What can you accomplish in 110 days?
Greetings from Vacation in the town of Bath, North Carolina (one time home of Black Beard). Plenty of laughs, board games, shopping trips and authentic North Carolina food.
Speaking as your friend you should eat at Yoder’s.
Speaking as your trainer DO NOT go to Yoder’s! Just keep driving.
I've been eating well to put it mildly.
My fitness has taken a week long step back. These things happen. After that trip to Yoder’s it felt like I stepped all the way back to square one. It got me thinking… if I were actually starting from scratch what would I do?
Then I decided to actually do it.
Train- Just You. Your goal. Your coach. Let’s get it.
SMART goals
Smart goals are
Here are two SMART goals I'm committing to when I return to normal life. Beginning September 25th (National Quesadilla day it just so happens) I'm done living the easy life. Let’s dial in on 2 goals. Follow along at home if you feeling stuck at square one.
110 days of no processed sugar
We eat too much sugar. The negative effects are well documented. The benefits are it tastes good. Let’s cut it out.
It sounds more daunting than it is. I’ve done 3 months in the past. Once you get into a groove it is actually very manageable. Some notes.
Cutting out 100% of processed sugar is impossible. Don’t beat yourself up when you inadvertently have some. We’re aiming for better, not perfect.
What is processed sugar? Any food that can't be sourced back to the earth or an animal in 1 or 2 steps is processed. Anything that comes in a bag or a box, from a refrigerator, or doesn't expire is processed. I'll limit these with about 95% effectiveness.
Non processed sugar is A OK. Where do you find that? Fruit. Honey. Maple syrup.
Non processed sugar is A OK. Where do you find that? “Natural sources like apples, bananas, low-fat milk, Greek yogurt, carrots, beets, and sweet potatoes”.
Natural sugars are complex carbs. “Natural sugars are processed more slowly, meaning your blood glucose level stays elevated for a longer period.” Carbs aren’t the enemy- simple carbs are. The low carb ads aren’t lying, but they ain’t quite telling the truth.
Wine has processed sugar. I don’t drink, but if this is a non-starter let’s allow 1 glass a night, 5 days a week. Fair?
Coffee drinker? Maple syrup/honey not sweet enough. We’ll allow 1 sugar packet/day. Fair?
20 minute workouts twice a day
Let’s try an experiment.
There are 4 workouts/mindful exercises I want to do daily, but I only have so much time.
Yoga
Running
Strength
Meditation
If I squeezed all 4 of these in every day I’d be… exhausted. I already have a 1 year old at home.
A recent study suggested that workouts as short as 5 minutes a day provide physiological benefits. 20 minutes should be sufficiently long to sharpen me up.
So the goal is to do at least two (or more) of the 4 workouts above for 20 minutes (tops), 5-6 days a week.
40 minutes constitutes 2.7% of my day. I think I can manage that. If I count only my waking hours it comes to 4%. Not a huge ask.
Starting 9/25
Start date is Monday 9/25/23. Come along for all, or part, or just monitor progress here.
110 days takes us to January 13th— but I’m going to push that to January 15th so I can live a little on Thanksgiving and Christmas.
It’ll be just like that old cliche promises: you overestimate what you can accomplish in a day, underestimate what you can accomplish in a month.
Imagine what we can do in 110 days.