About this blog/diary:+ Show Spoiler +
I'm a professional musician and (very) amateur gamer.
Blogging about improving and sticking to a program is very effective for my overall progress!
Having been inspired by Haulvern, I hope this humble blog can motivate another someone in need of positive change.
Thanks for checking this out and feel free to leave any comments or suggestions!
Blogging about improving and sticking to a program is very effective for my overall progress!
Having been inspired by Haulvern, I hope this humble blog can motivate another someone in need of positive change.
Thanks for checking this out and feel free to leave any comments or suggestions!
Week preview: Continuing the ramp up of lifting games, it's time to set a medium range goal for music practice.
Goals for the Week
Fitness Goals:
4 Weight-lifting sessions (program):
2 Rowing HIIT or LISS sessions (log):
(opt) Running/Hills/Weighted walk sessions (log):
1-Month of 2kcal Slow Cut: (log) + Show Spoiler [Weight Progress] +
Gaming Goals:
Log write-ups of my team's OCC Blood Bowl games (Current Standings):
Log write-ups and session prep for my DND 5E Campaign (wiki):
Personal Goals:
4+ Self-Hypnosis or Affirmation sessions: ()
4+ Meditation sessions: ()
Log daily food intake: (log) ( )
Quality challenge-seeking practice session: ()()()
Weigh-in regularly (log): ()
Previous Weeks: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30.
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Monday 3/2:
Yeeessss! Nailed the SHIT out of 1+ rep deadlift day for the second consecutive month. The TLHFI guys are right... I think I might be deadlifting too little weight. Anyways, because I nailed 4 reps I get to up my weight by 20lbs instead of 10lbs for the next cycle. This means (drumroll...) that I'm finally at "intermediate" levels for all of my big 4 lifts! Gooood good stuff.
Weight loss is progressing, though not as quickly as I would hope. I'm losing consistently between .5-1lb a week at 2kcal. Part of me wants to speed that up and drop 10lbs as quickly as my sanity will allow. I have to actively fight that line of logic as it has failed and frustrated me before. Right now it's much better to establish a solid foundation of logging my food daily and lifting strong. I'm enjoying thoroughly my lifting gains and want to keep that going.
The audition list for the coming months has been released and there are 3 huge auditions that I can definitely win! One in particular would take my wife and I back to Houston, and I'm sure she would love that. I'm so pumped... so ready to get back on the audition trail. The last couple months of biding my time have been a bit frustrating. Recording myself was a good exercise and an excellent pastime, but I'm ready for the battle again .
Also, I'm phasing out Cardhunter as my initial charmed period with the game has cooled. Card accumulation is good, but too random and lengthy. I just didn't feel the desire to farm my cards after hitting the max level and doing all the quests. Oh well... Heroes next mb ?
Tuesday 3/3:
Though it may not live up to the previous seasons, House of Cards is proving to be an excellent backdrop for LISS rowing. Today's session was 45 minutes long, which is about as long I want to go with LISS for now. It was an excellent afternoon rest day pastime.
Practicing today was quite good as well! Enjoyed the day very much!
Wednesday 3/4:
Lazy day today :-(... Didn't accomplish much other than nailing the crap out of Bench Day today... Tomorrow will be better.
Thursday 3/5:
I'm much more productive with some mini-goals set at the start of the day. Let's do this!
Setting mini-goals for each practice session has been quite informative! I feel much more productive heading into each session with a clear goal. I've been able to shore up some weaknesses that have been exposed of late, so it's been feeling good.
Squat Day was scheduled to be today, but I decided to forego it and push it back one day. My back started spasming after awkwardly moving a harp yesterday, and has yet to fully recover. While it didn't impede my bench effort, I'm taking no chances on the squat. With that in mind, a light row was all I focused on today. I didn't even strap into the heart rate monitor and instead focused on even form with a slower release into the catch. Felt nice despite my garage being below freezing...
Friday 3/6:
Quick after the fact update because the day was pretty full. Bummed I failed to manage the update, but on the whole I'm not too dissatisfied. I had a moderately stressful double rehearsal in the morning, the segue between them being an eat-out lunch and a self-hypnosis session. When I came home, I relaxed and didnt' accomplish another practice session... bumming me out. I did play a Heroes session with my baby cousin which was an absolute blast. Previously we'd played LoL (a complete failure because of the time commitment and toxicity of the crowd), and since have been playing SC2. Playing HotS just seems to fit. He has fun running around completing map objectives, and I get to level up alternate toons while trying to farm gold. I also played two Blood Bowl games on my pub Chaos team and managed some good level-ups!
Saturday 3/7:
This morning I weighed in suddenly down two pounds from the previous weeks' progress. Honestly, it felt really really good to get this sudden swing. I'm so happy to have adopted a "let's just give it another week" attitude to sticking to my calorie count. I'd see gradually fluctuating progress, but this major swing feels nice and reinforces my overall good feeling. I'll definitely remember this when progress feels slow in the future. It's better to save muscle gains and go super slow then burn hard-earned muscle mass.
Looking back at my MFP profile, I realized the weigh-in also ties for my lowest official weigh-in in the past year! Man this feels good! I'm going to make myself a cheesecake to celebrate!
Sunday 3/8:
Supplemental exercise for today's deadlift workout was digging my car out of the snowbank :-). Other than that, nailed some good practice, did some self-hypno, played some HotS, and just generally had a good day!