Focus

I realized the other day I've been spending a lot of time thinking about the things I need to stop doing.  After lunch I would think about not eating chocolate... but then I would.  Stopping in the grocery store, I would think about not buying something that would get me off track... but then I would.  I'd plan on not staying up too late... and in a blink of an eye I was going to bed 2 hours later than I wanted to.  These are the things that frustrate me and I couldn't figure out how to stop the trend.  The next day, I would do the exact same thing.  The more I repeated, the more focused I got to NOT do something.
It's amazing when you focus on something it tends to come true.  Whether you meant to do them or not.  I began to think back to January when I was starting my journey out.  Kendra empathized that I should focus on adding certain foods.  Slowly, I focused on making sure to get lots of proteins, healthy fats, and even more of the dreaded veggies.  I would plan out what I was eating for the week and have everything cooked on Sunday for the first half of the week and Wednesday for the second half.  I focused on journaling what and when I was eating and how I was feeling.  With all my focus on the positive changes I was successful!

Somewhere my focus shifted to the negative, but now I'm aware of the change.  I've already laid out of plan to get back on track by focusing on the positive changes.  :)

This past weekend I competed in my very first Crossfit competition.  It was the Northeast Garage Games hosted by Crossfit Southie.  It was a crazy weekend!  There were 6 Crossfit Route 1 athletes competing and I was pumped to be one of them.  The competition was a total of 5 workouts over 2 days.  Saturday's WODs kicked off with Snatchballs, followed by WhiteBulger, and finally Spiderman to wrap up the day.  I was excited for Snatchballs because it consisted of snatches and wall balls at a light weight for me.  I finished in 30th place out of 58! 

Heading into the last workout of the day I was nervous.  It involved 4 rounds of 20 reps of 20" box jumps, 15 pull ups, and 10 push ups.  Eleven months ago, I was barely jumping on a 12" box, couldn't even do 1 pull up with the thickest band, and I definitely couldn't do "real" push ups.  With the support of my family, friends, and CFRT1 family I worked hard for 15 minutes...  Took a major spill in my 4th round of box jumps... just got back up and continued.  Struggled getting my pull ups... I was lucky enough to have Kendra and Coach J there to push me talk me through them efficiently.  It was the hardest 15 minutes I've pushed myself through and it felt amazing... when I finished :)  I hit the 15 minute time cap with just 18 reps left.  I couldn't have asked for anything better!  In less then a year I focused on learning to do pull ups, getting my push ups strong, and building my mental strength for box jumps.  I never wavered on that focus and it paid off! 

Day 2 I knew I just had to complete the GI Joe WOD to finish up my first competition!  I was excited for this workout because it involved running.  The one thing I knew how to do before starting crossfit.  It turns out when you add a 25lb sandbag to running it's not easy!!!  I actually found the running to be harder than the overhead squats, situps, jump roping and then more situps and overhead squats.  I had a lot of fun doing it though and even had a great judge to make it fun :)

After an awesome weekend of seeing the positive results of staying crossfit focused, I'm excited to refocus my nutrition to get the same results!

Crossfit Family

It's been awhile since my last post... Sorry about that, but life has been nuts. I've really been struggling the past couple months to make my journey of health a priority. I'm sure I'm not the only one that has happened to. Sometimes it's easier to eat the chocolate outside your office, stop and grab pizza on the way home, or have one too many pudding shots ;). With that said, none of these things give me the results I want, make me feel good, or make me happy. So why have I and so many other people who struggle with nutrition give in? That's a great question, if you have the answer I would love to hear it.

The one thing that I do know is that I can make excuses all day long, but in the end it's up to me to change it. A part of me is scared that if I do get back on track, I won't have the results I want. Or if I do get down to the weight I want, I still won't feel like I've accomplished anything. Logically I realize this doesn't make sense, but emotionally I've been there. In 2003, I lost 45lbs and was the "skinniest" I've ever been at 144lbs. I was wearing a size 8 and was on top of the world. I even started to train for my first marathon. Yet, I still felt I had weight to lose and obsessed over WW points. I began to sabotage myself.  When I felt I was having a "bad day," I would eat every high point food I could find all while thinking "I'll start again tomorrow." I honestly believe my emotions of still feeling overweight, was what caused me to over eat to catch my body up with where I saw myself. Not healthy, I know.

Flash forward to today... I've finally found a lifestyle that has changed the way I look at food and understand what my body needs to perform at its best. But yet for the past few months, I haven't allowed myself to benefit from this lifestyle. The same habits have come back... Oh I already had chocolate today, so I can have some more and start over tomorrow. Or I had a crappy day at work and I need a piece of pizza to make me feel better. I actually caught myself thinking these things. The scary thing is that pizza doesn't make me feel better; it makes me feel like crap and then makes me mad that I couldn't say no.

At this point you must be thinking... "What does this have to do with Crossfit Family?" Well over this past year, even though my nutrition has faltered my new family has not. Three to four times a week I go to Crossfit Route 1 to give every last ounce of effort I have to that day's WOD (work out of the day). But that's not the only thing I get from my box. I have developed a second family. It's a place where you are instantly friends with everyone there whether you've meet them before or not.  After awhile, you begin to learn people's strengths, weaknesses, and goals.  You want them to succeed as much as you want yourself to succeed.  How many of you hug the people you work out with when leaving an event?  It's now a normal occurrence for me when leaving my new family.

I often forget that my fellow crossfitters have their own struggles as well. I've gotten so wrapped up in trying to succeed with my weight loss goal that I was missing the bigger picture. I forgot the feeling of "I can do anything" I had at the beginning of the year when I was on track with nutrition. The thing is I'm still improving even now when I'm not losing weight. I also forgot that not everyone's goal is to lose weight. They focus on nutrition just for better health and better results with their Crossfit performance. I forgot that not everyone event wants to eat Paleo. Some are fighting injuries, some are trying to break through plateaus, and some are brand new and learning they can do things they never thought possible.

The thing is if we were all the same, we would never grow. We need the weird people that attend 6am classes... We need the people who want to do competitions and those who want nothing to do with them. We need the people focused on nutrition and those who are focused on just surviving the WOD. People have good days and bad days, but there is always someone there to support you and cheer you on. I can always rely on my Crossfit Route 1 family to keep me motivated and bring things into prospective. For that, I am forever thankful.

So even though I seem to have started to repeat history, I do firmly believe my fate will be different. I now have my family, my friends, and my Crossfit Route 1 family to help me succeed!