Skip to main content

Day 49: the seven week report



“The days are long but the years are short”—Lazarus Long, or Gretchen Rubin, depending on your source.

I am very, very close to being halfway through my #100DaysofHealth project. It’s stunning to think that it’s been 7 weeks. It feels like forever, but also like I just started.


In 7 weeks, I’ve worked out for 40 hours—a full work week. I’ve spend at least 25 hours writing blog posts, and probably 40 if you count thinking about blog posts and researching blog posts. I’ve used up 2 bottles of sunscreen, which is literally more than I’ve used in an entire year in the past. I’ve meditated for roughly 7 hours (which is about 8 hours less than I think I should have). I’ve eaten pounds of watermelon (my go-to treat when I’m not eating sweets). I’ve eaten fish 40 times, vegan meals 5 times, chicken or turkey 20 times, and red meat less than a dozen.

What I haven’t done, interestingly, is lost any weight. Since day 1, yes, I’m down roughly 6 pounds. But since a month ago, I’ve been circling the same weight, +/- 1 pound, every day. The smartboy says he can tell that I’m more muscular. My friend claims that she can see a difference. I can’t. And even though my stated goal for #100DaysofHealth was to be stronger, live longer, survive the zombie invasion, I have to say the no weight loss thing is a bit frustrating.

I can definitely tell I’m stronger. Last weekend’s 90 minute bike ride would have had me limping for days, had I done it in May; it didn’t even create a blip on my physical radar. In fact, it’s been a couple of weeks since a workout left me really sore (vs. the first month or more, when EVERY workout left me sore).

I still have to make myself remember to eat more vegetables than meat. I still have to remember to eat mindfully, and stop when I’m full. I still have to work to not resent the amount of time that all this working out and blogging takes away from my business tasks and personal life. I still have to make myself remember why I’m doing this.

But since the first half of my 100 days was focused primarily on my physical health, I’m going to put some effort into focusing the second half on my mental health. I’m not 100% sure what that means yet, because apparently there’s no such thing as “mental health”, except that it’s lack of mental illness. As it’s evolving in my head, it’s going to end up being something more about peace or happiness, if I can find some leading indicators of what’s going to produce peace or happiness for me.

But that’s for another day. Tomorrow, in fact.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 1, in which I say WTF.

My name is Vena. I'm a 39 year old single entrepreneur in a long-term relationship with an ADD smartboy who is 14 years, 9 months my junior. The first thing you should know about me is that you can't believe anything I say about my age. My boyfriend isn't 25, he's 36. I've been in business for myself since 1989. Do the math if you care to; all I can tell you is that I'm a lot younger at the age I am now that my mom was, and that many of the people I went to school with are, so the number literally makes no sense to me. I've never blogged about anything personal, but I'm blogging about my #100DaystoHealth because I'm worried. I'm worried that, even though I have no chronic illnesses or pains, I'll find myself on that downhill slide that so many of my older friends accept with complete equanimity ("I was so strong 10 years ago, now I can't lift a sheet of drywall"; "I'd go hiking in Vietnam, but my knees won't t...
13 comments
Read more

Day 4, in which I commit to taking my own damn advice

In one of my businesses, I spend a lot of time educating and coaching grownups to achieve some big goals around money and finance. I've been doing this for, like 20 years, which is a lot of years for a 39 year old, and so I've noticed some things about how mindset and behavior correlates to success, at least in this other business. There are some things I say so often that they've begun to sound trite even to me, but which I really, really find to be true. So much so, in fact, that I believe that if I could actually make any one person believe and act on them all, that person would quickly morph into the Captain America of my business, growing in size, strength, skill, success, and all around goodness in mere moments. Here's all of it: The difference between the 20% who make it and the 80% who don't isn't how much information they have; the same information is available to everyone in our business who seeks it out. It's inner game: are they telling t...
3 comments
Read more

Day 34, on which I see a bad moon risin.

Two things are happening that are conspiring to throw me off track in my #100DaysofHealth efforts. First, I’ve developed a bit of an injury. My left knee (which has no known problems but which does occasionally flare up like this) has been bothering me for more than a week. In the past couple of days, it’s gotten bad enough that I have a hard time walking downstairs (though up seems to be fine) and doing some of the things that are part of the bootcamp I take every other day.
2 comments
Read more