Starting a total transformation

[hiimnotcool]

Good job bro!!!!!!!! I can tell that you've lost weight in the stomach area too. It's slimming down, just hope you don't get discouraged when you up your calorie intake and some of the weight comes back. Just remember that's normal and to just keep pushing through.


I'm about to go to a bar and have a few beers. I am so serious-I CANNOT kick this habit. I hope the running and exercise will still work even though I'm drinking. I know that's pretty counterproductive, but d.amn..

[LaRibbon]

Wow omnium11 you are doing good! Your stomach really shrank! hmm, i think i will try meditating too...

Well as for me hmm...
- go to the gym at least 3 times a week: Yes I did !
- build more muscle/tone: Yes, I lifted weights
- jog for 20 minutes at least 3 times a week: No it's been getting dark early and I've been studying for exams, will try to next week though.
- eat 3 times a day: Yes
- no chocolate or ice-cream / junk food except once a week: No just been comfort eating cos of exams, but I did eat more healthy food too
- go to bed at midnight every night (instead of 3 am): No I was studying up untill the wee hours. My last exam is next week so will be good after that.

[Omnium11]

Hiimnotcool: Oh man I hear you about the beer, I used to absolutely hate beer but over the last year or so I've started to really love it. My dad was an alcoholic though so I never let myself get too far into it. Also the fact that I never leave the house helps me with not buying it and such lol.

LaRibbon: Great job! :-D Meditation is the secret imho. Helps get rid of urges to binge and also breaks down mental resistance to things like running. I'll link you to some real good guided meditation here in a bit.

[Omnium11]

Day 7:

Weight: 177.6
General sentiment: 6.5 (so far)

Woke up feeling a bit more tired than usual. Had a great sleep though, not restless at all. I've started to have those real vivid dreams the past 2 days that I get when I meditate a lot. Today I feel like getting out of the house and going fishing or something, will see if my dad is home today. If not I'll try tomorrow. So far I haven't even thought about food yet. Need to do a meditation real quick before I start my day. Even though my physical energy is hella low I will do a run / walk combo for at least 30 minutes today.

Todays goals

Meditation: 2 hours
Exercise: 30 minutes
Internet usage: 1 hour
Sit in sun: 30 minutes (already pretty burned / tanned)
First yoga session: 30 minutes

Pictures coming up in 20 minutes or so.

[Omnium11]

Alright here's the normal relaxed pic.


Here's a flexed pic (abs and arms)

[Cerberus]

Wow. You're losing your gut fast.


ugh. I drank last night and I ended up binging. I ate two pizzas. I feel so sick right now. I always end up eating too much when I drink. I won't be drinking again for a while.

[hiimnotcool]

Originally Posted by Cerberus

Wow. You're losing your gut fast.


ugh. I drank last night and I ended up binging. I ate two pizzas. I feel so sick right now. I always end up eating too much when I drink. I won't be drinking again for a while.

LOL yeah. I feel your pain. I didn't eat anything bad though surprisingly. Someone I was with had cheese sticks and I managed to refuse them. But I can't refuse beer. I was only going to have 2 pints, then my friend was like 'i'll buy you a pitcher'. Geez.


Anyways, Ominum-you're looking great. Such a big difference! By the way, where are you located to where you get Sun every single day? Ugh, here in Seattle it hasn't been sunny for like a week straight. I'm beginning to lose the tan I worked on when it was actually summer weather.



I just got done with doing 45-50 minutes of Core Synergistics. Later on I will potentially do push ups and run 3-4 miles.

I'll come back and edit if I do in fact end up doing those things


**edit**
I ended up doing the push ups but I'm gonna skip the run. Watching the UFC fights instead

[Omnium11]

Thanks guys.

Today I've slacked off a lot. I spent too much time on the internet. Also I haven't done exercise or yoga and only meditated for like 30 minutes, not a very good meditation either.

I'm gonna force myself to do some stuff here before I go to bed.

[Omnium11]

Oh I live in Denver btw. Yesterday was cloudy the whole day. Today is sunny again.

Weight; 176
General Sentiment: 6.5


Had vivid dreams, slacked off yesterday, will do better today.

[Cerberus]

Damnit! I'm sick. After more than a month of working out six days a week every week, I'm going to have to take a day or two (hopefully no more) off. I'm going to try and keep my protein intake high so that my body doesn't start catabolizing my muscle to fight off this sore throat and fever that I have. So, I guess my diet will mostly be chicken noodle soup and protein shakes and maybe some orange juice.

What's the best way to get rid of a sore throat? Mouth wash has helped a little.

[hiimnotcool]

Try gargling with salt water.



Today was a pretty relaxed day. It was technically supposed to be a rest day but I went to a track and ran 3.5 miles. I actually ran the entire time and a pretty good pace. I'm surprised. I've only ran 3 times and already doing that. I suppose the 3 weeks of strength training and other cardio work really helped running alot.

My goal is to run a 1 mile race on July 27th and do it in aroud 5 minutes and 30 seconds.

[Omnium11]

Ditto the salt water. Its nasty but works pretty well

Oh wow! good luck hiim! I have running endurance but am **** as far as speed goes lol. I 'run' at a measly 6-6.5 mph

Today has been pretty damn good. I feel very light and relaxed again. Also I did some pushups. The extreme low cal diet has put me into a very nice mental state I think. Feel very agile and dexterous. Lots of energy both mental and physical which is pretty odd considering the lack of food. I'm definitely losing some muscle but that's ok I think because I don't really feel the need of getting huge like I used to. Just athletic and toned seems fine to me now. I also spent about 2.5 hours cooking today lol! Cooked lots of really good foods, I was really in to it and was getting very creative. (I didn't eat any of it though!) I also had no real physical sensation of hunger. Like I LOVED cooking and I got completely into it but I was happy to just watch everyone else eat it. No strong desire to eat. Mental resistance seems to have broken.

Also I get to report my first real social encounter experience.

Social Anxiety: (Lower being better) 2.5! That is an incredible number for me! Very little anxiety. I was lots more talkative than I usually am and cracked lots of jokes (Awkward silence didn't follow either lol, was real genuine laughter!). Even though I know the people who came pretty well. My brothers friends and sisters boyfriend. Great experience. Partly why I'm feeling so good right now I think.

I just can't waste this on the internet! I'm gonna go run real quick and then meditate!

Good luck everyone. Feeling great!!


General Sentiment 8/10

EDIT
Did 40 minutes exercise, downloaded some Eckhart Tolle audiobooks that I haven't listened to before, will listen to them while being present as a meditation tonight I think.

Good luck everyone. I'm so glad I made this thread. Has really helped to motivate me and I feel like everyone would know I failed if I didn't stick through this. So I can't stop now got to see this through till the end

[Omnium11]

Day 9

This will be short for now, woke up feeling pretty lethargic, hard to get out of bed, good vivid dreams though

Weight: 175.6 (leveled off it seems)
General Sentiment: 6

[hiimnotcool]

Do you have a goal weight in mind at the end of this thing (well, not the end since you're probably going to stick with a good routine, but you know what I mean)? By the way, last night on the internet I found this amazing (and really easy) Yoga technique that you should try out. It's pretty meditative in itself. It's said to reduce belly fat, raise good cholesterol, generate the proper acidic levels in the body, and even make your face glow and more attractive. Apparently you can even push anxiety and bad mental patterns out too. I would have been skeptical about all of this a while ago but I think the world and the human body and spirit work in incredible ways so I'm going to try it. The good thing is you only have to do it 5-15 minutes a day. 15 minutes is max. It's called Kapalbhati Yoga.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2v-9LmU7IE


With that said, last night I ended up doing 25 minutes of Yoga and then the breathing exercise I mentioned above just to relax for the night. I have exercise TV On Demand and there is this really great Yoga on the Sunset video. It's really calming.That's probably going to be become a routine just because it helped me fall asleep too.

This morning I woke up and did 25 minutes of Yoga then immediately followed with a 5 minute push up and 15 minute ab routine.

I'm down to 165.2 now. I believe I started this at 169 but am not too sure. I'm definitely eating alot more now though so that's probably a reason I'm not losing a ton of weight.

Oh and today my Mom is picking me up one of those pull up bars that attaches to the door frame from the picture earlier in this thread. That should help develop the back.


Keep up the good work!

[Catlover4100]

Wow, you guys are inspiring! Great job!

Omnium: Can you recommend a book or website that teaches about meditation. Currently, my meditation consists of about 20 min/day of guided visualization with a podcast. It definitely helps me relax, so I'm looking for some more in-depth techniques.

I went from only exercising a few times a month to exercising about 5 days/week (even if only for 20 minutes), and I've kept it up pretty well for about 6 months. Now my goal is to increase duration and intensity. I would love to lose some fat too (I have a very high body fat percentage despite being a healthy weight -- but I've gotten that down from 33% to about 26%). I'd like to get it down to around 15% at some point.

[hiimnotcool]

Okay this is the same pic from last week.



This one too.



Here is some pics from today.



Wow my stomach is really flattening out. I'm just standing normal there with no flexing at all.



Eh, back and arms aren't much different. As soon as I get the pull up bar there should be noticeable gains.

[Brightpaperwarewolf]

It's noticeable, it looks more tight and I think you are doing a great job. Some of the stuff you are doing, it took me about 3 years to figure out that what I should be doing rather than just lifting weights and running. How beneficial yoga is and you are doing the right things for your body type (which is mine as well) I'm not even talking from a mental standpoint, a physical standpoint, it hardens your body and develops core stability, especially if you are lifting weight, it's important. Keep it up and you'll look pimp. I also think you should keep further exploration on breathing exercises because it's no joke, it'll harden your core, breath in softly and make sure to push all the air out like you are pushing all the air out from your belly button, it's an explosion followed by that last push pushing all the air out.

One things you'll have to watch out is to space out your eating. If you feel, hungry eat. But you don't want to let yourself get hungry to the point where you'll ransack your kitchen in one sitting because that's when you'll put on body fat. But otherwise don't be afraid to eat good stuff, that's key. Also get a body fat monitor, they're like $20-$40 bucks for those electronic ones, it'll give you a better idea on when to adjust your goals because you don't wanna be ultra skinny because you'll eventually get a low body fat if you keep it up and that's when you want to stop losing weight and focus more on gains.

Yeah man, keep it up, you look great.

[Omnium11]

Hiim: I think I will try to lose another 10-15 pounds or so or about 10-11% bodyfat or s (probably will take more than 10-15 pnds) Though I don't have calipers so I will have to guestimate. Its strange though it seems I have a lot more bodyfat this time around at this weight. I still have a fairly high bf percentage it seems. I must have los a lot of muscle sitting around on my *** everyday. Oooh ty for the video I found this nice firefox add on called 'download helper' which lets you download youtube video's pretty easily and then transfer them on portable media players. This is exactly the sort of thing I am really into. Seems like a good way to start off meditations everyday. I hope that pull up bar works great for you. Can't wait to get one as well. Excellent reviews on those things. Great pics btw man!

Catlover: Sure I'll assemble a list of my favorite meditations. Been meaning to do this for a while now. Good luck on your fat loss Catlover. Be sure to check back in soon :-D

Bright: Great advice. Those electric body fat testers or some nice calipers are 2nd on my list after the pull up bar.

Alright my favorite meditations coming up shortly here.

[Omnium11]

Meditation

First I highly highly highly recommend buying an MP3 player and listening to these guided meditations. Also first I would listen to Eckhart Tolle's the power of now book over and over again before you start meditating. Really teaches you a lot of things that will help you not just with your everyday life but also with your meditations. Very very important. So much of this book completely resonated with me and just made so much sense to me. Also there are a bunch of Eckhart Tolle / Adyashanti recorder retreats that I like to listen to. Very easy to do a 'presence' meditation while you are listening to them.

Also first I would like to tell you why I really really believe in meditation. Especially the ones I am about to list. I had suffered some severe mental traumas (temporary depersonalization syndrome, completely bizarre and very destructive thoughts) due to some really bad hallucinogenic drug experiences. I was pretty much a complete anxious / depressed suicidal mess for half a year afterwards. Only after about 1 year could i be somewhat functional. (Still incredibly anxious and depressed but better than I was) Anyway I was researching meditation and buddhism, and was practicing 'mindfulness of breath meditation,' I was doing it wrong, was controlling the breath instead of just 'watching' it without manipulating it. Anyways I had been meditating for 2 and a half hours or so in the dark basement when all the sudden I sort of freaked myself out, I felt the panic sensation coming and my heart started beating incredibly fast. My first urge was to stop meditating and try to escape mentally before it turned into a full fledged panic attack, instead I decided to stay with it and completely surrender to the panic attack, I 'let it do its worst', make no mental resistance, just allow the panic to be, watch it, don't identify with it, don't think about it, just feel it and put your attention on it. Anyways it turned it into a complete full blown panic attack. My heart and breath were incredibly fast. Still had the urge to try to escape it mentally but I did not I just continued the practice.

Anyways after about 1 or 2 minutes of this and me staying present and creating no mental resistance to it and facing it head on all the sudden the panic completely changed. I was no longer panicky at all. I felt absolutely amazing. It shifted almost instantly too. I had what felt like energy and tingles just surging up and down my back and I felt incredibly elated like a huge weight was lifted off my mind. Felt very happy and completely different. Seemed like all the negative energy was released. A state of bliss. Most amazing experience I've ever had. I never had a panic attack again and for half year or so I felt very good, still had some social anxiety by it was greatly reduced, then I got into other drugs and bad habits returned. Anxious again. Bad anxiety maybe but still no panic attacks. Also I think I closed the door on depersonalization syndrome forever. Never depersonalized since or had the feeling like your awareness increases like 100x like you do when you are about to depersonalize. Anyways I later read Eckhart Tolle and Adyashanti and they described the mental aspect of it perfectly. Also Eckhart Tolle described exactly what happened to me. Like people would come up to him and tell him about experiences that were the exact same as mine

Also here's something I wrote in another thread which I think is really helpful.

The more energy you give to thoughts the more prevalent and more powerful they become. You must not feed them any more energy. The key to living in the now is to allow everything to be as it is. Don't resist anything mentally. Don't project into the future in attempt to escape an unpleasant now. Just be still. Feeling anxious? Allow yourself to feel anxious, don't try and escape it. Treat every moment as if you had chosen it. Totally surrender to whatever you are feeling, even if it is very negative, when you are completely surrendered then there is no conflict, no projection, no trying to escape, no more negative thoughts (which trigger even more negative thoughts and negative emotions which trigger negative thoughts etc.) There are two methods that I use to try to become more present if I am dwelling on things from the past. The first is to just watch your thoughts. Don't identify with them. Don't judge them. Just watch them. Observe them, realize that they are not you, they are just a matrix of repetitive conditioned thought loops. Gradually they will start to lose power over you and will no longer make emotional connections which trigger negative emotions and other thought loops. Another method is to consciously put your attention into the present moment. Try to feel your body from the inside and any sensations. Listen to the noises around you. Put your attention on your breathing etc. I alternate between these and others though. I find the 'allowing everything to be as it is' method the best though because you are not trying to get anywhere (which is projection, the false belief that you need to 'get somewhere' to feel complete and in the now, sometimes I got myself into bad mental states trying to hard to be in the now, so completely surrendering to the present moment and your emotions whatever they may be is best, you will sort of figure it out though through trial and error)

Favorite meditations in order with descriptions:

Adyashanti's "Allow everything to be as it is meditation"
Found in "Spontaneous Awakening audiobook" for me its chapter 5 but chapter 4 is also needed imho. Can be found on the internet if you know where to look ;-) Just please buy them if they work for you. Guided meditation. Listen to it with an mp3 player. (Also this might be a better meditation to try when you have some experience with eckhart tolle's meditations.)

This is very very similar to what I was doing during that panic attack. The general idea is to completely stop manipulating your experience. Don't try to get to any particular mental state. Don't resist anything mentally. Allow everything to be as it is. Accept each mental state as if you had chosen it. Surrender to the now. Completely surrender to whatever you are feeling, feeling anxious? Allow yourself to feel anxious. Don't resist it, don't try to think your way out of it. Allow awareness to flow wherever it will. Don't try to change it. Allow it move about freely. Very relaxing meditation. Great for when you are in an unpleasant mental state. When you are in a bad mental state the last thing you want to do is 'think your way our of it' or do a manipulative meditation to try and get out of it. This can cause serious conflict if you fail and more mind activity and negativity. Best to allow it to be and totally surrender to it, then see what happens

Eckhart Tolle meditations:
In his book / audiobook "The Power of Now"
Can be found on the internet if you know where to look
General idea is to stay in the now instead of in the past or future. Escape your mind by creating 'gaps in the mind' where there is no thought just awareness. Many methods of doing this, you can 'listen to the silence' which means put your attention on the 'silence.' (Better listen tot he audiobook to get a better understanding of what this means. You can also just listen to whatever sounds pop up, just put your attention to listening to whatever comes up. Another is the 'feeling your inner body' meditation which never worked to well for me, I usually just focus on whatever sensations I feel against my skin and such. "Watching the mind meditation" is a very powerful one, its purpose is to break your identification with your mind. So your mind no longer controls you, watch it make mistakes, become aware of you (the observer / awareness) and your thoughts at the same time. Goal is to realize that you are not your mind, and your thoughts are not you, and are often completely irrational and crazy and make no sense. Lots of good meditations in the book. I recommend doing these ones first.

Jon-Kabbat Zinn General mindfulness meditation
I like listening to this one when the others aren't working so well. I rarely do it relatively but it is a good meditation especially for beginners. I don't like mindfulness of breath meditation because I did it wrong for so long and felt so much negative energy / physical discomfort in my chest and 'controlled' my breathing instead of just watching it. If you do the mindfulness of breath technique try to feel the breath on your nostrils and not your chest if you feel lots of anxiety in your chest. But still a good meditation. Very effective and great for a beginner. He really does a good job explaining what you are supposed to do. I also like the method of gently putting your awareness on several things at once. Such as your hearing, the feeling in your body and hands etc and your breath at the same time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nwwKbM_vJc


Here's a good ebook dealing with mindfulness
Mindulness in Plain English
http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html

I alternate between all of these, these are the major ones that I do. Occasionally I will do others but I find these the most effective. Recommend Jon-Kabbat Zinn / Eckhart Tolle meditations for beginners, when you are more experienced or if the previous meditations seem to lose their effect try Adyashanti's meditation. I constantly alternate between these ones especially if my meditations have become stale or unsuccessful.

Very tired right now I will elaborate on this more tomorrow.

[hiimnotcool]

Originally Posted by Brightpaperwarewolf

It's noticeable, it looks more tight and I think you are doing a great job. Some of the stuff you are doing, it took me about 3 years to figure out that what I should be doing rather than just lifting weights and running. How beneficial yoga is and you are doing the right things for your body type (which is mine as well) I'm not even talking from a mental standpoint, a physical standpoint, it hardens your body and develops core stability, especially if you are lifting weight, it's important. Keep it up and you'll look pimp. I also think you should keep further exploration on breathing exercises because it's no joke, it'll harden your core, breath in softly and make sure to push all the air out like you are pushing all the air out from your belly button, it's an explosion followed by that last push pushing all the air out.

One things you'll have to watch out is to space out your eating. If you feel, hungry eat. But you don't want to let yourself get hungry to the point where you'll ransack your kitchen in one sitting because that's when you'll put on body fat. But otherwise don't be afraid to eat good stuff, that's key. Also get a body fat monitor, they're like $20-$40 bucks for those electronic ones, it'll give you a better idea on when to adjust your goals because you don't wanna be ultra skinny because you'll eventually get a low body fat if you keep it up and that's when you want to stop losing weight and focus more on gains.

Yeah man, keep it up, you look great.

Really fantastic advice. I never would have guessed how much strength Yoga can bring. I always looked at it as sort of girly and easy, but now I see that it's no joke at all. In 4 weeks I've noticed a definite increase in ease (because i've gotten stronger, not because the Yoga is itself easy) so it's very encouraging. I think it helps with my push ups too. When I first started I could literally barely do 10 push ups. It was just so difficult. Now I can sets of 10 without too much strain. These breathing exercises are really great. I just got done doing the one I mentioned earlier today. When I do it it seems like my entire body is getting hot. It mentioned that would happen because it's literally cleaning out your body but it's a cool sensation.


My eating is really healthy for the most part. I'm pretty obsessive compulsive when I get into things. My normal day of eating would be something like :


Breakfast:
Whey protein powder, half a banana, and oatmeal all blended up with milk to make a good breakfast shake. Sometimes I'll replace that with egg whites and turkey bacon.

Snack
Something like lentil soup. Maybe some nuts.

Lunch
Wheat tortilla with turkey, organic beans, brown rice, lettuce, jalapenos, mustard and some salsa inside with a side of cottage cheese.

Dinner
Mostly lean turkey burgers or skinless chicken breasts with a side of mixed vegetables.

Then sometimes I'll have another protein shake at the end of the night.

Water intake is probably around 120-150 ounces per day as well.


I'll also have to say that depression and anxiety have decreased ALOT since starting to work out. It's absolutely amazing. I expect that it will even get better once I start running more frequently and more mileage.

My end goal is just to be really lean and cut. I don't really want mass at all. I mean semi large arms and pecs would be good but I don't want to be a monster lol