Generalismo

I am sitting here with a list on a piece of paper of muscle groups; legs, tris/bis, delts/pecs, abs/core, and then at the end I have tacked on “20 minute cardio.”

I am really getting too fluffy. Being away from full length mirrors has helped with the impression that I can eat anything I want and get away with it. So I have turned some ideas in my head over - running more, weight lifting, or just eating less. And I think the only solution is to start lifting weights again. Running I can’t always do on the road, eating less I will have to do anyway, but weight lifting seems to be a way to build muscle so you don’t have to eat that much less (because you’re burning more calories).

A few years ago I got really into Body For Life. I liked it a lot and it was challenging and resulted in “arms” and being able to get into jeans that are currently in the bottom of my closet at home. I was disciplined in what I ate for the most part (except on Sunday, on which I could eat anything.) I ate tons of cottage cheese and vegetables, and would go for heaping plates of salad at the beginning of any buffet meal and try to be stuffed full of that by the time I got around to eating anything else. I would read up on Skwigg’s blog regularly and read all of her articles. Then, after I sort of gave up BFL. I fell to the temptation of making every day Free Day. When I started feeling like I wanted abs again, I realized I had to eat differently again, but food on the road tends to be everywhere. My family and I get taken out to eat on occasion, and church dinners are loaded with desserts and food and that sort of thing. So I heard about Eat, Stop, Eat, and tried that for a few weeks; basically, whenever I felt I had overeaten I would not eat the next day. Instead of fasting from one night to the morning after the next day, I’d just do 24 hour periods, which meant I could eat breakfast one day and then breakfast the next.

Well, to make thing long story wrap up into a short ending, that kind of eating was too drastic and I fell off the bandwagon entirely. And ever since, I have been eating pretty much whatever I feel like. When I started BFL, I started realizing that most store-made cookies and such are just junk. Cakes, and all that, and plasticky stuff, well, it’s just junk. So I need to start off with that again - no sweets unless they’re really really worth it. (Chocolate is worth it).

Second, I need to up my protein and veggie intake. Metabolism needs to be kept up, but not with carby foods like bread. The more water in something, the more safe it is to snack on. I know my mouth likes to be occupied, and it’s bad habit, but if I keep it occupied with carrots or green beans, then it’s not so bad to be munching. Frozen greenbeans used to be a staple of mine, and then when we had the garden I would munch on bunches of lettuce and raw greenbeans.

I guess I’m a little late for this to be a New Year’s Resolution, but it really isn’t anyway. It’s much better to view it as a lifelong thing. That being said, I *know* I won’t be doing BFL for the rest of my life, or any other fitness program, but I can always go back to it, and I should be always shooting for something, whether it’s long distance walking, or pushups, or running, or BFL, or swimming, etc. It’s boring to stick to one thing, anyway. If I get tired of weight lifting I can take up running or something. Alternatively, I could just get a job as a construction worker and get paid to work out

When I was actively weight lifting, I didn’t really care how much I weighed - in fact, the more I weighed the better - but now I’m rather afraid because I know my body fat percentage has gone way up, and that means I can’t say “Oh, well I just weigh a lot because of muscle.”

Posted by Bonnie under exercise, food, goals, health, running

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Principles often apply to not just one, but many areas. Once in a while I’ll find an article online and think YEAH - that’s it exactly! This guy, who happens to be a great musician, has written a lot of articles at his site. While some of the things he writes about I don’t agree with, there’s a lot both spiritually and musicially that you can consider. Some of the things he says about music just strike a chord in me. They inspire me. Here is Ron Block,  a man of many talents.  

I put a sign above my desk where I practice and spend a lot of time. It reads “DON’T WORRY ABOUT RESULTS, JUST DO THE RIGHT THING.” It’s so easy to get caught up in the here and now pleasures of life. We eat until we’re fat because more than enjoying the pleasures of being thin enough to do normal things in life, we enjoy today’s chocolate (I just ate some!). Rather than saying no to sin, we’d rather enjoy it right here and now. When I get caught up in seeing RESULTS, I don’t do what I’m supposed to, because results don’t show immediately. But if you focus on doing what you know is right EVERY time, results will follow and you can enjoy them without worrying about them.

Posted by Bonnie under exercise, food, goals, health

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I’ve got a variety of different notebooks around. Some have my math problems from 5th grade, others have journals, and still others music I’ve written, and notes from lectures.

My grandfather, who is a scholar and taught at colleges for many years, has always told me I ought to keep a notebook. In it, he said, you ought to write down observations and in particular prayers. Opening yourself up to write things down can make you look at what’s going on in your head from another perspective.

Leonardo da Vinci, according to his bio at Molecular Expressions, “kept huge notebooks of his fantastic designs, sketches and ideas.” After reading Michael Gelb’s How To Think Like Leonardo da Vinci, which encourages the practice of keeping a notebook, I decided it was time to open up my notebooking to a broader spectrum of writing. The page I have pictured above is part of a short list I’ve jotted down to blog about here at Generalismo. A random sampling of my notebook includes

1. How many eggs I need to serve eggs benedict to 11 people - includes ratio of eggs to butter for hollandaise sauce
2. A reminder to not focus every response I make on me, ask more questions of people
3. How to say “Hello” in Russian - which sounds to me like Preeviet so I wrote it down like that
4. My new bicep building plan
5. A question I want to find the answer to - why do some electrical appliances (like computer speakers) take a minute to die down completely when you push the off button?

I am currently using a small notebook. I find it’s easier to find things because you can make one thought on one page and not worry about wasting a whole large notebook page. You can also save the back of a page to return to and make related statements, or the answer to your question.

In your notebook you can write down whatever information you like but here are some suggestions to get you started.

1. Longterm goals
2. An idea you have - inventions, improvements, concepts, etc
3. Any observation you find important. This might be that the buds have come out on the trees, or that today was the coldest day in your locale in 100 years, or that you started your vitamin regimen.
4. Thoughts that keep you up at night - write them down and you don’t have to worry about forgetting them
5. A question about how something works, or why a particular phenomenon occurs
6. A word you need to look up in the dictionary
7. Books you’ve read recently, with author’s name and short review

You can also make particular notebooks for particular things - say, to track the progress and results of your consistent practice of an instrument, or to keep records of local weather. When I was running (and even now), this was a very useful thing to have. I would record whatever seemed pertinent (weather, how I felt), the data from my GPS (average speed, distance), and while I was traveling, what state I was in. Some places I returned to and I could look in my notebook and see what observations I made about the trail last time, and how fast or slow I ran it.

Posted by Bonnie under exercise, goals, organizing, running

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