Category Archives: Wellness

Oatmeal Pancakes. Social Media. Kindle.

Posted on 20 January 2015 | 2 comments

Today I didn’t wake up until 8AM, and I decided that I was going to take this day off as easy as possible, until I go to the gym later this afternoon.My workout today will not be an easy one, so I needed all the rest I could get. I’m basically doing everything there is to do at the gym, which I know is not the best course of action, but I am doing it anyway, because I have the day off, so I can spend as long as I want there working out. I’m swimming, biking, running, and lifting. Dumb? Yes. Oh, well. It’s not like I do that every day, but I’m sure I’ll be sore tomorrow.

EDIT: Just in the course of writing this and eating my breakfast, I’ve decided to go run outside on a paved trail I’ve been meaning to try out. I’ll take advantage of the unseasonable warmth. Then I’ll just go lift and probably swim. I’ll save biking for tomorrow. Or, maybe even, I’ll go run around the island at Fort Snelling. Such choices.

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One of my favorite meals is breakfast, but I have no money to go out for a big lavish feast, so I decided to make myself some pancakes. Not just any pancake would suffice, of course, because I always need special pancakes. I used a basic pancake recipe, but made it gluten-free. Oh, and I added everything I love: bananas, oats, coconut, nutmeg, cinnamon, and maple syrup. I was going to add some protein powder, too, but the only flavors I have are chocolate and strawberry, which I didn’t think would taste very good with everything else. Maybe the chocolate, but then all I’d taste is chocolate, and I want to taste the bananas, oats, and coconut.

I also brewed up some of our special holiday gift coffee from Caribou Coffee. The name of this particular blend/roast is ¡Ay Caramba!, and it’s a Mexican coffee with subtle cocoa hints. Delicious with pancakes no doubt.

I just flipped the first batch of four little pancakes, and they were slightly darker than I’d like them to be, but the batter is pretty thick, so there weren’t any little bubbles forming. Thick batter is the problem with hearty pancakes. Thick batter is also the pleasure of hearty pancakes.

As I anticipated, these pancakes were amazing and they paired well with the coffee. One thing I do have to say about Caribou is that our roastmasters are pretty fantastic, even though they are obsessed with light roasting things. I seriously can’t wait for the Ethiopian coffee that’s coming out in February. Ethiopian coffees are my favorites, and I am confident that our roastmasters won’t fuck it up when it comes to getting the best taste out of them. It’s really nice to work for a company where people pay attention to details like that. And, I’m happy to know that all of our beans are Rainforest Alliance Certified.

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I have a new love. Her name is Kindle Fire. Seriously, when my parents bought them for my brother and me for Christmas, I was a little taken aback. I love books. I love their pages. I love their ink. I love their smell. I love their feel. I would certainly never let anything come between me and my books, let alone this electronic thing.

Love is fickle. Love is so very fickle. And I’ve fallen for my Kindle.

Now I love the ability to read a book anywhere, anytime, on my phone, or on my Kindle. I am no longer that geeky girl who carries a book everywhere with her (or am I?). When I was younger, I stuffed books everywhere, sometimes even carrying them outright and bold, standing in line at the theater with my family reading a book, walking through the grocery store shopping with my mom and my brother reading a book, lying next to the pool reading a book, basically doing anything anytime reading a book. Needless to say, I was so popular. I was never ashamed of my love of reading. In fact, I sore of wore my oddities as a badge, but I always knew I was slightly out of step with the other kids around me.

The beauty of the Kindle is I can be reading anytime and it just looks like I am any one of any other mindless drones on my phone. Only while others play games or use social media, I’m secretly reading literature! I finally fit in (not so much)!

Seriously, though, I do love this thing. I have already read two books on the Kindle, and I’ve only been using it for a week. I love the Kindle Unlimited possibility, that for $10 a month I can read unlimited books. Are they books I’d normally read? Mostly no, but there are some really good ones, maybe just older ones, like Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, in the unlimited library. And any book is a good book, I suppose, with the exception of the Twilight Series and Fifty Shades of Grey. I’ve found that there are very few books that are bad enough for me to stop reading.

I’ve also learned that in the realm of the literary, at least, I can have more than one lover. I can love my Kindle Fire, and I can love my print books. I will tell you that there will be no Toni Morrison, Louise Erdrich, or Margaret Atwood on the Kindle, unless, of course, I also own them in print. Those three women deserve real pages to be turned, real ink to be seen, and a real cover to be caressed. And, dare I say, simple realness to be savored with every sense.

And that’s that.

 

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Posted in Biking, Christmas, Coffee, Cooking, Cycling, Fat, Fat Runner, Fitness, Food, Fort Snelling, Goals, Gym, Health, Literature, Reading, Running, Swimming, Trail Running, Weight Loss, Weightlifting, Wellness

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Feeling vs. Looking. Books. Work.

Posted on 9 January 2015 | 3 comments

I noticed this morning that my body is starting to feel better with the moderation of food, excluding the day when I ate an entire bag of holiday peppermint M&Ms, the careful attention to water consumption, and the additional exercise. I am beginning to feel like an athlete again, which is a great joy. Now here’s the sticky wicket: when I get to this point, I always want my body to start to looking like an athlete’s body as soon as possible. I know it doesn’t happen this way. I know it will take a good six months to start noticing bodily changes in the mirror. I always notice the changes in my pants first, and I have already started to notice the way they fit differently, a bit loser in the waist, a bit tighter in the thighs. Damn you, squats, I’ve only been at this for two weeks, and you’re already making my thighs big(ger). I don’t like to weigh myself all the time, because then I get really discouraged, so I’ll wait until January 23, one month from when I started at 235 pounds. Hopefully, we’ll see a bit loss, but I feel better, so all is well anyway.

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I finished Tiny Beautiful Things the other day, and decided the best thing I can do for my mental health is keep reading books. I fired up my new Kindle, a Christmas gift from my parents, and borrowed The Bloodletter’s Daughter. I know nothing about this book, except that it’s historical fiction and looks a little seedy. After I walk the dogs, this morning, I am going to start reading my first electronic book ever. I’m also finishing the last two chapters of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, which has taken me forever to finish, and I’m starting Wild Things by Dave Eggers, which I owned at one point in my life, but must have lost somewhere. I purchased this copy from Half Price Books. Next on the list is the Wrinkle in Time trilogy, and from there who knows. My goal is just to read about a book a week or so and love them in the way I described in my last post.

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Work is going well. I love the coffee business. I just wish it paid a bit more, like double what it pays. Haha. Right.

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Posted in Coffee, Fat, Fitness, Goals, Literature, Mental Health, Reading, Weight Loss, Wellness, Work

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Making Gains and Losing Ground

Posted on 7 January 2015 | Leave a comment

Making Gains: Weightlifting went very well yesterday, as I thought it would. I was simply nervous to get started again. I’m waiting for the day when I can do a pull up, and when (if) that ever gets here, I’ll celebrate with a giant beer or some such. I started with light weights to try to get the forms right, and because of that wise decision, I am not the least bit sore. The plan I am using is designed to give big lifting gains, but I am not going to increase my weights for a couple of weeks until I get used to the rhythm of this new thing. I’d say all in all it went well.

Losing Ground: I have eaten lots of M&Ms the past few days. And I mean lots of M&Ms. There is no moderation here.

Making Gains: Today I plan to spend the entire morning finishing Tiny Beautiful Things. When I finish this book, I will have read two books since the new year, which makes me extremely happy, because reading books for pleasure, not for dissection, is my lifeblood. It just feels right. I should’ve gone into math or science and kept my books sacred. Going into literature, which seemed like the logical choice, took a good portion of the joy away from reading. I am finally getting back to the place where I can simply escape into another world through a book, instead of constantly trying to analyze, theorize, and otherwise profane the texts I once loved for their magical power to transport me anywhere but here.

Losing Ground: I have eaten lots of M&Ms the past few days. And I mean lots of M&Ms. There is no moderation here.

 

 

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Posted in Addiction, Joy, Literature, Reading, Weightlifting, Wellness, What I Ate Wednesday

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Weightlifting and Ground Kissing

Posted on 6 January 2015 | Leave a comment

The last time I lifted weights was just after college. I was trying like mad to lose weight to get into the military to become a medic and to eventually go to medical school, because the military was the only way I could think to follow that path. I needed to lose about 40 more pounds than I had already lost, so I did the only natural thing to do. I starved myself and exercised a lot. I was teaching at Garfield Elementary then and living in Hartford City in the downstairs of a haunted house that had been made into an apartment. I would wake up most days really early and go for a 4- to 6-mile run, then I would head into Ball State Recreation Facilities to either swim or lift weights, then I would teach all day, and finally I would come home and go for a 20-mile bike ride or so. I lost weight, but not enough, so I ate less. The eventual side effect of all of this was not acceptance into armed forces; the eventual side effect was dark circles, little to no energy, hair loss, and some permanent damage to my body.

I was, as some would say, a hot mess.

Today I start weightlifting again. I’ve found a plan called the 5X5, which uses five simple, full-body lifts (deadlift, overhead press, bench press, squats, and Pendlay rows) to condition the entire body over three workouts a week. Their goal is to lift heavier weights in succession, but my goal is simply to build and balance my muscles. Truth be told, I would love it if I could bulk up my muscles a bit, but my goal here is simply fitness, so I can swim, bike, and run more efficiently.

In order to be held accountable on my goal of moderation, I’m posting my general workout schedule here:

Monday: Run and Swim
Tuesday: Lift and Cycle
Wednesday: Run and Swim
Thursday: Lift and Cycle
Friday: REST
Saturday: Weights, Run (LSD), Swim (LSD)
Sunday: REST

I mentioned that my goal is to eat more protein, because even when I was eating strictly paleo, I didn’t eat enough protein, so I have started adding a protein supplement into my breakfast. I also plan to buy a bit more meat to eat throughout the day. My problem is that I love fruit, which contains lots of sugar and almost no protein. I guess I just mention this to say that I am trying to balance my body with exercise and the tools it needs to repair the muscles, so I can keep going.

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Over the weekend, Bec and I watched the movie Unbroken. If you know me well, you know that I hate watching movies in the theater, and this makes the second one we’ve seen in three weeks, the first being Into the Woods. Unbroken was a beautiful, traumatic, hopeful, tragic film. The scene that moved me the most was when Louis came home from Japan and got off the plane and kissed the ground. Again, if you know me well, you know how I feel about the US, that we have pretty much as many flaws as we have positive attributes, but for some reason that scene struck me. For me, that scene wasn’t so much about the US as it was about being alive, safe, and at home. I am sure for Zamporini, the kiss was about the US, at least partially, since he was a soldier. (I just want to make a side note here that while I have little to no respect for our penchant for war and military might in the US, I do have the utmost respect for our military personnel. I love and adore several current and former sailors, soldiers, marines, air(wo)men, and guardians, and I appreciate the work they do and the sacrifices they make.)

That scene, when Louis returns home, reminds me of one of my favorite sayings by Thich Nhat Hanh: “Walk as if you are kissing the earth with your feet.” Though it seems strange to pair a movie about war with the writings of a peace activist, there is a perfect connection between the two in my mind. If we could walk as if our feet are kissing the earth, we would have no need for war, because we would be so busy appreciating the beauty of our own lives and the sacredness of this earth. We would each revel in our own mysteries as we’re connected to this land, to each other, and to ourselves.

I’ve been noticing that many people function from their areas of insecurity and shame, instead of from their feelings of pride, worth, compassion, and love. We are a hurting people who keep continuing the cycle of hurt. By metaphorically kissing the ground, or imagining we are doing it with our feet as we walk, we move from a state of injury, shame, and hollowness to a state of appreciation and grace and love. Be mindful, like Zamporini, that you are alive.

 

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Posted in Biking, Buddhism, Christianity, Cycling, Fat, Fat Runner, Fitness, Food, Goals, Grace, Health, Mental Health, Relationships, Religion, Running, Spirituality, Swimming, Triathlon, Weight Loss, Weightlifting, Wellness, Writing

Happy New Year 2015

Posted on 2 January 2015 | 2 comments

Well, here it is, the time of year in which we’re supposed to look back with a regretful or chastising eye and then look forward with a hopeful or change-oriented one. For me, that’s every day, so this socially constructed mindfulness, reflection, personal analysis seems a bit felt up. I’m not being judgmental toward others who find this act refreshing; I’m simply saying that the way most people feel right now, looking back and looking forward, is pretty much how I live my life. I do enjoy the way the new year brings us all together into the same thoughtful consideration of what we’d like to change about ourselves. I love reading the goals that other people post, and I love hearing how people want to make the world better, starting with themselves. And I do love to participate in goal setting or resolution making. It’s an act of hope, like thinking that one day things will be better. So here’s to 2015, which will be better than 2014!

  1. Social Media: As of January 5, I plan to remove myself from social media. No more Facebook, no more Twitter, no more Instagram. For one year. Instead of these venues, I plan to call people, have real email conversations, and engage in face-to-face interactions with those people I love (or those who I will get to know). My interactions on Facebook, with the exception of some, simply serve to make me angry, jealous, bitter, ungracious, or otherwise not kind, compassionate, loving, friendly, or like someone I’d want to be around. If you know me, you can feel free to email, call, or text.
  2. Blogging: In lieu of social media, I am starting a creative project in which I write letters to people from throughout my life. Some letters will be anonymous, some addressed to the intended recipient, but all will be as close to the “truth” as I can get. I’ll house those posts at Grace and Shame, Letters, which is also linked on the right hand side of this blog. I doubt many folks will read the letters, because I won’t have them posting to Facebook or Twitter, but I hope to simply get improve my writing, post some hilarious and heartbreaking stories from my life (people are always telling me I have lots of stories), and maybe connect to some people through things that we have in common. I plan to allow myself an hour a day for writing, starting on January 5 for a total of 360 letters by year-end.
  3. Athletic Pursuits: This year I plan to work out five times a week, doing a variety of running, swimming, biking, and weight lifting. I have mapped out all of January, and I’ve been running and swimming a mile each day, so I think I’m on a good track there. I have two big goals for this calendar year: Muncie 70.3 (finish in 7 hours) and Big Shoulders 5K (finish in 2 hours). That’s it. Other than a couple of fun 5Ks, I have no other goals, except possibly a fall marathon, which entirely depends on my recovery from the 70.3. You can follow my Muncie 70.3 training by clicking above on Ironquest, which is where I will also begin posting my Ironman Wisconsin training after July.
  4. Food for Thought: I am going to eat what I want, when I am hungry. I will focus on eating whole foods and lean toward paleo/primal, but I’m not going to pass up some delicious crusty bread, Chunky Monkey ice cream, or M&Ms, if one of them is offered to me. I’m also checking one macro in my diet, protein, just to make sure I am getting enough to fuel my athletics. I do hope to lose some weight this year, so I’m going to be cautious, but not overly regimented about what I eat.
  5. Drinking: There will be only water, tea, coffee, and fruit juice. Mostly water (a gallon a day if possible, I hear it’s all the rage) and coffee (because I need it to cope). I am abstaining from alcohol, except for the fourth annual Burris Pub Crawl, for the entire year. On a somewhat related note, smoking is out too.
  6. Spirituality: Part of writing, for me, is thinking theologically. The hour of writing will include a bit of time for meditation, scripture reading, and prayer.
  7. Hairy Topics: A seemingly trivial and ridiculous goal is to let my hair grow. My long-term goal is Ironman Wisconsin in 2016, and if I let my hair grow from now until then, I’ll have enough to donate to Locks of Love again. Human hair grows about half an inch a month, so by September of 2016, I should have around ten inches of hair to pull back into a pony tail and shave off. I say this seems like a ridiculous goal, because what kind of a person can’t let her hair grow? Once my hair gets to a certain length, I have a terrible time leaving it on my head. I’ve been mostly bald for the better part of eight years, I’d say, and hair just seems extraneous. However, I do understand how very important hair is to those who have lost it. And, I say this in all humility, I do have pretty awesome hair.

Well, Happy New Year from me to you. I love you all. I do hope you’ll follow my journey.

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Posted in Beer, Biking, Christianity, Cider, Coffee, Cooking, Cycling, Family, Fat, Fat Runner, Fitness, Food, Goals, Grace, Gym, Hair, Health, Joy, Meditation, Mental Health, Minneapolis, Minnesota, New Year, Paleo/Primal, Relationships, Religion, Running, silence, Spirituality, Swimming, Trail Running, Triathlon, Walking, Weight Loss, Wellness, Writing

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