I went out for a run this morning. Distressed with my tightening pant waists, I had long ago decided to wake up early in the morning to run. Unfortunately, I'm not a morning person and I tended to sleep past the alarm.
For a while, I was tempted to try Steve Pavina's method of training yourself to wake up on cue by practising, in the evening, getting out of bed when the alarm rings over and over. I would have done it, except that I thought it was a bit over the top.
Instead, this Saturday I woke around when I normally do for work (7am) and went for a quick there and back run to see how much time I need to put aside for my weekday runs. Turns out that it only takes me 10 minutes to get to the gym and back, even when I'm tired.
This morning, being a statutory holiday (Victoria Day), I tried the morning routine again, but added in the stretching and half hour at the gym. I still managed to run back home from the gym in 10 minutes even after some good cardio work.
I'll be focusing mainly on cardio because I want to get my stamina in top shape again and, really, I just want to focus on fat burn rather than muscle gain.
The weather was brilliant today. I love overcast, it has to be my favourite weather condition. No rain, not too bright, but still warm. And sometimes, if you're extra lucky, just enough wind for kite flying. It's funny because I was just talking about favourite weather conditions with my girlfriend yesterday. Yes, we were talking about the weather, but we also talked about other things in case you're wondering if our relationship took a dive.
While mine is overcast, she likes sunny weather, but only just barely/mildly so. It was essentially my favourite weather but with less clouds. It's neat that we can still find things in common even after six years.
Showing posts with label Self-Improvement. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Self-Improvement. Show all posts
Monday, May 18, 2009
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
GG, GG
Heh, already a new post. Good game, Grouse Grind.
I just wanted to share with you guys a bit of what I've been doing recently to improve myself.
Firstly, I'm slowly adjusting my sleep schedule so that I sleep earlier and wake earlier. I now sleep anywhere between 10pm-1am and wake at 630am. It took a few tries to get this, but I had a few tricks. The first, obviously, is to get out of bed. This is difficult, because the bed is so comfortable and warm. I used a variety of tactics, including putting my alarm away from the bed, drinking a lot of liquids prior to bed, and convincing myself that I can return to bed after feeding my goldfishies. Naturally, once you're out of bed, you can think a little bit clearer and achieving your goal becomes that much easier. At the very least, just take one step out of bed and stand there for a moment.
The next step is to adjust your body to the sleeping schedule. Those that suffer from jet lag may find this difficult. I borrowed a trick learned from a Harvard research report on jet lag. Apparently, starving yourself 14-16 hours prior to sleep will help your body adjust to a new sleeping schedule almost immediately. It took two attempts with this trick before I felt like I was fully adjusted. The first day I went to sleep about 8-10 hours after eating and the second day it was 12-14 hours before. Be forewarn, however, if you starve yourself your body will go into an emergency mode where food may be rationed and stored longer in your body, making it easier to gain weight (this is the reason why diets usually fail). I'm trying to balance this with proper meals now and some extra exercise.
The final thing that you need to do is to find something to do with your extra hours. You can work out, play games, do work, etc. So far I'm doing random things. Essentially I'm taking my post-midnight activities (gaming, surfing the net, knitting, whatever) and putting them in the morning. I find that my mind works better this way and, since it's in the morning, I cannot overindulge in an activity since the rest of my day gets in the way. I'm hoping that eventually I'll be able to allocate my time to writing, but more on that later.
A nice tip for the sleeping bit and for life in general: Try to change your eating habits so that your largest meal is breakfast and the lightest is dinner. This will help you sleep better and your body is less likely to take the extra energy and convert it to fat (though the World Health Organization may argue with me on that). Nonetheless a big breakfast will make your day much easier, especially after lunch when your normal reserves are all used up. A lot of people are skipping breakfast these days, but waking up earlier should afford them the time to enjoy a heartier meal.
Exercise works wonders for me in that it keeps me from eating too much. I don't usually feel like eating too much before or after exercise, I'm just not in the mood for it. So I'm trying to use exercise a bit to keep my eating habits in check while I switch the heaviness of my meals around. For exercise, I'm going to kickboxing still, but also the gym and the grouse grind (more on that later), and I'm also doing this program and trying for 100 consecutive "good form" push ups. I'm on week 3 now and having a bit of trouble. You see, I wanted to double the minimum amount for the final set of push ups for each day. This way, I'd be at 100 consecutive by the end of week 6. However, I'm currently at 50 some push ups at the end of a grueling set and I'm having difficulties eking out past 30. Oh well, I'm still about 100 every other day now and my arm muscles are starting to hinder my flexibility. So, maybe I will scale back a bit, but not too much.
My sister and I tried to form a pact earlier last month in July. We were going to wake up early together and try to do some activity, whether it be going to the gym, a walk, or out for coffee with each other. Unfortunately that failed when we were both unable to get up in the morning. However, I'm finding some success in that now and, when our schedules permit it, we are still attempting some sibling bonding. Originally my sister was supposed to accompany me on the Grouse Grind last Friday but, seeing how we're in Vancouver, the weather crapped all over our plans with rain. She didn't want to go out, but I ended up doing it anyways. I had bought some trekking poles just for mountain climbing/hiking and I wanted to use them as often as possible before summer ended. So I climbed the treacherous mountain in the pouring rain.
Here are my times, broken into quarters (which are marked on the trail):
1. 17 mins 20
2. 13 mins 07
3. 14 mins 51
4. 13 mins 08
Total: 58 mins 27
I might have started timing a bit early, as there was a fork in the road some ways past the "Grouse Grind Timer" that pointed one way to the Grouse Grind and another way to some other trail. This may account a bit for the longer starting quarter. I pushed myself a bit too hard too early and had to fight off a cramp for most of the second half (which is steeper and much harder to navigate in the rain). I ended timing a bit earlier too, as I stopped the clock once I was clear of the trail. I noticed the ending Grouse Grind Timer after I stopped the clock, but literally it was only about 20 feet of flat terrain away, so the most it could have added was another minute, which would still keep me under an hour.
My goal for the Grouse Grind this trip was to simply not stop. Finishing in under an hour was actually a goal for the next trip, but I got that too. I'll be visiting the Grind again this Friday, but with my sister in tow. How this affects my time, we'll see, but I think the companionship and conversation would be worth it.
I just wanted to share with you guys a bit of what I've been doing recently to improve myself.
Firstly, I'm slowly adjusting my sleep schedule so that I sleep earlier and wake earlier. I now sleep anywhere between 10pm-1am and wake at 630am. It took a few tries to get this, but I had a few tricks. The first, obviously, is to get out of bed. This is difficult, because the bed is so comfortable and warm. I used a variety of tactics, including putting my alarm away from the bed, drinking a lot of liquids prior to bed, and convincing myself that I can return to bed after feeding my goldfishies. Naturally, once you're out of bed, you can think a little bit clearer and achieving your goal becomes that much easier. At the very least, just take one step out of bed and stand there for a moment.
The next step is to adjust your body to the sleeping schedule. Those that suffer from jet lag may find this difficult. I borrowed a trick learned from a Harvard research report on jet lag. Apparently, starving yourself 14-16 hours prior to sleep will help your body adjust to a new sleeping schedule almost immediately. It took two attempts with this trick before I felt like I was fully adjusted. The first day I went to sleep about 8-10 hours after eating and the second day it was 12-14 hours before. Be forewarn, however, if you starve yourself your body will go into an emergency mode where food may be rationed and stored longer in your body, making it easier to gain weight (this is the reason why diets usually fail). I'm trying to balance this with proper meals now and some extra exercise.
The final thing that you need to do is to find something to do with your extra hours. You can work out, play games, do work, etc. So far I'm doing random things. Essentially I'm taking my post-midnight activities (gaming, surfing the net, knitting, whatever) and putting them in the morning. I find that my mind works better this way and, since it's in the morning, I cannot overindulge in an activity since the rest of my day gets in the way. I'm hoping that eventually I'll be able to allocate my time to writing, but more on that later.
A nice tip for the sleeping bit and for life in general: Try to change your eating habits so that your largest meal is breakfast and the lightest is dinner. This will help you sleep better and your body is less likely to take the extra energy and convert it to fat (though the World Health Organization may argue with me on that). Nonetheless a big breakfast will make your day much easier, especially after lunch when your normal reserves are all used up. A lot of people are skipping breakfast these days, but waking up earlier should afford them the time to enjoy a heartier meal.
Exercise works wonders for me in that it keeps me from eating too much. I don't usually feel like eating too much before or after exercise, I'm just not in the mood for it. So I'm trying to use exercise a bit to keep my eating habits in check while I switch the heaviness of my meals around. For exercise, I'm going to kickboxing still, but also the gym and the grouse grind (more on that later), and I'm also doing this program and trying for 100 consecutive "good form" push ups. I'm on week 3 now and having a bit of trouble. You see, I wanted to double the minimum amount for the final set of push ups for each day. This way, I'd be at 100 consecutive by the end of week 6. However, I'm currently at 50 some push ups at the end of a grueling set and I'm having difficulties eking out past 30. Oh well, I'm still about 100 every other day now and my arm muscles are starting to hinder my flexibility. So, maybe I will scale back a bit, but not too much.
My sister and I tried to form a pact earlier last month in July. We were going to wake up early together and try to do some activity, whether it be going to the gym, a walk, or out for coffee with each other. Unfortunately that failed when we were both unable to get up in the morning. However, I'm finding some success in that now and, when our schedules permit it, we are still attempting some sibling bonding. Originally my sister was supposed to accompany me on the Grouse Grind last Friday but, seeing how we're in Vancouver, the weather crapped all over our plans with rain. She didn't want to go out, but I ended up doing it anyways. I had bought some trekking poles just for mountain climbing/hiking and I wanted to use them as often as possible before summer ended. So I climbed the treacherous mountain in the pouring rain.
Here are my times, broken into quarters (which are marked on the trail):
1. 17 mins 20
2. 13 mins 07
3. 14 mins 51
4. 13 mins 08
Total: 58 mins 27
I might have started timing a bit early, as there was a fork in the road some ways past the "Grouse Grind Timer" that pointed one way to the Grouse Grind and another way to some other trail. This may account a bit for the longer starting quarter. I pushed myself a bit too hard too early and had to fight off a cramp for most of the second half (which is steeper and much harder to navigate in the rain). I ended timing a bit earlier too, as I stopped the clock once I was clear of the trail. I noticed the ending Grouse Grind Timer after I stopped the clock, but literally it was only about 20 feet of flat terrain away, so the most it could have added was another minute, which would still keep me under an hour.
My goal for the Grouse Grind this trip was to simply not stop. Finishing in under an hour was actually a goal for the next trip, but I got that too. I'll be visiting the Grind again this Friday, but with my sister in tow. How this affects my time, we'll see, but I think the companionship and conversation would be worth it.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Everything in Moderation
I've been making quite a few posts on self-improvement topics lately, but it's all good. People have time in the summer, why not use it to try new ways to improve themselves? Myself, I've been making my usual attempt at improving myself physically and mentally and, unfortunately, making my usual poor showing at the task. The topic of today's post might be the cause of it, but if it is, then I don't really want to change as I believe very strongly in this mantra.
"Everything in Moderation" is indeed my mantra and one that I've been saying and following to some success. While I may have had an inkling of this idea, it became very concrete after I read the introduction to Ursula LeGuin's The Left Hand of Darkness (I have an autographed copy of another one of her books, Wizard of the Earthsea). In the introduction, LeGuin talked about the role of the science fiction writer in how they can formulate a dystopia by taking any element of our current society and exaggerating it to cancerous levels. When I say cancerous, I do literally mean cancerous as a tumor is natural part of your body that is growing out of control.
We can easily see some examples here: warnings against a tightly controlled society, war, over-reliance of technology. In a recent film, WALL-E, we see what happens if consumption, pollution, and privatization goes on unchecked.
With that in mind, let's turn back to moderation and its application to everything. I don't really believe in denying yourself of any of life's pleasures. People may have strong beliefs or opinions about certain things and that's fine. However, completely ridding things like carbs or sweets from your diet for the sake of fitness, I feel, is just silly. There is no point in living to the age 100 if the last 20-40 years is drab, dull and full of regret. Live a little, indulge a little, but keep it all in check. Moderation.
This also applies to work. Be careful not to become a workaholic or fitness freak. To me, that is equally unnatural. For a person to have the best possible life, they must maintain a rough balance (nothing too strict) in all aspects of their lives. Essentially, no matter what it is, be sure to hold yourself back a little now and then, you'll find that the pleasures (or hardships) of an activity will last longer/be more bearable as you take it on gradually.
Here's an example of each spectrum of this idea. When I was a child, I loved to eat (still do!). McDonalds used to have very cheap McChicken burgers every Monday and my mother, being the wonderful understanding person she is, used to buy a whole bunch and I would have them for lunch at school practically everyday. Eventually it got to the point where I was simply sick of the damn things and refused to eat any McDonalds for years. I think they have a punishment like that in hell, where they give you too much of a good thing.
On the opposite end of the spectrum is something like studying. Research has shown that people retain information better from the first 20 minutes of study and the last 20 minutes of study. All that work in the middle? Usually fuzzy if not completely gone. Cramming rarely works to the best effect. If you take the same all-night 10 hour study period and break it down into 30/10 min study and break periods, you'll actually recall the information better than if you studied straight through the night.
Paradoxically, this mantra can be applied to itself. There will be times when people have no choice but to bog down and something for a prolonged period of time. It may be because of work, a need for training, or a plane crash leaving you marooned on a desert island. In either case, if you find yourself doing something too much, don't feel bad, just plan your schedule a bit better to allow some breaks.
What I'm getting at here is that moderation is good and that we are built for it. Humans like to explore and, more often than not, these trials help them to appreciate what they already have and enjoy it more. I suppose everyone is born with a level of ADD. Like they say in science fiction, the biggest problem with any utopian society is boredom.
"Everything in Moderation" is indeed my mantra and one that I've been saying and following to some success. While I may have had an inkling of this idea, it became very concrete after I read the introduction to Ursula LeGuin's The Left Hand of Darkness (I have an autographed copy of another one of her books, Wizard of the Earthsea). In the introduction, LeGuin talked about the role of the science fiction writer in how they can formulate a dystopia by taking any element of our current society and exaggerating it to cancerous levels. When I say cancerous, I do literally mean cancerous as a tumor is natural part of your body that is growing out of control.
We can easily see some examples here: warnings against a tightly controlled society, war, over-reliance of technology. In a recent film, WALL-E, we see what happens if consumption, pollution, and privatization goes on unchecked.
With that in mind, let's turn back to moderation and its application to everything. I don't really believe in denying yourself of any of life's pleasures. People may have strong beliefs or opinions about certain things and that's fine. However, completely ridding things like carbs or sweets from your diet for the sake of fitness, I feel, is just silly. There is no point in living to the age 100 if the last 20-40 years is drab, dull and full of regret. Live a little, indulge a little, but keep it all in check. Moderation.
This also applies to work. Be careful not to become a workaholic or fitness freak. To me, that is equally unnatural. For a person to have the best possible life, they must maintain a rough balance (nothing too strict) in all aspects of their lives. Essentially, no matter what it is, be sure to hold yourself back a little now and then, you'll find that the pleasures (or hardships) of an activity will last longer/be more bearable as you take it on gradually.
Here's an example of each spectrum of this idea. When I was a child, I loved to eat (still do!). McDonalds used to have very cheap McChicken burgers every Monday and my mother, being the wonderful understanding person she is, used to buy a whole bunch and I would have them for lunch at school practically everyday. Eventually it got to the point where I was simply sick of the damn things and refused to eat any McDonalds for years. I think they have a punishment like that in hell, where they give you too much of a good thing.
On the opposite end of the spectrum is something like studying. Research has shown that people retain information better from the first 20 minutes of study and the last 20 minutes of study. All that work in the middle? Usually fuzzy if not completely gone. Cramming rarely works to the best effect. If you take the same all-night 10 hour study period and break it down into 30/10 min study and break periods, you'll actually recall the information better than if you studied straight through the night.
Paradoxically, this mantra can be applied to itself. There will be times when people have no choice but to bog down and something for a prolonged period of time. It may be because of work, a need for training, or a plane crash leaving you marooned on a desert island. In either case, if you find yourself doing something too much, don't feel bad, just plan your schedule a bit better to allow some breaks.
What I'm getting at here is that moderation is good and that we are built for it. Humans like to explore and, more often than not, these trials help them to appreciate what they already have and enjoy it more. I suppose everyone is born with a level of ADD. Like they say in science fiction, the biggest problem with any utopian society is boredom.
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