Bismillah. To be honest, initially I wanted to try write more in Malay. Try to challenge myself and all that. Tapi in the spirit of removing obstacles and having consistency, I will not limit myself to the language. Ada masa nak tulis dalam Bahasa Melayu, I will do so. Sometimes terasa nak tulis dalam Bahasa Inggeris, I will do so as well.
A Journey Starts With A Single Step
As we all know, a successful health plan is incomplete if it’s just focused on the diet. In fact, my challenge is not necessarily the eating side of things. It’s really about the sedentary lifestyle I have been living for more than a decade.
Oh wait, hold on! There’s actually something a lot more important than that. It is the mind that is holding me back.
The mind of an intelligent person can be a dangerous thing. The level of excuses it can come up with is truly fascinating. We know the logic, the health reasoning, we know the consequences. But if the inertia is too great, the resistance is too great, it will not work. It HAS NOT worked!
Especially after numerous attempts at it. Some had genuinely promising progress, but after a few months, life got in the way and things fizzled out.
The mind is protecting me from further failures. That’s essentially it.
Changing Strategies
This time round, I am changing strategies completely.
I will not be focusing on health as a motivation. I will be focusing on accountability through public shame. Yup, shame! I have self-reflected and analysed myself, and realise this will do the trick.
Let me explain.
I am reaching mid-40’s and when I look at myself in the mirror, I should face reality. But since I am a man and quite delusional, I do not feel the urgency I should. That’s because my reflection is just for me and by extension, my wife. No more shame.
By bringing this out into the world, through my engagement with the DSSS Facebook group and sharing this on the blog, I am opening myself up to everyone. I am forcing myself to be accountable, follow through on the action plan, be vulnerable and seek help.
The shame isn’t who I am now. The shame will be who I’ll be if I don’t follow through after 12 months of public commitment.
Challenging The Mind
Here’s the genius part: telling the mind it needs to force the body to exercise is a task too heavy for it. Especially when it’s been defeated many times by lethargy.
Growing this new blog, on the other hand, is a pretty darn exciting challenge for the mind to engage in. In the last few days, I am thinking about content, positioning, and so on. Just earlier, I was fully engaged on building the logo and design aspect of things.
By announcing that I want to lose 18kg in 12 months, I’ve created a huge challenge. At first glance, it can seem intimidating. But looking at the progress by members of the Facebook group, it makes things far more realistic than previously anticipated. It is highly encouraging.
If the mind can see it happen, it can believe that it too can make it happen.
To further facilitate that, I downloaded the Strava app to record my progress. On the first day of using it, I walked a distance of 1.47km in 15mins. The next day, I clocked 2.44km in 25mins. All the information is there. I can see the route I took, the incline, the speed and pace.
All of a sudden, this health journey is no longer about health per se. It is now a data-driven project that the mind can get excited about. There’s enough growth potential to work on. There’s enough metrics to set goals and targets. There’s enough community to stay engaged.
Ecosystem
What I am creating here are building blocks to make sure I remain consistent throughout this whole journey. I have gone through enough failed attempts to learn how I respond to things.
My accountability system includes:
- Public documentation through this blog
- Community support via the Facebook group
- Data tracking with Strava for walking progress
- Visual progress that I can analyze and optimize
This current attempt is still new. But I believe by putting in the right pieces, this will work inshaAllah.
