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Aug. 31st, 2008 06:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jakebe
Weight This Week: 175.4 lbs.
Weight Last Week: 173.2 lbs.
Change: +2.2 lbs.
Time: 30 minutes
Distance: 3.02 miles
Top Speed: 6.5
Calories: 359
Chest Press: 100 lbs.
Bent Arm Cable Pulldown: 45 lbs.
I don't get this yo-yoing weight thing. I'm making gains with the running and I had a really good week with the diet, but it doesn't seem to have helped. I think I'll measure chest, waist, stomach, arms and thighs to see what the numbers come out to there; it could be that I've added muscle and lost fat, but I'm not so sure. Either way, it's a little frustrating. I feel great about the exercise, though, and my diet is getting better all the time.
I took a vow of silence yesterday, the first one I've tried in several years. I could only manage for a day, because, well, there's too much else going on for me to do it much longer, but I learned a few things in the relatively short amount of time I was quiet.
It drove poor Ryan crazy. :D That was an expected effect of the experiment, though. I knew it would be rough on him, because we're so used to talking to each other, sharing opinions, helping each other out with our bad memory, offering general input. One of the things this underscored is how much we really do talk to each other, and seek one another out for things, how much we've come to rely on one another for that feedback. It was honestly a worry of mine, that we didn't talk or communicate very well, but those fears have been put to bed; there's always work that can be done, but...I'm a lot more appreciative of what we have.
That being said, things are a lot better when you don't complain about them. :D I've made a lot of progress here, too, but there are times where I can still voice my displeasure a lot, and this got me to think about my reasons why; a friend of mine told me that most of the time we speak it's because we're trying to get something we want, and I've found this to be embarrassingly true for me. When I'm griping, even if I say it's just to vent, it's because I want something: either validation or sympathy, or for someone to do something about my situation. Without that crutch, without that hope that maybe if I speak up I'll get what I want, I found myself far more accepting of things I wouldn't have picked myself. Almost everything was more enjoyable because of this one thing.
This probably doesn't mean that I'll stop complaining. It does mean that I'll complain a lot less; before I gripe, I'll have to honestly consider my reasons for doing so, and the consequences of it. Does this thing really matter enough that I have devote energy into expressing how I'd rather be doing something else? Most of the time, it honestly doesn't.
In general, there's a tendency to fill our lives with noise as distraction from what's really going on around us. Even when there's no radio or iPod or television to provide a running commentary for us when conversation won't do, we block out things with constant mental chatter. We often see and hear the things around us, but it feels very rare that we're actually paying attention. Going silent, even for a day, reminded me of how much more effort I could be putting into the act of observation. There are, of course, less extreme ways for me to realize this, and I think I'll have to play around with ways to make sure I 'listen twice as much as I speak,' to use the expression.
Weight Last Week: 173.2 lbs.
Change: +2.2 lbs.
Time: 30 minutes
Distance: 3.02 miles
Top Speed: 6.5
Calories: 359
Chest Press: 100 lbs.
Bent Arm Cable Pulldown: 45 lbs.
I don't get this yo-yoing weight thing. I'm making gains with the running and I had a really good week with the diet, but it doesn't seem to have helped. I think I'll measure chest, waist, stomach, arms and thighs to see what the numbers come out to there; it could be that I've added muscle and lost fat, but I'm not so sure. Either way, it's a little frustrating. I feel great about the exercise, though, and my diet is getting better all the time.
I took a vow of silence yesterday, the first one I've tried in several years. I could only manage for a day, because, well, there's too much else going on for me to do it much longer, but I learned a few things in the relatively short amount of time I was quiet.
It drove poor Ryan crazy. :D That was an expected effect of the experiment, though. I knew it would be rough on him, because we're so used to talking to each other, sharing opinions, helping each other out with our bad memory, offering general input. One of the things this underscored is how much we really do talk to each other, and seek one another out for things, how much we've come to rely on one another for that feedback. It was honestly a worry of mine, that we didn't talk or communicate very well, but those fears have been put to bed; there's always work that can be done, but...I'm a lot more appreciative of what we have.
That being said, things are a lot better when you don't complain about them. :D I've made a lot of progress here, too, but there are times where I can still voice my displeasure a lot, and this got me to think about my reasons why; a friend of mine told me that most of the time we speak it's because we're trying to get something we want, and I've found this to be embarrassingly true for me. When I'm griping, even if I say it's just to vent, it's because I want something: either validation or sympathy, or for someone to do something about my situation. Without that crutch, without that hope that maybe if I speak up I'll get what I want, I found myself far more accepting of things I wouldn't have picked myself. Almost everything was more enjoyable because of this one thing.
This probably doesn't mean that I'll stop complaining. It does mean that I'll complain a lot less; before I gripe, I'll have to honestly consider my reasons for doing so, and the consequences of it. Does this thing really matter enough that I have devote energy into expressing how I'd rather be doing something else? Most of the time, it honestly doesn't.
In general, there's a tendency to fill our lives with noise as distraction from what's really going on around us. Even when there's no radio or iPod or television to provide a running commentary for us when conversation won't do, we block out things with constant mental chatter. We often see and hear the things around us, but it feels very rare that we're actually paying attention. Going silent, even for a day, reminded me of how much more effort I could be putting into the act of observation. There are, of course, less extreme ways for me to realize this, and I think I'll have to play around with ways to make sure I 'listen twice as much as I speak,' to use the expression.
