Congratulations to
Austin on getting recognized in the Atlanta Journal Constitution today for playing the Character Fitness Game! Austin lost 45 pounds over 6 months just by implementing the principles of the game. Austin truly transformed his habits around health and fitness!
Check out the article about
Austin's weight-loss in the Atlanta Journal Constitution and Austin also wrote a short post about the article at
www.austinklee.com
Six months ago I started playing the Character Fitness Game with Day and
I was in pretty sorry shape. I was making decisions about my health and fitness that weren't taking me in the direction that I wanted to go. I made a decision to put my whole effort into this game and see what happened. I only gave Day one small rule: he had to explain everything to me and not just say "because I said so."
I am ending my 6 month Character Fitness experiment tomorrow afternoon with a
Game Day and I am hoping to make it to the Intermediate playing field. Regardless of what happens tomorrow I look better, feel better, and can't wait to keep it up for the rest of my life. One of the things I was interested in was whether or not I can keep this up without seeing Day 2 times a week. So, while I will not be playing the game with Day on a regular basis, I am shifting the focus of my interaction here on the Character Fitness Blog.
The ultimate test of any health and fitness regimen is whether or not it is something you can do without a ton of assistance from a professional trainer. Day and I will review my BC tomorrow and come up with a BC for me to do on my own. I will then join a gym near my home and at the beginning I will come back to Day and participate in a Game Day experience and see how I have been improving on my own.
I am a little nervous, but I am confident that I have learned how to make the best choices for my health and fitness and with my BC in hand I won't have to wonder what I need to do when I get to the gym.
I will be posting my final pictures as well as wrapping up my experience with Day on Thursday. Trust me...you won't want to miss that!
As anyone who reads this blog or plays the Character Fitness game knows, health and fitness is 50% mental, 30% what you put in your body and 20% what you do in the gym. It's the 30% that can be the biggest challenge, especially when you want to eat outside of your home. That's why I was so excited to learn about
Yeah! Burger. I saw it being built just a few blocks away from my home and frankly had never heard of it.
Yeah! Burger is Not Just Another Burger Joint
I thought to myself, "that's just what we need...another burger joint". I probably would have continued to think this way and never gone had I not had a conversation with Day about when he went there. He told me all about the menu which was not only organic but incredibly offered gluten free options including buns, french fries and onion rings. I was stupefied. This meant I could indulge my hankering for a burger and onion rings and not abandon my lifestyle choices.
My Yeah! Burger Experience
My wife, daughter and I went on a Saturday night. The store was busy but not too crowded. It looked great and it was easy to see they put some thought into decor and did a great job with the brand and integrating it into the restaurant. I ordered a turkey burger, gluten free bun, all the veggies(a wide assortment for just another burger joint) with garlic aioli and Mississippi mop sauce. I mention the sauces as they were numerous, unique and delicious and I can't wait to go back and try more. The onion rings were also delicious.
Anyone who eats a gluten free diet knows that eating hand held food is next to impossible, so it was a double treat that I could eat with my hands instead of a knife and fork. Safe to say, I will frequent my local Yeah! Burger but not just because it is delicious. It is hard to be committed to a life of health and fitness and still enjoy the common experiences that most Americans share.
Yeah! Burger allows me to do both. With the shift in awareness of health and diet gaining momentum in this country, Yeah! Burger is the right idea at the right time. I highly recommend Yeah! Burger to anyone who prioritizes their health and fitness but still enjoys a burger joint experience.
Don't forget the mop sauce!
My friend Rafa at eyespeak wrote a post about circumstances today on the eyespeak blog. Here's an excerpt:
Life is generally made up of things that we expect to happen and things that we do not expect. If these things are positive, we rejoice, feel happy and cheerful. We are in a good mood because of our happiness in our current circumstance. It could be the purchase of a wanted item, a promotion, met an interesting person, or just watched a good movie. Our mindsgo over and over again through all of these good things that happened we are rewarded internally with a flood of wonderful emotions.
This sounds great, however, one thing we know about life: Everything is impermanent, even life itself. We might care a lot about our new car, but thirty years from now, it will most probably have been recycled into something else. We may be happy about our possessions, or personal relationships, but some time from now, that thing, or that person, will not be there anymore. So, how can we be happy at all if all our happiness depends on something that is not permanent? How can we make happiness permanent in an impermanent universe?
To read the rest check out
Happy No Matter What and choose today to stop being attached to your circumstances!
I went to an event last night and ran into someone that I haven't seen in about 9 months. We talked about my weight loss, as this topic is the first thing that someone notices when they haven't seen me in a while. And as per normal after describing the Character Fitness experience to someone the question came up, "Well, do you miss all of the good food?"
I know what she meant, she meant, "Do you miss pizza, cookies, donuts, candy bars, and chips?" Not "good for me" but just plain tasty foods. I finally realized last night that I don't really miss those foods at all because I have released my attachment to those foods. They simply don't have the power over me that they once had.
I used to see those foods as bad foods. Now I see them as foods that will move me away from my goals and aspirations for health and fitness. They are the kind of foods that I used to eat all the time and it got me to 37% body fat and 223 pounds. I don't miss them because I hate them now, I don't miss them because I don't miss feeling tired, unhealthy, and lethargic.
Are you missing out or have you decided to look at food in a new way?
I went to the doctor last week to get my annual check-up. I think they used to call them "well visits" when I was a kid, but whatever. I hadn't been for an annual check-up in about 3 years so I guess calling it my annual check-up isn't really accurate, seeing as how I am 2 years behind.
I stepped on the scales weighed in at a doctor's office official 181 pounds and then had my blood pressure checked (104/82), heart rate (91 bpm), and then they took blood for cholesterol (190) and Blood Sugar (70), as well as a bunch of other stuff that I didn't understand.
What I do know is that my doctor was extremely impressed with the change in my weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol levels. He asked what I did to achieve these changes since last I saw him and I told him all about the game. He was stunned! He was 100% on board with all of the changes I made and was even more impressed at how detailed the analysis was of the Game Day.
If you are sitting at home reading this and wondering if this works, I can tell you that I went from 223 pounds, sky high cholesterol and unhealthy blood pressure to what I am today in only 6 months. It wasn't easy, but it was simple to understand and every day when I log my activity into the Balance Chart it stares at me in black and white.
I can't hide from the game. I always used to be able to avoid the scale, "try" to eat better, but looking at it on paper really gets me motivated.
I hope you will read through the blog and join us in the
3 Week Challenge. You can start the challenge whenever you want. Just let us know so we can encourage you along the way!
I worked out with Benj yesterday and he was doing these jumps from the floor to a stacked set of exercise steps. I wasn't sure at first, but I gave it a try on 40" and made it! Check out the video:
One of the interesting things about most of the diet plans and exercise regimens that I used before Character Fitness was that each of them weren't sustainable over the long term. Just like Character Fitness they were full of focused intensity. I focused on not eating carbs, or eating more grilled vegetables, or maybe the focus was on exercising more.
With Character Fitness I am focusing more on transforming my habits as opposed to the smaller parts of my diet and exercise instead of on temporary changes. The difference is that the other diets and exercise programs were focusing on telling me what not to do and what to do instead. It was pretty easy to burn out on those diets and plans because you felt like a complete failure when you broke one of the rules.
Character Fitness works for me because it gives me the power to choose. By focusing on the habits behind the food and exercise I have power over them. I get to choose whether or not to eat that piece of cake. I know that my habits are the key to unlocking the potential for my health and fitness.
I know it sounds weird but try this for 3 weeks:
- Think about your eating habits
- Pick one habit that you would like to transform.
- Replace that habit with a habit that will move you closer to your ideal health and fitness goal.
- Do it everyday for 3 weeks.
At the end of those 3 weeks you should feel like you have power over choosing that habit. Struggling to decide your habits? Here are a few habits that I implemented that probably apply to most people:
- If you eat late meals or late snack switch that habit and choose not to eat after 8pm.
- If you come home from work and sit in front of the TV for an hour, choose to take a 2 mile walk. (Probably 30 minutes.)
- If you usually go out for lunch at work, choose to bring a sack lunch everyday.
- If you eat lots of bread at every meal, choose to replace that with brown rice or a small helping of potatoes.
- If you are a big cheese and milk drinker, choose to buy Almond, Rice, or Soy milk and cut out the cheese.
- If you are a big soda drinker, choose to drink 10 cups of water each day instead.
These aren't massively intrusive habits to change, but they will be significant. I found that each time I was able to implement a new habit I was choosing to do something instead of what I used to do. It no longer became bad vs. good, it became choosing to live in a different way.
Are you going to take the 3 week challenge?
One of the phrases that I have heard over and over throughout my life is: Listen to your body. I always scoffed at the notion that listening to my body was a possibility. It was kind of like someone telling me that the answers to the math test were in my head and I just needed to listen closely and I would get the right answers. This was true until I met Day.
Day taught me how to listen to my body. If you want to learn how to listen to your body then follow these simple steps:
- Go to a quiet room in your house and sit or lie down and be very still.
- Think about each of your body parts in succession starting with your toes and working all the way up to your head. Try to feel that part of your body with your mind. I know it sounds silly, but it is amazing that you can isolate a part of your body with your mind...just try it. (Think about your right toes, left toes, right arch, left arch, right heel, left heel, right ankle, left ankle...etc.)
- When you are in the gym or at your home working out, start trying to isolate the muscles you are working as they are being worked. Take a deep breath and attempt to send your breath into that specific muscle.
- Pay attention to your body as you eat, try to eat slowly and listen for your body to tell you that you are full.
These simple exercises will assist you in gaining awareness of your body and how it responds to different situations. This is especially helpful during highly stressful times. The more you are in-tune with your body, the easier it will be for you to know when you need to slow down and take it easy, what foods make you feel bad so you can avoid them, and which muscles are weak and need extra attention in the gym.
If you have some secrets about listening to your body, I would love to hear them. Leave me some tips in the comment section or tweet them to
@dayadeogba with the hashtag #characterfitness
It has been known for over a decade now that the MSG's that had been added to Chinese food are unhealthy. At the same time, there are scientific studies out there claiming that MSG's pose no threat to our health as long as we consume it in moderate amounts. Without going into some scientific explanation, MSG is short for Monosodium Glutamate and it is a food enhancer that is derived from fermenting starch, sugar beets, sugar cane and molasses. Need I say more? Processed, fermented, and made from sugar!
What does MSG's represent in Character Fitness?
It represents a standard that you can choose to live by that will most likely improve your state of health as well as the other 95% of Americans. M stands for Milk; S stands for Sugar, and G stands for Gluten. I propose that if you become aware of each of these general foods, you can start to choose a substitute for each one that will create a environment of health within you. Part one of the MSG series focused on the importance of understanding how
milk does not add to your health. We also discussed some milk alternatives to use when cooking or for cereal. Part two focuses on sugar and its impact on your health.
S is for Sugar
Most of the sugars that the American population consumes is a highly refined white sugar. When we consume this sugar it activates our pancreas to produce insulin. Without insulin, this sugar can not be converted into energy for the body - better known as glycogen. Insulin is also responsible for converting sugar and starches into adipose tissue a.k.a fat. What most people don't know is that insulin blocks your body from utilizing fat because it is responsible for helping to create it.
We can continue to talk in theory or we can talk empirically. I have measured peoples body fat thousands of times and before we talk about their habits, I can tell them what some of their habits are. This is possible because your body does not know how to lie. It either tells you that your habits are healthy or unhealthy. Having mentioned that, there is one area that is known to carry the majority of fat on most people - the kidney. Whenever someone has a high kidney measurement, automatically I can tell they have a sugar habit (desserts, sweets, wines, alcohol). And as always, they confirm it. That is why I love this game. It keeps us honest.
I still love a sweet treat, but as with milk I knew there had to be a good alternative. Honey, Stevia, and Agave are all fair game to use as substitutes for processed sugar. Keep in mind that although honey is still considered an insulin producer, the healing attributes far outweigh the rise in insulin level. These sweetener's are more prevalent than ever due to our slowly awakening American health conscience. So next time you decide that you would like a Gatorade, whip out a lemon, add some honey and a pinch of sea salt to purified water and presto. You just eliminated all of the sugars, artificial sweeteners and food coloring.
Part 3 of the MSG Series deals with gluten and its affects on your health. Stay tuned.