Activities to accomplish this week. Looking forward to life lessons by Zyen!
Day 15 - Monday (13/5/2013)
I need to really pick up the momentum. I'm plagued today with an enormous amount of laziness. This is a bad start to week 3 definitely. Today, I was reading about the blood type diet. Yes, just another 'for fun' experiment. Zyen (trainer) passed it to me the other day, so I thought, might as well just give it a try. It's rather sad that my efforts are mostly towards weight loss. Rather superficial. I tried to do Titibhasana but failed. Couldn't even lift off the ground. I noticed though, with daily yoga practice, I do feel better. Jo wants me to go for intermediate classes only. She says I really can't improve if I don't try out the harder classes. Challenge.. ACCEPTED!
Apparently there are foods that act as 'medicine' to our bodies, there are neutral ones and also the ones that are toxic. The table she handed to me covered pretty much every general food items we eat (couldn't find petai though! giggles!). So for each blood type, these 'medicine', 'neutral' and 'toxic' food are different.
O blood types for example are encouraged to eat red meat, where else for B blood types, red meat is neutral and they have to stay away from chicken. I'm going to try it out, at least in some way, it doesn't feel like a diet. Generally no 'dying' or suffering involved. Bought groceries of the items for blood type O. I'm ecstatic to know that red meat is one of my 'medicine' food! I've always loved red meat.
Went over to Surya Yoga for lunch. Had some work to do. Love the garden pasta salad. Really yummy. Lots of students at Surya Yoga order it. I guess because it's a good blend of carbs and veggy. The basil sauce is really healthy too.
I had yogurt at home after that. I ordered it from Surya Yoga as well. Homemade yogurt in fact. Aunty Susan (chef) is pretty great. Come to think of it, I should really learn how to make some of the salad dressing. Rather boring day, took the day off. It's going to be a busy week.
Been working on the patterns for the yoga mat bag I will be attempting to sew. Probably the ONLY productive thing I did today.
Day 16 - Tuesday (14/5/2013)
I actually like to cook (probably no surprise there). Actually, this can be a bad thing. For example, at one point in time, I would whip up a stack of banana choc chip pancakes to eat in the middle of the night when I couldn't sleep. I made it worse by drowning them in honey. I found this recipe for sweet potato fries here and decided to give it a shot. Sweet potatoes are one of my 'medicine' food according to the blood type diet!
Verdict? Pretty darn awesome. Taste a little like potato fries
but with that hint of sweetness. Actually, I'm not sure in what way
are sweet potatoes better than general potatoes. I should read up on it.
Day 17 - Wednesday (15/5/2013)
Thinking of working on my core. Above are pretty awesome yoga moves to build up core muscles. I'm going to try this out. Actually looks pretty tough. I think I'm really going to feel the 'burn'.
Fabian, a Surya Yoga student and friend of mine took a photo of me trying out the one-legged pigeon pose. I'm almost there. I need to learn how to balance on the split and reach both hands back to touch my foot (make sense?). Everyone was in class and had some free time last night at work.
What the one-legged pigeon pose is supposed to look like.
Had italian ceaser salad for dinner and my super favorite pumpkin soup. Oh, did I mention that I've continued with juicing? I'm hooked on it now! I don't think weight loss is apparent, but I feel great! Feel light on my feet, I sleep a little better and I have more energy. Oh, I still can't drink Milo (which is fantastic) and I tend to stay away from fried, oily, santan-ey stuff. My auto pilot reaction now to most unhealthy food can be compared to projectile vomiting (which again, is good) (giggles).
Day 18 - Thursday (16/5/2013)
Made it to Regine's intermediate class yesterday. She taught us some serious yoga moves. She makes it look realllly easy (but I DEFINITELY struggled). I know for a fact that Regine trained really hard! Yes, behind all of the 'effortless moves' indeed was A LOT of effort!
Regine is really just the sweetest person ever. Bubbly and always has a smile on her face. She mentioned to me once, during one or two of our little meals at the Juice and Salad Bar that all she really wants is to challenge herself, and see how far she can take her body in terms of yoga. I love how dedicated she is to constant learning and improvement. Once or twice I see her coming up with her own yoga poses. And she'll be practicing it while waiting for her next class to start. Sometimes she even practices while the students are in shavasana. No time but the present? She's such an inspiration!
Managed to do the one legged pigeon pose, but not the full advance version yet. Will be working on it more. I plan to start those core building exercises soon. Was actually thinking of asking Jo to teach me the right way, maybe even take a quick video of her.
Lunch. A Juice Master juice and French Golden Mango salad. I'm getting the hang of eating healthier these days. It actually feels reallllyy good. Once or twice I cave in and run back to chocolate, but overall, this is great improvement to my curry puff munching days.
Day 19 - Friday (17/5/2013)
Last night at work, I had to handle an inquiry. It went rather well apart from the mini indirect insult which DIRECTLY hurt. She more or less said that I'm the front liner of the studio and she said, actually she looked at me and puffed up her mouth/face (mimicking a fat person I reckon). That was rather rude and a slap in my face! A bit even, juvenile? You bet I'm angry! But then after some thought, I remembered what my friend said, take every insult as encou-rage-ment. Technically, at that point in time, it was mostly just rage. I of course just smiled at the customer and answered her many questions. People can be and are insensitive at times. Pardon, the true life emo-ness. I think it happens quite often to many.
We added a couple of newer, nicer frames to the studio. Both Jo and I put it up today. We are giving Surya Yoga a mini makeover. Will be revamp-ing the changing room area and perhaps even the menu board. I'm pretty excited and happy that Jo took some of my suggestions and ideas. I feel like a mini interior designer. I love working at Surya Yoga. I get to do tons of stuff and learn how to do many things such as poster design, blog maintenance and even make videos from time to time. Amazing that Jo gives me space to grow, experiment and learn.
Both mindful makeover assignment and part of work. I have to make power point slides for the weight loss and detox workshop this Sunday. These booklets are really informative. Learning a lot. It's a bit of a rush to get the slides done by tonight but yes challenge... ACCEPTED! By the way, juicing, I'm hooked on it. I make juices 3-4 times a day. I hope to keep it up.
Interesting huh?
Our two lovely prenatal class mommies' to be got featured in Feminine magazine! I couldn't help but take a photo of the 3 J's (Jaime, Josephine and Joanne) with the spread. We got 3 whole pages! Tomorrow, Jo and I have to open a booth at this pregnancy and childbirth related event at Daveleen. I've been preparing all the items for this event these past few weeks designing posters, cd covers and even made this photo board thingy.
Just want to add as well that I'm struggling a little. Keeping up with the healthier diet and staying completely away from unhealthy food is difficult. It's hard to change old habits, but of course, this particular dog CAN learn new tricks, it's just going to take time. I've slipped occasionally and headed straight to comfort food when I'm feeling horrible. I know for a fact that my biggest enemy, nemesis and challenge is in fact my very OWN self.
Day 20 - Saturday (18/5/2013)
My whole Saturday was spent at Daveleen Confinement Center's event. Came home super tired. First time for me learning marketing skills. Didn't get to do any home yoga practice today. Actually, I don't think I did much yoga on my own today. Need to pick up the pace.
The diet, the blood type diet so far makes me feel full for longer. I'm eating much healthier for sure. The food at the Juice and Salad Bar is pretty good. I'm getting the hang of eating AND actually enjoying salads.
Weight loss, I don't have much to update on unfortunately. Still wondering why I feel 'lighter' but the scale hasn't really budged. BUT, I think I look a little smaller in the photo with Jo. (Giggles) That's probably because Fabian (Surya Yoga friend) taught me how to pose for photos. Pose to look slimmer I mean (smiles).
Day 21 - Sunday (19/5/2013)
Regine taught me how to build my strength up. I was asking her how to do Titibhasana and she said, I should work on my arm strength first. This is Chaturanga but with the help of a belt. To hold the pose is pretty difficult. Hope to build up sufficient arm strength to do Titibhasana (below).
Took some photos of the weight loss and detox workshop at Surya Yoga today. The response was fantastic. Met some really nice people as well, especially this lady from Bolivia, named yes, Olivia (smiles). She's a yoga instructor that trained in Thailand. Working at Surya Yoga is pretty inspiring at times, especially when I get to meet tons of interesting people. Such a blessing.
Regine helped out with the Weight Loss workshop. While Jo was conducting the theoretical part of the workshop, Regine taught me some moves and showed me how to do Wild Thing. YES, the pose is reeealllly called wild thing! I'm so used to hard to pronounce yoga pose names, but this one was surprisingly easy.
Regine and I had a little talk about the issue of being fat. She says that it's a blessing or gift that I'm flexible. She actually said that there are more fat, plus sized yogis out there. More than I know of. She said, bottom line, yoga is for everyone. ANYONE can do it, even those with limitations of any kind. It's adjustable, yoga is adjustable and can be made to suit anyone, everyone and yes, every condition.
This is why I love yoga. The only person you are up against, is really just yourself. There is no making comparisons, there is no yardstick that you have to reach or cross. It's really about challenging your own body and mind. For me, I don't feel 'less than' or 'better than' other yogis because I know, we are all different! There are poses I cannot do definitely that others find easy. It's just different for everyone. So yes, yoga is not a competition. It is I guess, but you only compete with yourself (smiles).
As you can see, progress this week is rather horrible. Been finding it hard to do home yoga practice. At times, I ask myself, 'Truly, what is wrong with me?'. Is it a matter of discipline, lack of motivation or just plain laziness? I think I haven't developed the 'strong willed' aspect people need to do amazing stuff and make a difference.
A little inspiration for next week.
Till next week!
Namaste
Elirus
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