Seities Says - A 2020 B/Log experiment

[seities]

Weekly review - Week ending April 4th

Weight: 251.4 (was 251.8)

Not particularly exciting compared to progress in previous weeks, but I think it’s a good sign that it is still heading down and not rebounding at all. This is my lowest weight since October 2018. I have not weight in under 240lbs since March 2014, so that is what I have my sights set on at the moment. Mostly it is going to come from eating less. We are only ordering groceries once every 2-3 weeks so getting toward the end of that period I am likely to be eating a lot more processed food that could stay shelf stable for that long.

Sleep

8.0 hours a night average. Another solid week

Deliberate exercise

0/7 - sigh. I still haven’t got any momentum on this.

Stretches

0/7.

Meditation

5/7. I heard about another meditation app called Balance. They are currently giving a free year of subscription. It’s pretty interesting because they ask a few questions in the app before each session and then compose a session for you based on your responses. I’ve done 3 sessions with this app so far and am liking it.

Reading

3/7. I finished Stillness is the Key and have moved on to book 2 of the Dresden Files for a bit of a break from non-fiction.

[Rivaldo]

I’m right at about 251, too, broseph!

race you to 240!

[Rivaldo]

just did 4.1 miles in 60 minutes, bettering last-week’s-effort by .2 miles

got to feel the music in my earbuds this time and allow it to propel me, instead of just hating life lol

2 days to recover and slightly overeat helped lol

[seities]

That’s great Riv!

I’ve never been able to get into running, but I know people who have. It seems like there is a tipping point where it goes from being a real grind to something people enjoy greatly. I guess that tipping point might not exist for everyone, but hopefully this is a sign you are finding it.

That’s a really solid run. Proud of you man.

[seities]

Weekly review - Week ending April 11th

Another week down and all the talk is about how seities is currently ahead of cassette in the Mjiggy Walrus, relegating all headlines about the pandemic to the second page.

On with the review.

Weight: 246.6 (was 251.4)

Ya boy seities is droppin dem pounds! So to keep it real I am highly skeptical of just how accurate my scales are on any given day but there is absolutely a strong trend here, and its the overall trend that I am paying attention to. I’ve lost somewhere in the area of 15lbs in recent times which I am very happy about. That goal of 240 by the end of April is still in play.

I was thinking about this some more last night and I realized that I am very likely getting a lot more fiber in my diet due to eating less processed foods and more fruit/veg and bowls of oats in the morning. It occurred to me that an almost simplified weight loss diet could simply be targeting high fiber meals, particularly for breakfast and lunch since they will keep me full longer and maybe bring about smaller meals for dinner.

So breakfast could look something like:

Eggs on two pieces of whole wheat toast or
Greek yoghurt with granola and berries or
Oats with berries

Lunch could be:

Lunch bowls with a base of quinoa or kale, some chicken, other salad mixes, making sure to include some high fiber stuff like beans, peas, avo etc or
Sandwiches with whole wheat bread or
Chilli.

Sleep

8.0 hours 20 minutes average this week. My best in a while.

Deliberate exercise

0/7 - Yeah nah…

Stretches

0/7.

Meditation

5/7. Still really liking the Balance meditation app. I am working through one of the advanced courses and the meditation last night was on visualization, which I found pretty effective. It started by having me visualize a small square of garden bed, and over time added in components like adding seeds in whatever shape I prefer (straight rows, randomly scattered) and then seeing that land be nurtured and tended. Looking forward to building on it in the next session.

Reading

6/7. Some definite validation here that I read more when I am reading a fiction book. It’s important for me to keep reading the non fiction books though because I learn a lot from them, but I think this strategy of alternating between fiction and non fiction is a good one that will help me stay consistent with the habit.

[seities]

Weekly review - Week ending April 18th

It’s now been about 8 weeks since I have left my apartment building…

Weight: 245.2 (was 246.6)

The weight is still going down. This last week was a little slower, and we also got a massive groceries order in a few days ago. I think making 240 by end of April won’t happen, but I should get close.

Sleep

7 hrs 47 mins average. A drop on last week and I do feel it. This tracking is really helping me hone my sweet spot for the sleep time I need.

Deliberate exercise

0/7 - Yeah nah…

Stretches

0/7.

Meditation

5/7. Even though I have 5 sessions this week, a few of them were not good quality. I guess someone in the neighboring apartment is watching more TV or something because in a few of my meditation sessions I could hear constant talking which made it really hard for me to focus my attention. Thinking about getting some Bose QC35’s since they have excellent noise cancelling, though generally the in-ear pieces don’t fully block the sound for me. Maybe something I can research a solution for.

Reading

7/7. I finished Fool Moon this week, the second book in Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files series. I have now moved on to Hyperfocus by Chris Bailey. Improving my focus is something I have really been working on for a while now. Maybe reading this book will give me some more tips I can apply.

[seities]

Waddup ya’ll!

I realize I missed a week here. Bad seities! But I will log for both weeks now.

Weekly review - Week ending April 25th

Weight: 244.4 (was 245.2)

Sleep

7 hrs 51 mins average.

Deliberate exercise

0/7 - The reality is I don’t think I am going to get to doing this any time soon. Being stuck in a small studio apartment, where my wife and I both work from at the moment, it is just requiring more willpower of me than I have to find a suitable time that I can rearrange some stuff in that small space and do some limited exercises. I am going to keep logging it but it is going to be 0/7 for a while.

Stretches

0/7. This is really a similar story to the deliberate exercise, but there is…well I guess a glimmer of a chance that I will start doing this. It requires a bit less willpower but is currently still a bridge too far.

Meditation

2/7. My worst week for meditation practice for quite a while. It was a few weeks ago and already I can’t remember the details as to why it fell away during this week, but the subsequent week was better.

Reading

5/7.

[seities]

Weekly review - Week ending May 2nd

Weight: 243 (was 245.2)

When I did my review for the week ending Feb 8th, my weight was at 263. So this now marks 20lbs lost in let’s say 3 months. I have some mixed feelings about this. I am very happy about the milestone, though I would say I have 20-30lbs still to go. Some shirts are fitting much more loosely on me, and it is a lot of progress on what is an important goal for me. On the negative side, it basically took a pandemic for me to make this change. Mostly it has come as a result of us ordering no takeout since February, so everything is groceries we ordered. I am also purposefully eating less because the less I eat the less frequently we have to get a grocery order.

From other people I have talked to, I realize this is kinda the opposite to how it is working out for a lot of people (it seems a lot more common for people to be gaining weight right now). But in a way I guess this also highlights just how bad my eating habits were before now. Anyway, every week I see this number go down is a good thing, but I expect to reach a plateau some time soon.

Sleep

8 hrs 24 mins average. Aww yiss. More weeks like this, please. Sleep is so, so important for me. One other cool thing about my weight loss is that I have needed to adjust the settings on my CPAP machine as I now need less air pressure. I will always gladly invest in anything that helps with sleep, be it a new CPAP machine (when a new model comes out that is a notable upgrade), or a good quality mattress.

Deliberate exercise

0/7

Stretches

0/7.

Meditation

5/7. Back on the horse this week. The app I am using was giving me more breath-control meditations during this period (involves breathing more with your diaphragm). I really didn’t enjoy that style very much so am moving back to focusing on the breath.

Reading

6/7. I haven’t touched that Hyperfocus book in a few weeks. Instead I kept doing “lazy reading” - more of the Dresden Files series. Definitely a part of this is because I read in bed before sleep and some simple non-fiction is a lot more enjoyable than trying to concentrate on fiction. I should probably start reading fiction in the mornings.

[Rexx]

I like your layout weekly review. Would you mind if I stole it and used something similar in my log?

You’re doing really well with the weight loss. How do you think it will go once things go back more to normal? However long that may be.

[seities]

Thanks Rexxie!

And of course I wouldn’t mind. Feel free to copy whatever you like. I’d like to add a bit more “colour” to my reviews than I have been so it is a bit more interesting for people, but I guess the extra effort required is why that hasn’t happened much.

I expect to rebound a little simply because we are bound to want some of the delicious things we wont have had for so long. But I am also hoping that this momentum I have is enough to keep moderation further to the front of my mind. I am really believing now that i can lose another 10-20lbs by the end of the year, so hopefully that belief is enough to keep me on track.

Again though, this seems abnormal compared to the impact the situation has on most peoples weight. Ive told some other people IRL and they are all like “wtf im gaining like crazy”.

[seities]

Weekly review - Week ending May 9th

Weight: 239.8 (was 243)

BOOM!!! I did it! Under 240lbs. It was an arbitrary goal but I really feel happy about this milestone. The last time I weighed in at under 240 was in March 2014. I know progress is going to get slower over time, but I am setting 230lbs as my new goal, by end of June.

Sleep

7 hrs 55 mins average.

Deliberate exercise

0/7

Stretches

0/7.

Meditation

4/7. I feel like I am struggling a bit with meditation at the moment. Just the usual frustration for people at a somewhat beginner level like myself of having my attention wander a lot and feeling like meditation is more work than zen. But I am trying to remind myself that focus is like a muscle, and as long as I keep training it, it will get stronger.

Reading

6/7. Still mostly sticking with fiction at the moment.

[jmakin]

You have encouraged me to try meditation, my therapist always tells me to but I don’t.

[seities]

Good sir your replies, in this thread in particular, could not be more welcome. Getting this meditation thing down is really, really important to me.

You are, of course, completely right that it is not a pass/fail situation. For me particularly I am focussed on mindfulness meditation, and I was just thinking a few days ago about a metaphor that is useful for me.

I am trying to work on “holding” attention. So attention is basically a dumbbell I have in my hand. When I am able to hold attention, it is the same as having the dumbbell lifted up, at the top of the curl. And when my attention wanders, my arm and the dumbbell drop to my side.

So, by bringing my attention back I am essentially performing a curl, and strengthening that muscle. They are the reps. And the more reps I can do, the stronger the muscle is, and the easier it is going to be to hold the dumbbell at the top of the curl without fatiguing and having it drop back down to my side again.

Maybe not the best description out there, but I am really trying to remind myself that my attention and my focus are like muscles, and so long as I keep working at it, those muscles will get bigger.

Anyway…I guess my previous post was more along the lines of…I feel like I’ve been working out, but I am having some crappy days in the gym, you know? I feel like I should be a bit stronger. But…I know I need to let that go. I think I just want this really bad, because I know how much it is going to do for me in both my work output and managing my anxiety and overall mental health.

I just gotta keep putting in the reps I guess, and accept plateaus?

Thanks for your replies and input about this, it’s really appreciated. I need to start posting in the meditation thread a bit too, I just haven’t got to it yet.

[seities]

This makes me happy because worst case you don’t stick with it, and nothing is lost. But best case I really believe it will be a huge benefit to you. Let me know if I can do anything to help in the way of suggestions, and of course there are more experienced people than me with the subject in the meditation thread that recently got started: Meditation

[seities]

Weekly review - Week ending May 16th

Weight: 237 (was 239.8)

Another pretty big weight loss last week. I think a large part is because it was more than 3 weeks since we had got a grocery delivery, so I was definitely eating less as a result. With that said groceries turned up Monday morning and my consumption since then has been…well let’s just say that I wouldn’t be surprised if my weight this week shows an increase for the first time in months.

Sleep

8 hrs 34 mins average.

This is great, though a little misleading. During the week I generally got 7.5-8 hrs, but on the weekend I slept for nearly 10 hrs both days. I think I mentioned earlier that I had to change the settings on my CPAP machine since the air pressure I used to require was too high now. Something else that has long been an issue with the CPAP is I get a very dry mouth and wake up with halitosis. I’ve just started trying out a product called Xylimelts, which seem to be helping. You basically stick 1 or 2 of them onto a molar (or molars) and over time they slowly dissolve, stimulating salival production as they do so. I definitely notice a difference when I wake up.

Deliberate exercise

0/7

Stretches

0/7.

Meditation

3/7. Eep. Definitely lower than I would like. One thing to add though is that so far this week I have meditated 3 times so I am sure my results will end up better. I have also started meditating earlier in the day so I am not trying to fight off sleep at the same time. I am at a part of the program where they are increasing the unguided amount by 1 minute each day, so today I did 9 minutes of unguided. I did a better job of not chastising myself when my mind wandered, and instead being proud of myself when I brought it back. I honestly had a thought about my conversation with @anon46587892 when I did that. I am sure it has helped me this week.

Reading/Podcast

7/7. I finished another book of The Dresden Files this week. But I have decided to change things up a bit here. My goal around reading is primarily to a) learn more and b) get better at focusing my attention. Reading fiction doesn’t do a whole lot for part a, though it does help my vocabulary. But I have decided to include listening to a podcast in this category, since it can achieve both goals. I started listening last night to the “Fall of Civilizations” podcast. This episode was about China’s Han Dynasty. As you might guess it is long form, coming in at over 2 hours. I listen to it at 1.5x speed since it helps get through the content faster, and the faster speaking gives my mind more reason to hold focus than 1x. It was cool, and I have heeaappps of different stuff I want to catch up on from various sectors. I am excited for this addition.

[Rivaldo]

dayum, you’ve sped past me in the weight loss!

I kinda plateaued at between 245 and 250, but just minutes earlier I got on the scale, and I’m at 243.

just finished an 8.5 hour shift, and didn’t eat shit all day. It’s in the low 80s here, so got a good lather going earlier lol

anyway, installed a water heater for this nice gal, and she tipped me 100$ straight cash homie

[seities]

Grats, Riv! That’s a nice tip.

Yeah I havent posted my next review yet but for the first time in a long time I gained weight this week, though less than a pound. Im not worried about it, we got a grocery order on Monday and I didn’t eat so great this week. It’s a marathon, not a sprint

Go rehydrate and get some food into you my man!

[mjiggy]

Wow I just skipped ahead a few months and good job on the weight loss! I’m not sure what you’re doing to achieve it but I will say that intermittent fasting worked pretty well for me before quarantine to help drop a few pounds. I basically didn’t eat until 1030 at the earliest and then would have dinner at around 6 and be done eating until the next day. I thought it would be difficult but honestly I got into a groove almost immediately; I found that by doing it I was also snacking way less. Unfortunately quarantine lifestyle has been a setback and I’m back to being a fatty, although a slightly slimmer one that I was previously.

[Rivaldo]

I heard the term ‘quarantine 15’ on twitter or somewhere, like weight gain has befallen lots of people owing to the circumstances. Find that curious with comorbidities thought to contribute to worse Covid outcomes.

[mjiggy]

I prefer the simplicity of the “COVID 19” [ as in 19 lbs weight gain]. I’m down from my highest weight but up since quarantine started. Trying to cut back again but my stress levels have been way up and eating is an easy way to cope.