Steve v5.0

Posts Tagged ‘Eating’

Image by Laughing Squid via Flickr

I’d like to say that I’m just a regular guy, virtually free of pride and arrogance.  That’s right, hardly full of myself at all.  I recognize and thank all those responsible for whatever minutiae may be construed as positive attributes for this mess of flesh occupying my shoes.  Parental genetics and rearing, environment, and everybody I’ve ever met; I’m a little bit of it all- piled almost six-and-a-half feet high.  Thanks!

It’s the width I’m trying to whittle away.

That’s where humility steps up and again, loads of thanks.  Just as I consider myself a big pile of pieces of everyone I’ve ever met, I also know that a great deal of my weight loss success is due to the influence of others.  Family, friends, the people in my blogroll, everyone who has inspired, offered words of encouragement and advice, looks of disdain, or called me names.  Thanks!

Early on in this process of shrinking myself, the weight came off pretty quick.  I guess that’s what happens when you have a lot of weight to lose and make some pretty significant changes to your lifestyle.  Firing up the old metabolism with exercise and cutting about 4000 calories from your diet is a real kick in the pants- if by “kick in the pants” I mean that exercising daily and eating the appropriate number of nutritional calories is the best way to return to a healthy weight, then yeah, it’s a kick in the pants.

Anyhoo, as I get closer to my goal/proper weight I’m finding that it’s getting a lot tougher and changes aren’t as remarkable.  It’s getting a little frustrating and I’ll tell you why.

The date I set for achieving my ultimate goal-weight is getting closer and I’m close weight-wise but I’m not there, It’s the holiday season, and I like pie.

The real thing is that weight loss plans and “shortcuts” are becoming, well, attractive.  Here I am, I’ve lost a little weight and have more to lose, I’m not seeing results like I used to, and the programs my friends have used to lose lots of weight are looking pretty good to me- like a good way to jump start things again.

So I’m struggling.  Should I jump in, sign up, and fast-track the last load of flab, or stick to what I’ve been doing and ramp up portion control and exercise a little more?  I boggle in quandary– and don’t use words good and whatnot.  Hmm.

I believe I’ll stay the course, do a better job of watching what I eat and continue with the exercise.  I also think I’ll take a look at changing my exercise routine a little and see how it goes for the rest of the month.  Then do a real assessment and adjust if necessary.  I really don’t think I’m ready to give up control to someone else.

 

So after a week of freezing my butt off at night and hiking hill and dale during the day, I’m out of the woods and back to civilization. It was an excellent trip chock-full of wilderness and wildlife fun, and most importantly, we all survived AND I dropped another two pounds!

To what do I owe the weight loss? Exercise and diet, of course. It’s weird, I know, but the same things that work at home also work quite well out in the woods.

Exercise-wise, we spent each day hiking around the surrounding hills- usually about 3 – 5 miles and ate much the same as I do at home. We had modest meals (6) throughout the day, small quantities of tasty things meant to provide fuel for the days activities rather than become the focus of the trip. I snacked on gorp and fruit, and avoided the soda and breads. During hikes I would eat a Clif Bar to keep my energy up, always keeping a mental ballpark tally of calories consumed lodged in the back of my skull in an effort to avoid over-doing it.

But you know what? Over-doing it was never an issue. I think I was too distracted during the day and too tired at night to pig-out. I didn’t want to and the cool thing is that I still don’t (want to pig-out, that is).

So here’s the deal, now that I’m back and elbow-deep in make-up work I’ll need to really focus to retain the effects of the past week. No mindless munching on snacks- only fuel to maintain my energy. No 12-hour ass-plants at my desk without getting up to move around- frequent breaks to stretch and get the blood flowing. No calorie bingeing before bed time- just six evenly-spaced meals throughout the day.

I’ve made some decent progress over the past few weeks and am feeling pretty good about it all. My clothes are fitting better, which is cool because they’re clothes I haven’t been able to fit into in over a decade. Horribly out of fashion but hey, I heard that comfort never goes out of style.

 

Image via WikipediaI’m sure I’ve burdened this blog with my peculiarities in regard to doing things in multiples of three. Reps, sets, laps, servings, anything that’s measured is done in threes. It’s a little quirky, I know, but hey- quirky is my best feature and a major component in what I refer to as my pseudo-charm.

Not everything can be done in threes- but I don’t want to talk about them right now. That would be nuts.

Anyway, back on the 26th of August I set a goal to lose 10 pounds by September 30th. Since then I’ve lost a total of three (3) pounds. That was three (3) weeks and three (3) days to lose three (3) pounds. Triple threes! Yikes! If I were a superstitious guy I might have read something into that, some kind of triple-threat thing. And while I am a little superstitious, the only significance I see in this situation is that I have only eleven (11) days left and seven (7) pounds to lose in order to reach my goal. Seven pounds, in my mind, is a significant quantity of weight that isn’t divisible by three.

Wait a tick. If I take the number eleven and break it down by it’s number of tens and ones I get 1 and 1. Add those together and I get 2 (1 + 1 = 2). Add that to the seven pounds I have left to lose and I get 9 (2 + 7 = 9). Nine is three cubed (3^3 or 3 x 3 x 3). Triple triples again! Add those three triples to the three triples that have already occurred and I have six triples to lose ten pounds. Ho-lee Crap! What does it mean?

It means absolutely nothing. Here’s the thing- I could go on all day every day for the rest of my life attaching nonsensical and mystical non-information to my efforts to return to a healthy weight, and it’s all fun and good until I’ve become so distracted that I’ve forgotten the truly important tenets of healthy weight loss.

People, all to often, get caught up in tricks, fads, and gimmicks that promise quick weight loss. We all see them in spam and on television; we have friends that use them. We live in a world of gimmicks and fads few of which guarantee lasting results. So what do I do?

Stay focused. Eat the right quantity of good, healthy foods. Exercise in some way every day. Live life and enjoy the experience. I believe it’s as simple as that.