Monthly recap : July 2021

I don’t have much to share in this month’s recap as well. My mom was diagnosed with covid on 13th July and subsequently on 17th July, the rest of the family (including me) tested positive. I didn’t feel like doing any of the self care activities during this time. However, in the hindsight, I truly believe that spending some time on self care each day could have helped me cope up with this demanding phase of life in a much better manner. Lesson learnt.

Mental health

• Meditated for 1/31 days.
• Journaled/documented my day for 0 days.
• Practiced gratitude journaling for 0 days.

Personal Growth

This section is for a new skill or talent that I’ve acquired in this month, tried a new activity or thing that has pushed me out of my comfort zone.

• I handled the household responsibilities and took care of my mom as she was diagnosed with covid a week before us. Although it isn’t a talent or a skill to be talked about, I’m glad I was able to pull through this mentally exhausting phase.

Workouts

• Zero outdoor/indoor runs
• Worked out for 4/31 days

Education

• Zero progress with CFA level 1 curriculum. Exam has been deferred to March 2022.
• Zero online courses completed in July

Entertainment

• Completed reading 1 book – Mint your money by Pranjal Kamra. It’s an amazing read especially for the ones who want to understand the basics and begin their financial planning journey. (More than halfway through 2 books.)
• I watched the season 2 of Never Have I Ever and absolutely loved it. It distracted me from all that was going on at home when we were recovering from covid. A must watch!
• Also breezed through Mimi on Netflix. Pretty mediocre, can be skipped.

Ending on a positive note and hoping that I can start afresh and accomplish the goals that I set for August.

The real test

#56/100

“Be happy for no reason, like a child. If you are happy for a reason, you’re in trouble, because that reason can be taken from you.”

― Deepak Chopra

It is so easy to be happy when things are going well. The real test lies in our efforts to stay happy when things don’t take place as per our expectations. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been really happy, for no particular reason to be honest. Listening to good songs, watching good shows, eating good food, I sought happiness from these daily basic activities and sort of created a routine out of it. Everything seemed great, I genuinely began to feel a childlike sense of happiness in a lot of things. I didn’t realize that I had created a routine for myself. Any change in this routine could bring me massive disappointment and sadness as I wasn’t anticipating it. That’s exactly what happened!

My mom injured her hand day before yesterday. It’s a fracture and her hand needs to be put under a cast for 6 weeks. Now this comes as a big jolt to my routine as I’m heavily dependent on my mother for everything. Now is the real test of my happiness. There’s a big change in my routine, the exact same routine that was a reason behind my happiness from the past few weeks.

Now is when I need to put extra efforts in being happy under any circumstances. It’s also extremely important to know our “why” (the purpose behind doing anything) before starting any new thing. This “why” makes us focused, dedicated and gritty enough to achieve our goals. My “why” is to be happy under any circumstances, especially during the bad ones. Difficult as it may sound, there’s always a way out.

Be fit 2.0 : Milestone 1

#38/100

Yay! I hit the first milestone of my 2020 fitness resolve. On 10th August, I decided to do everything possible to get into the best shape of my life. August has been a month of hits and misses however I’m pretty happy with my overall fitness progress. After having a fairly chilled out first month of the journey, I’ve realized I need to buck up to meet my target in the next 4 months. The goal is completely doable but demands a little extra focus and determination.

Here are my achievements for this month :-

Weight :-

Starting weight (10th August) : 62.9 kgs

Milestone 1 (31st August) : 62.5 kgs (Lost 0.4 kgs)

Workouts :-

Was regular on most days with a one rest day in a week. However, the first week that I had to attend office for 2 consecutive days (13th & 14th Aug) and had to travel almost 11 hrs each day, I missed 4 consecutive days of workouts (13th to 16th Aug). I made it up the next week by rope skipping early in the morning on office going days.

Meditation :-

Have not been meditating at all for the past 2 weeks. I plan to resume it from tomorrow on wards. I somehow stop meditating once I start feeling better and happier in my life.I am aware of the amazing benefits of meditation in our overall growth and well being and will try my best to make it a daily habit tomorrow on wards.

Food :-

I’m pretty proud of myself for eating healthy as much as possible. I did indulge in cakes and ice cream once a week but my portion size was limited. I’ve outgrown my sweet tooth and do not enjoy extremely sweet desserts. I also indulged in few cheat foods during the weekend and enjoyed them thoroughly.

Key achievements :

• Longest rope skipping session of 2000 skips on 23rd August
• Attempted a 10 km indoor running session for a virtual marathon event on 30th August. Although I took double the amount of time to complete the distance as the indoor are made me feel more tired and suffocated (1.42.15 hrs), I’m extremely happy to have completed the run.
• Attempted two different 30 min difficult HIIT sessions in the same week.

Goals for Milestone 2 (30th September):-

• Workout 6 days a week
• No refined sugar
• Limit cheat meals (Fried, processed food)
• Rope skip every evening at least 500 times
• Attempt 10 push ups
• Run at least 5 kms every Sunday
• Meditate at least for 5 mins everyday

See you until the next milestone!!

Run with the wind

#9/100

Many years ago, I was going through Will Smith’s interviews on YouTube on a lazy afternoon. I had watched his movie “The Pursuit of Happyness” and was mesmerized by his performance in the movie. I wanted to understand his personality and ideologies more and would end up watching a lot of his interviews. During one such browsing session, I stumbled upon his award show winning speech which left a huge impact on me.

“The keys to life are running and reading. When you’re running, there’s a little person that talks to you and says, “Oh I’m tired. My lung’s about to pop. I’m so hurt. There’s no way I can possibly continue.” You want to quit. If you learn how to defeat that person when you’re running. You will know how to not quit when things get hard in your life.

-Will Smith

During those days I was completely cut out from any form of physical activity. As a kid, I was never into sports and ended up being that overweight kid who avoided the sports class in school. I never had a dislike for sports or any exercise in particular, I was just not into multitasking back then. School only meant studying for me, I was never part of any extra-curricular activity (a thing that I totally condemn now).

My tryst with running started when my best friend enrolled us into a 5 km marathon about 4 years back. I had never run more than 100 mtrs in my life till that time but somehow had the confidence to complete this run. You can sense my total disregard to the concept of distance and time here. In my mind, 5 km didn’t seem that difficult a target to accomplish. My confidence was crushed when I barely huffed and puffed my way past the finish line in 55 mins on the race day. Although my timing was horrible, this run somehow managed to release a great deal of endorphins in my body and gave me a sense of accomplishment. But that was it, I made unsuccessful attempts to make running into a habit many times after the marathon. I even purchased running shoes and active wear to motivate myself only ending up being stored safely in my cupboard. I just didn’t have the will to wake up early and run during the weekends.

Two years back, I was reunited with this sport when I was rock solid on my resolve to lose weight. I started slow but was determined to be consistent this time. I barely could complete 2 kms in the beginning but didn’t lose hope. I slowly increased the distance of my runs with each passing week and was able to build up the confidence to enroll myself into a 10 km marathon within 3 months.

Today, my love for this sport has completely transformed me for the better. As Will Smith said, it helps us quieten that little voice in our head which says “No” to any hurdle/struggle/change. Running gave me confidence to begin any new task headstrong and just dive right into it. The longest distance I’ve covered in a single session in the last 2 years has been 26 kms. Before the start of each long run, my mind always presents me with many negative emotions and doubts about completing the run. However, I’ve managed to complete every single run target I’ve set for myself and crossed the finish line feeling like a super woman each time.

There are certain habits which you know would work wonders for you yet difficult to imbibe. In my case it was running. I just had to force myself the first month and then it benefited me ways which were hard to ignore. I ran 5 kms after 4 months today because of the lock down and had the most surreal start to my day.

Reset, restart, refocus

Whatever you do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it

-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

#8/100

I’m always excited for every new beginning, be it a new month, new year or even a new book for that matter. During my school days, the start of every new term thrilled me to bits. New term meant starting afresh, new books, new classes, new people, basically turning over a new leaf. All past mistakes, hiccups, misfortune takes a back seat and there’s renewed hope for the future.

You get innumerous opportunities to start afresh in your life. However, I tend to leave things unfinished when they don’t go as per plan. I am a self confessed perfectionist. Please don’t confuse a perfectionist as to someone who ‘likes‘ to be perfect. The dictionary meaning of a perfectionist is “a person who refuses to accept any standard short of perfection“. Do you think it’s a good thing to be a perfectionist? A perfectionist has an extremely low tolerance for any flaws whatsoever. Anything that falls short of their idea of perfection is thrown out of the window without being given a second chance. If we consider a simple example of studying for an exam, a perfectionist would want to go through the thickest book on the subject, study everything thoroughly, take an insanely long amount to cover everything. They either burn out completely by the mid of it leaving things unfinished or end up doing a great job at it if they manage to complete it. Things gradually changed once I became more at peace with my natural self, complete with my imperfections and shortcomings. It was a slow, organic process of self introspection and discovery that took a long time to manifest into the person that I currently am. I also became less concerned with the thoughts and comments of people who were critical of my journey of self growth. I realized their judgments stemmed from their own sense of insecurity and didn’t positively impact my life.

New beginnings are great, they give everyone a fresh new start, a fresh new hope. Our existence and this world is built on hope, hope for a better future. That’s the reason people are exhilarated by the end of a year and celebrate it joyously. Every new resolution, timetable, purchase, course is scheduled at the beginning of a new day/week/month/year. Embracing change requires a great deal of self motivation and the lure of a fresh start somehow instills a sense of hope in people.

I always used to wait for a new month to schedule all my new habits. However, a year and a half ago, I embarked on my weight loss journey in the middle of a week on an impulse and that has been one of the best decisions of my life. Not only did I stuck through my resolve till I reached my desired weight, I was consistent throughout. So what was different this time? My intense desire to accomplish my goal. I just couldn’t wait for a new week or month to embark on the journey I was so passionate about. I realized that all these years, I just hid behind the facade of a “fresh start” to stay cooped up in my comfort zone. We just need to keep our mind focused on the journey, bring us back to the process when the mind starts seeking results, keep the mind busy and happy by giving it interim rewards, read, live and breath positive affirmations to keep the hope held high for the future. Since I speak from my personal experience of accomplishing a goal that I once believed was impossible for me, faith and hope can work wonders in your life. Always find ways to reinstate your hope and your life will flourish.