my weekly video updates will be popping up again. So stay tuned!

Also, congrats to all those who knocked out the Rock N' Roll Half Marathon in Chicago this past Sunday. It's been fun reading your reports!

My (Slightly Belated) June Goals

One of my reoccuring downfalls on my weight loss journey has been setting all my final, big picture goals up front and then rarely setting smaller, more bite-sized goals along the way. As a result, every time I stumbled on my diet or gain a few pounds here or there, I saw my progress through the lens of the larger goal and found myself getting discouraged because I had "such a long way to go", and would forget that one, bad day doesn't ruin everything and that I just needed to forget yesterday's failure and focus on winning today. I've never been good at that...

So in an attempt to combat this cycle from rearing its ugly head anymore, I'm going to take some time at the beginning of each month to set some goals for myself for the upcoming 30 days. I think I'll give a few, different kinds of goals: weight, nutrition, activity and maybe something unrelated to weight loss.

Before I get into my June goals, let me backtrack a little and talk about May. My efforts - on a scale of 1 to 10 - probably registered only about a 4.5 last month. I had a couple weeks where I ate well and got to the gym 4-6 times a week, but the other half of the month I avoided the gym, at donuts for breakfast and enjoyed way too much soda. However, I still managed to lose 8-10 pounds last month despite my efforts not to, haha.

For June, I've found a new source of motivation to help me through the summer. Some of the women at work started a Biggest Loser type of contest and asked me to join! The prize is yet to be determined, but I'm still really excited about it. I'll get more into that at a later date. On to the goals!

By July 1st, here are some things I want to say I've accomplished:

- Lose 15-20 pounds so I can get myself back into the 250s
- Avoid all non-diet soda
- Be able to run 5 miles without stopping
- Gain 50 combined Twitter followers/YouTube subscribers/Facebook page 'Likes'
- Blog at least once a week
- Read one Runner's World and one Men's Health

I like the list I've put together here! They encompass a lot of the different areas I want to work on and allow me to make smaller steps forward in all of them! I'll lose weight, develop healthier habits by dropping soda, work towards my goal of 'being a runner,' improve my online presence and gain knowledge my reading! Man, I love these!

So there ya go! Let me know your thoughts on my goals, and I want to know what YOU want to accomplish in June! I'm real pumped about this, can't you tell? :)

Spring Cleaning

For today's post I'm feeling quite scatter-brained and absent-minded. I feel kind of frazzled and unable to focus intently on a single topic for this post, so I think I'll touch on a group of things that I feel I need to update you on. Got that? Great. Read on.

1. As you may have seen, my weekly updates have not gotten off the ground yet. I know it just sounds like an excuse, but allergies have been whoopin' my behind these last, two weeks and I haven't been making any progress that warrants a legit 'update.' However, I PROMISE you that updates will be around the corner. With Easter weekend coming up I will be visiting my parents in Wisconsin, so you can plan on my first update coming to you on April 14th. Let's see what kind of numbers I can have for you in two weeks!

2. I mentioned that I have a goal of losing 40 pounds by June 9th. If I do, I get to sign up for the Chicago Half Marathon. My lovely wife has also just informed me that she has an awesome gift she wants to give me as well that she and her brother have been collaborating on. In order to get that, I need to string together two great weeks of eating and exercising. Can't wait to see what it is! (And don't worry, I'll fill you in when I receive it.)

3. Also in that same vein, I got an email this morning telling me that the aforementioned Chicago Half Marathon is 33% ahead of its 2011 numbers, and that it will likely sell out in the near future. That's a bummer for me because I won't know if I can sign up for it until June 9th... Thus, I will either have to just sign up for it now to guarantee my spot, hope it'll still be open by June, or just accept the fact that I won't be able to run it. Or maybe just sign up for the Chicago Men's Health Urbanathlon in October instead!

4. I've recently started a new job downtown and I knew things were going to be different than my last job. The commute is much longer, the hours are longer and the work is harder. What I didn't expect was for there to be a break room stocked consistently with chips, soda and lots of other snacks. Needless to say, that has been a major struggle in my first, two weeks at the new gig. I really wish I could take a lunchtime run outside, but I would come back quite sweaty and smelly if I tried that. Maybe just a nice stroll will have to suffice. And lay off the Sun Chips, man!

5. As a result of the allergies and work snacks I assume that I have made negative progress on the scale. It's pretty frustrating, to be honest. But it's more of a frustration with my lack of effort, discipline and self-control rather than a frustration with the scale or the snacks. I'm the only one who can control which way the numbers go, and lately I've been quite lazy, complacent and out of control. With each day I string together I gain more confidence, so I just have to put the work in and get the ball rolling. Easier said than done...

And finally, I'll have to admit that I'm a bit jealous. I've been reading a lot of posts or seeing a lot of 'after pictures' lately by great individuals who have progress to show for their efforts. And while I'm happy for them, it's just kind of hard to see everyone ELSE doing well while I continue to tread water and sometimes almost sink at times.

But like I said, that will only continue if I allow it to. And let's start making each hour of the day count! Tomorrow morning I'm making my 6:00am-7:00am count by hitting the gym! I'll post proof tomorrow

Change Is Hard

Tonight I've had an epiphany of sorts.

I've made it a habit of trying to breakdown my screwy mindset with this whole losing weight process. I know that I can achieve my goal physically (because I got went from 240-215 during the summer of 2005), but I feel that something needs to click mentally before I can get back to that.

Summer of '05 after my first 10k race (215 lbs)

Do I need to have my world rocked by scary, physical statistics about unhealthy I am? Oh wait, I've been there and done that. Maybe I need to do some physical accomplishment so I can realize what I'm capable of if I put my mind to it. What? I've run four half marathons? Darn...

Sometimes I just sit back, throw up my arms and wonder, "So what needs to click?!?"

Well after talking with my wonderful wife this evening, I think I've narrowed down some things. Maybe I'm scared and intimidated by the lifestyle changes I'd have to endure in order to reach my goal. Could it be that my innate desire to be comfortable and inconvenienced supersedes my desire to put in the work to lose 75 pounds?

Let's hope not.

Does the bad food really taste that good? Nope.  Do I lack support and encouragement not only from family members, but also from those who have accomplished last weight loss before me? Not at all! Am I just being a lazy wuss who doesn't want to "work too hard" to accomplish not only a wanted goal, but a NEEDED one? Now we might be onto something...

Every day that passes is one day closer to my 'goal date' - I need to be making better use of these days!

Me. Gym. 6 a.m. tomorrow morning.