Archive for the ‘70 day challenge’ Category

Day 7- 70 Day Challenge- Goals and Reality

Posted: February 18, 2012 in 70 day challenge, diet, Health, health and fitness, obesity, supplements and vitamins
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70 day challenge

Checking in for Day 7 on my 70 Day Challenge- hold me accountable at youtube, pinterest, and twitter. I done good and went for a run at the gym, did a crap load of sit ups and push ups, the best was the fact that I ran my mile under 11 minutes.  Tomorrow I am thinking about going for a run on a local trail that is about 10 miles long.  I haven’t run something like that since cross country days, should be interesting.

They can because they think they can~ Virgil

I can totally see myself doing this, I already am seeing the results and I believe that this will be a good all around.  So get off your butt and start changing your life!

If you continue to reflect on the past and fantasize about what can happen, but you do absolutely nothing to achieve your goal, then you aren’t truly thinking that you can ever be that healthy person.

Day 6- 70 Day Challenge- 5 Things I Do To Keep Myself Motivated

Posted: February 17, 2012 in 70 day challenge, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, Health, obesity
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What motivates you to keep up the regiment of healthy living?  I tell myself and validate the reality, but sometimes its just this funk I get into that seems like its not possible, or worse, that the end goal is not likely to occur.

This past week I didn’t live up to my physical hour of power and pain plan.  I allowed the initial disappointment to let me get into a funk about how I am not serious about this 70 day challenge.  Its only day 6!!!

Then I did my weight check in- which resulted in a finding that I gained a pound rather lost one!!!  To which I reminded myself that there are all sorts of body process that might have resulted in that 1 pound gain and that the weight is really a plus/minus 1.5 pound situation.

This whole process is a larger journey, so I tell myself that there will be all sorts of loses and wins, that for every loss as long as I was making some movement forward, it would be all the worthwhile because its better then where I was a year ago.  So that is what I tell myself.

Besides these self motivational conversations, I thought I would share the top five things that I do to keep myself motivated on this 70 day challenge and further more on the whole living healthy process; but in return it would be awesome to get some feedback on other things that you might think might help me.

  1. The Healthy Eating:  I keep myself from eating what my heart desires six days out of the week, but on one day, I give myself that day to eat one to two meals without thinking about how or what it will do to my body.  I won’t eat lasagna and bread and salad drenched with Ranch dressing and a bowl of ice cream topped with all sorts of goodies all throughout the week, but one day, as a treat to myself, I will sit down and eat it to my hearts desire.  Or chicken wings, fries, bread sticks and ranch dressing along with a pazookie- you name the delightful treat and the thousands of calories that go with it, I won’t keep myself from it because I know my body, spirit and heart crave it, so rather than abstinence, I approach with moderation and measured indulgence.
  2. Exercise: I go out of my way to tell myself not to construct obstructions to going and doing my physical hour of power and pain.  I always feel like I need a specific mind frame to go work out.  I need my clothes and I need my special running shoes.  I need my iPod along with my favorite headphones.  All these obstructionist items that make it easy to skip out on the hour or make the hour go by smoothly.  But the thing is I don’t need the gym- the world is my gym.  So the two days I didn’t do my hour, I spent time doing sit ups and push ups along with stretches.  Another day I didn’t feel like going to the gym so I went for a run around the block and then did lunges and other “calisthenics” (do people still use this term?).  The point is that I am freeing myself of the notion that I need these things to have a meaningful workout.  I realize I don’t so I just DO IT- most of the time.
  3. See the Results- There used to be  a time where I would weigh myself everyday.  That has to be one of the most depressing things I experienced.  Not seeing the results on a day-to-day basis was not a pleasant thought.  I wanted to see results and not seeing the results undermined my resolve, but far worse from that feeling was the feeling that I gained weight… So now I don’t emphasize on the “weight”- I look at body fat, I look at waist-to-hip ratio, I use waist size along with the “weight” part in conjunction with my time running a mile, or swimming the mile.  I look at other measures over the course of the week.  Each one I do once a week so that way I see results of some sort.  I think numbers are important but when its not coupled with some positive change, we feel disappointment because we like to see progress and immediate reward for our efforts.  So to keep myself out of the funk I approach the metrics aspect from this angle.  (The fact that I can fit into certain pants I bought five years ago, or my wetsuit…how exciting is that?  I feel like its the Progresso soup commercial and you all just don’t get it!)
  4. Eyes on the Prize- When you have statistics, you obviously need milestones and goals.  I ran a mile in 10 minutes and 45 seconds- WONDERFUL, especially since the earlier time was 12 minutes and 55 seconds.  My goal is to get to running a mile at 8 minutes and 35 seconds by Day 30- hypothetically.  I will feel like I have a sense of direction and an end goal to get to, and by accomplishing a milestone I am catapulted toward the goal and when I get to my goal I have a great sense of empowerment that hopefully will push me to do better.  In that way I am motivated to keep my eyes on the prize!  So set goals and realistic milestones, no matter how slow they might be, you never know you might end up surprising yourself!
  5. The Company You Keep- I am in law school, so the company I keep is quite limited.  I try to follow folks on social media that will drop good vibes on working out.  The picture is from tubmlr and stuff like that keeps things in perspective for me.  There are a whole bunch of people who will help keep you motivated, I guess that’s why you are reading this blog, I hope I can support you toward your goal as you read about my progress toward mine.  Also, I keep a subscription to Men’s Health, they have some great stories of guys who got their lives together and shed loads of pounds.  They also have visuals to keep you motivated and little nifty facts that tell you why staying in shape will not only make you look good but do some “other” wonders in your life.  Also, if you go to a gym find a partner who is more motivated then you are, not someone less motivated because you might end up supporting each others bad tendencies and not promoting good ones.

So those are my 5 tips on things I do to keep myself motivated.  I would add that another thing I do is I don’t limit my physical hour of power and pain to just your traditional regimented exercises.  I spice it up by going on hikes or going and playing my with kid cousins a game of hide-and-go-seek.  Stuff that varies from the monotonous gym experience keeps me motivated as well!

 

Day 5- 70 Day Challenge- Counting Calories?

Posted: February 16, 2012 in 70 day challenge, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, Health, obesity
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Checking in for Day 5 on my 70 Day Challenge- hold me accountable at youtube, pinterest, and twitter. I totally didn’t go to the gym yesterday, felt lazy and a bit out of it, though it was not an excuse.  I should have gone.  I can only make up for it by making sure I go today.

Like any normal, reasonable, socializing human being I first tried to develop a plan of action on loosing weight by asking people for advice, the simple question was: what can I do that is healthy and constructive to loosing weight?  The responses I got are pretty standard- exercise, watch what you eat, cut the junk food, go to the gym, weight training, eat at the right time.  The thing I heard consistently boiled down to the notion of “eating right.”

The way I interpreted that was “watch your calories” because calorie counting rests on the notion that eating and metabolism are a perfected science.  The simple equation is that the stuff you eat is storing what are called calories, which in turn are the way that scientists measure how beneficial or nutritious the food is.  The simplicity of the formulation of this type of “dieting plan” is very attractive.  The assumption is that if you can cut down on all your non-essential calorie intake and simultaneously burn off calories you will be loosing weight.  I was hooked with the prospect and for the first four months was tediously tracking my calories.

In the beginning, because its always at the beginning, this science was fun and it presented results.  I used a website to log in my food intake and measure up my progress over time, however, the honeymoon was not meant to last.  It was tedious and also it wasn’t the exact science that it was made out to be.  Sure I had one serving of Biryani with chicken, riata and salad.   Have you seen a “desi serving”?  There is no way to track how much calories was in that serving unless you drop it off at the lab and they do the analysis for you.  With ethnic food its not as easy as saying “oh I had one slice of ultimate meat pizza from pizza hut” so it definitely has x calories.

What really worked against me was also the fact that it wasn’t just girls who were calorie counting.  You hear about football players “carbing up” and marathoner are really picky about tracking calorie intake as well.  This is a legitimate training tool, but the problem is this tool requires such high degree of diligence that its not possible for an everyday Joe like me to have benefitted from it.  Worse was that its addictive, I began calorie counting everything so would spend time reading labels- again not a bad thing- and ask at restaurants about “calories in x food” to the point where friends were starting get annoyed by my behavior.

In that way calorie counting was a misleading science for me.  Worse, the exact science it was made out to be stopped making sense to me because I soon realized that some days I burned more calories then others, that on some days I needed more calories in my body to get physical work done and the limitations that calorie counting diets placed on its practitioners were just unrealistic to my lifestyle.  Then there are those things that you eat and forget about- the midnite snack, cup of coffee and piece of muffin in the morning staff meeting, birthday cake slices when you went to your cousins party- these things add up and even with mobile apps, its not always logged.  When its not logged its not accounted for and if its not accounted for, I feel, your cheating yourself.

Scientifically speaking, your body burns calories- thats metabolism- in 3 different types of phases.  The first is the thermic effect of eating. Believe it or not what you eat results in your burning calories and possibly could result in A LOT of calories being burned.  So the science says that when you eat something like protein it burn more calories then when you eat fatty foods or carbohydrates.  You burn 25 calories burned for every 100 calories consumed; versus an average of 13 calories for every 100 calories of carbs you eat.  Huge difference right?  The second type is what you burn through activity and exercise- which is pretty standard because every diet tells you about the calories you burn when you exercise.  Finally the third type is called basal metabolism and its the calorie burning that happens without you really doing anything- when your sleeping, sitting and reading- basically its the base level of calories used to sustain your body function.

To me the way I see the point of calories is not so much “calorie intake”- which I think is still really important- but in that there is a strategic way you can use your body to burn calories.  Example would be to go to work but instead of the elevator you use the stairs, instead of parking right next to the door park further away and walk a little; go do some physical activity for an hour during your day and throughout your day eat foods that will help burn more calories and not foods that will just add more fat to your body- so eat protein by itself rather then with the rice or pasta’s, eat nuts, or things RICH in fiber like oatmeal.  All in all your using your body to burn fat, so when you sleep, sit and type stuff up the metabolizing affect adds to your basal metabolism allowing you to loose fat.

There is much more to this, but the way I felt when I was calorie counting was that there just was nothing I could eat that wouldn’t drastically affect that formula.  In the end I just wanted to break free and behave in a way that was totally reckless and had little regard to my goals of loosing weight and getting healthy.  I believe folks who are OCD are a perfect match for the calorie counting regimen, and to be honest, they probably are already so disciplined that they don’t fit the category anyway so they don’t need to loose weight.

In the end, I believe that loosing weight is a lifestyle choice.   You choose to eat healthy, live healthy and feel healthy.  If you choose to do so whatever gets you to those goals you have must fit into your lifestyle in order to help you take the steps you need to get to your goal.  Calorie counting requires such  drastic lifestyle change that for me after the initial fun of it, I couldn’t make it fit into my crazy work/life balance without having to starve myself all the time.  Which was the first major failure I faced on my journey- I would fear eating the wrong thing so much that I would go without food all day and in the end I del to tired to go work out and burn calories, so I would tell myself that I already did a good job and I should eat something to sustain myself.  That first bite would cause so much temptation that I pretty much ended up eating two to three times the allowed calorie intake for the day.  Calorie counting in my weakest hour worked against me more than helping me.

 

Day 4- 70 Day Challenge- Inspired By

Posted: February 15, 2012 in 70 day challenge, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, Health, obesity, Social
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Checking in for Day 4 on my 70 Day Challenge- hold me accountable at youtube, pinterest, and twitter. Today I am feeling a bit meek- its raining and I feel I slept way to much.  I want to go work out but at the same time I sort of feel like just being lazy.  It doesn’t help that I am listening to J*DaVeY’s Evil Christian Cop.  Its this really chill kick back sensual heart beat inducer after inducer.  

Today I guess I can reflect on how I got here.  I would say that after being told by my Physician that I was overweight I laughed it off and continued to not care until the the next physical I had a year later where I was told that I now qualified for being “OBESE” medically speaking.  (I was puckering my lips with Class I obesity I guess? Or my Physician was trying to scare the shit out of me and telling me I needed to get my act together either way here I am not wanting to be like that!)

Its ironic, you know, that during the course of human history, society perceived being FAT, or obese, to be a sign of wealth and great worldly achievement.  Back then only the rich got to that “obese” status and now, look at our society, everyone is fronting by getting morbidly fat to the point that they dont fit into their jeans, or maybe its the fashion to wear two sizes smaller then what supposed to fit you- but regardless, the new “RICH” is to look superbly slim.  I am sure CoCo would be very much welcomed in King Henry VIII’s time, but he might need to put on a mini skirt to go with the jeans.

But I am not trying to get myself into a pair of skinny jeans, but rather trying to prevent myself from suffering all the horrible things that come with being fat- the increased stress due to increased levels of cortisol,  or the snoring and sleep deprivation from being to round in the belly, and obviously from the possible inability of being able to run around like a teenager.  What started this path to health conscious, well I would say this is a partial list in chronological order:

  1. Men’s Health- what I would consider to be the primer Mens magazine on the planet.  It gives the introduction to men’s health issues, and better, if you dont know anything about anything- from how to tie a tie to what sort of clothes  you wear to an interview and what to wear on a weekend getaway with your in-laws- this is the source of all manhood answers.  Better yet is the fact that after a year or two of flipping through the magazine you will find that the articles are repetitive in nature and incrementally build on the base information that you find from one month to the next.  So in a way after a year of reading through it you probably dont need it all that much.  However, I would add that its great to go through there and just get an idea of whats in fashion for men and also new things to try out.  It might inspire you inner Leonidas and have you yelling  ”THIS IS MY BODY!”  I guess the continuous infatuation with “The Abs you want by summer” or “the rock  hard arms” it might just motivate you toward the goals of achieving such great heights.
  2. The Abs Diet- which I mentioned in my last post- is a GREAT BOOK.  I started last year by just implementing the food habits suggested by DAVID ZINCZENKO are pretty straight forward and in my eyes totally reasonable.  I lost the initial weight just by doing the bare minimum, which was changing my eating habits to be in line with the Abs Diet.  Now its time to take it to the next level.
  3. P90X- God this shit is hard.  But the guy is freaking 50 years old and  he looks like he’s 30.  I like the workout, granted I am not at all doing it regularly like I should but its a goal I have to be able to eventually get to the point in my life where I can keep up with this grandpa.
  4. The Heart of a Champion- or the 70 Day Challenge- or just the guy Chris Kreuger- when I ran across his video on youtube I was totally taken aback that the guy went from being a blob to being cut in 70 days.  I know how much of a difference eating healthy made in my life, but in 70 days if I could get rid of the last 25 pounds of fat and get lean, how GREAT WOULD THAT FEEL?!  While I didn’t buy any of the products THE HEART OF A CHAMPION is offering, the video got me motivated to do my own 70 Day Challenge.  In that way Chris is an influence in my efforts.
  5. My brother- he calls me fat, and then he signs up for boxing classes.  I will beat the crap out of him and look good while doing it.  Nothing like sibling competition.

Day 3- 70 Day Challenge- You Are What You Eat

Posted: February 14, 2012 in 70 day challenge, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, Brand, diabetes, Health, heart disease, obesity, Social
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Checking in for Day 3 on my 70 Day Challenge- hold me accountable at youtube, pinterest, and twitter. I am really tired and didn’t get to go work out last night due to circumstances of my own making- procrastination+lawschool=epic-let-down.

Well the video isn’t embedding, which sucks, but go watch this ABC News special segment.

A lifestyle change is not easy, but thats what you want- to change your lifestyle.  Dieting does not work, in my experience if you tell me know, most likely I will find a way to say yes.  Lets not kid ourselves with the dieting fantasy.  The fallacy is not feasible because our bodies don’t work that way, keeping us from eating.  Americans don’t like being told what to put in our bodies- unless its like marijuana or some other controlled substance.  The thing is, whats required of you is not to stop yourself from eating, but rather, understanding how your body works, what your habits are and gradually bringing yourself in line with a lifestyle that is

healthy for you, but is not denying you the pleasures of food and life.  Moderation, balance and healthy decision making are part of a lifestyle whereas refrain, passing over and daniel are all part of the dieting experience.

But if you really want to make a change in your life, one of the significant things you can do starting right now, is dump the soda.  The maxim “you are what you eat” is incredibly true.  A year ago I came up with a simple list of things I would do for the first three months of my lifestyle shift, they were:

  1. Stop eating fast food.
  2. Stop drinking soda.
  3. Eat 2-3 hours before I called it a day and went to sleep.

For the first month I only focused on these three things and I had dramatic results where I lost a good 10 pounds by just sticking to the short list.  If you work yourself in increments, set feasible goals and focus on doing exceptionally well on those things, its not hard to build yourself toward loftier goals.  Its totally possible, you have the will power and discipline built into you.  You can totally do it, I know you can, so just stop “thinking about doing it” and start doing it.

Finally if you haven’t read this, read it!  The article gives you a really good picture on how the body responds to soda.  There is such a thing as being a “soda addict.“

Day 2- 70 Day Challenge- Get Up Off That ‘thaang!

Posted: February 13, 2012 in 70 day challenge, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, Asian American, diabetes, Health, heart disease, obesity, Social, Strategy
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Checking in for Day 2 on my 70 Day Challenge- hold me accountable at youtube, pinterest, and twitter.

Some thoughts to reflect on, especially if it pertains to you:

The average American man’s waist size is a ponderous 38.8 inches, up from 37.5 in 1988, according to the journal Obesity Research. (David Zinczenko, The Abs Diet, Kindle Locations 263-264)

Physicians’ Health Study that has tracked 22,701 male physicians since 1982, they found that men whose waists measured more than 36.8 inches had a significantly elevated risk for myocardial infarction, or heart attack, in which an area of the heart muscle dies or is permanently damaged by a lack of bloodflow. (id. Kindle Location 261-263)

The National Diabetes Education Program suggests that there is a direct correlation between heart disease and diabetes.  They suggest that 65% of people diagnosed with diabetes die from from heart disease related issues- 65%!  Diabetes in essence increases the chances of creating more problems for Americans when it comes to heart issues and complications.  Whats even scarier is that year after year an average of 13 million Americans have been diagnosed with adult-onset diabetes, the most recent being Paula Deen from Food Network.  So while Americans don’t like being told what to do- or what to eat- and we don’t like being told how to live- more specifically, what to not eat (i.e. diets)- we definitely value our lives, but unfortunately, the culture of consumption in this country is killing us.  All those advances in allowing us to live longer, get nutritious foods and live healthy lives are being destroyed by our waist sizes.

My goal is to go from a waist size 36 to a waist size of 32.  Currently I am at 35, so just by exerting a whole lot of energy over two days- including crunches and push ups at night and in the morning- controlling my diet, mainly being very cognizant of the amount of food intake, I cut back an inch- yaay for results!  I love the VW commercial because it shows that if a dog can “get up off that ‘thaang” to do what it loves, so can I!

An this is a epidemic in the US, especially amongst kids.  Obsiety is literally sapping away our youth into a world of diseases that to me seem worse than polio or influenza, in that the cure lies in the habits and education of individuals; no flu shot or vaccination will make diabetes or heart disease disappear off the face of the planet.  The First Lady has an initiative that you should check out, called “Lets Move“, where I found this report, which to me is quite startling:

Over the past three decades, childhood obesity rates in America have tripled, and today, nearly one in three children in America are overweight or obese. The numbers are even higher in African American and Hispanic communities, where nearly 40% of the children are overweight or obese. If we don’t solve this problem, one third of all children born in 2000 or later will suffer from diabetes at some point in their lives. Many others will face chronic obesity-related health problems like heart disease, high blood pressure, cancer, and asthma.

You can check out the report for yourself here.  One of the key recommendation is for kids, and families, to do 40-60 minutes of physical activity a day!  Having seen the recommendation now over and over again from various health institutes, initiatives, doctors and remembering back to how much I hated that 1 hour of Physical Education I had to do in elementary, middle and high school- I realize that it really was keeping me healthy, and what I need today is 1 hour every day to do something physical.  It doesn’t have to be the gym, or lifting weights, but 1 hour of continuous activity that pushes your body and builds a sweat is critical to stay healthy!

Day 1- 70 Day Challenge- Realizing We Aren’t Meant For This

Posted: February 12, 2012 in 70 day challenge, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, Health, obesity, Social Media
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This is my Day 1 check with everyone, hold me accountable at youtube, pinterest, and twitter.

I haven’t come out and told the world publicly, so its a bit hard coming out to tell a whole bunch of anonymous folks some private information about myself, especially since I am identifiable, so vulnerable.  I was diagnosed as being “obese”- whatever that means, in January 2010.  Honestly, I looked in the mirror to tell myself that the doctor was on crack, but what I saw in the mirror was not some disturbingly overweight brown person, rather it was someone that I wasn’t quite happy with.

I knew something had to change and that I had to be the change.  The simple solution was made difficult because my work directed my life.  Everything revolved around my career and worse when I did have time, all I wanted to do with it was to vegetate because I deserved some time off, right?  But I got thinking that this lifestyle was not natural, the way I felt was not natural and my inability to change even though I wanted to change was proving to be self-defeating.

I was reading Dr. Hallowell’s book when I discovered an answer to the question- how do we survive a 9-5, 5 days a week, year after year, until retirement with feeling like by retirement I’d be to burnt out to really be able to enjoy the “time off”?  Its not like no one has made it through this experience before.  Countless Americans have, and better yet, my generation has the greatest degree of employment protection and regulations then any generation before it- limited work hours, vacations, discrimination laws, etc.  My question was not so much a complaint, but rather its a genuine question about human nature versus self discipline.  It is quite possible to discipline oneself to a certain way, but you need to know what your nature consists of in order to achieve that higher degree of discipline.

Dr. Hallowell says that we are by nature created to be hunter gatherers.  Our brains are wired to be constantly moving, to be fully immersed in our environment, aware of the things that would hurt us and the things that we would very well need to live to the next day.  This behavior wired our brains to be constantly shifting and in that way over the millenniums our behavior was ingrained in our genetics. Our modern lifestyle presents the biggest challenges to this evolutionary process- it creates this great strain on what we are programmed to and what we are required to do.  For us to sit in one place in front of computer, lets say, goes against our very nature.  The brain fights this impulsively and subconsciously.  Many of us experience this in our short attention spans or easy ability to get distracted.  You know those 5 min breaks that turn into 2 hour moments of “where did the day just go!?!” freak out sessions.

You might be thinking “oh this evolutionary mumbo jumbo, you just get with the program, discipline yourself and get down to business and do the work you have to do!”  But this isn’t about “doing the work”- this is about the fact that our bodies are not designed to sit hours on end doing nothing.  As humans we are designed to be out hunting for mammoths, or more realistically doing work that is physically straining as well as intellectually.  Yes, our bodies can be trained to do modern work, but the problem is the other end of the evolutionary programming is our bodies metabolic process.  If you don’t buy the “hunter-gatherer” theory, you will have a harder time refuting the biology of your body.

According to high school biology books our body takes the food we eat and breaks it down.  The basic block that is used to energize the body is in the form of a calorie.  Our ancestors were hunter-gathers, so their bodies revolved around what they found to eat.  Naturally they took whatever excess calories they had and stored it away in the form of fat in order to survive the winter when food would be scarce.  During the summer our intensive activities would melt away the fat.  Food was scarce, so our bodies adapted the mechanism to  automatically save in the form of fat.  Fatty foods were desirous and the body craved them because it was the quickest way to save up that energy for when we faced a shortage of food.  In modern times we have deposed of our food scarcity- if you want a tangerine in the middle of winter, globalization serves up Peruvian summer tangerine in our dead cold winters- but our bodies, well unfortunately it has not gotten rid of its antiquated survival mode.  When fed fat rich diets, it does what it has been programmed to do over the millenniums- store all that good stuff in the form of those love handles, that pot belly that makes you look like your man-gerant, or those man-boobs you got going on.  To compound matters we sit in front of the computer, we sit while we drive places, we sit while we eat, we sit while we watch TV.  All we do is sedentary activities that won’t tell the body to turn off its survival mode.

Its a vicious compounding situation our bodies weren’t conditioned to cope with.  Thats why its important to turn the TV off and get out for an  hour of physical activity.  At the end something will always be better than nothing!

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