God given gifts

"I knew you were a demanding master reaping where you did not sew..so I hid my gift, here take what is yours...."

We all know how that ended up for the man who was too fearful to invest his talents. We are all talented and it shows in what we do. Every one of us is pretty successful in our careers and yet what about when it comes to ourselves? Are we investing our gifts wisely when it comes to finances, diet, and fitness?

One of the greatest gifts God gives us is our brain with it's ability to problem solve. Mankind has proven and scripture even says that, "nothing that they proposed to do was impossible to them".

Why is it then we suffer? Is it non belief? It could be. The ability to visualize and believe something is often the key to achieving success.

When it comes to losing weight, allow me to share some logical observations.
When we began the weight challenge, I said to myself , "calories in /calories out", that seems simple enough. As you know, I calculated what should have been my daily caloric output and then decided on a daily calorie intake.

In the last month I have lost 17 pounds. I am down 32 from the actual beginning but since the initial loss also reflects a lot of water or fluid loss, I started from where the graph seemed to flatten out. 17 pounds represents 14, 875 calories if you use the standard measure of 3500 calories per pound.
This means that I would have had a caloric deficit of 2125 calories per day.

Well, there you go. Science! Cool! Fitday says my daily caloric need is about 4100 per day and I am eating about 1800 per day . Hey, 2300 per day , it works!

Allowing for my inexact journaling of my food choices and the approximation that fitday makes about your caloric needs this is almost spot on.

I wish you all the best. Don't forget in the struggle of life, we have been equipped by God with all we need to thrive. Get your talents out from under the rock and invest them for the glory of God and the kingdom!

May God richly bless you and give you peace....

Pops

Blah,blah,blah

Hello, anybody out there???????

Hel-looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

I know you're all busy, but I miss you guys....wah,wah,wahhhhhhhhhhhh

It's never too late to start

I will be 54 years old in exactly one month. During the last several years I have gone from playing softball and feeling pretty good to feeling like what I imagine an elderly man with a lot of ailments feels like. I began to believe that I would never escape my weight.

"Maybe it is genetic..."  "I just need to accept who I am"   ...etc, etc.....These are some of the thoughts that raced through my head, but everytime I want to get dressed for an interview or  shop for clothes I couldn't help thinking about the negative aspects of being "large boned". Everytime I had to hold the bannister, pulling myself up the stairs and had to reach back and push myself forward to get up from a couch or even worse say "give me a hand" I would think "what is wrong with this picture?".

Now obviously, I did not mean what is wrong as in I was not aware that I had gotten large. One can't turn around without constant reminder that America has an obesity problem. I mean that I felt guilty and helpless and tried to make the best of it, but I felt depressed, overwhelmed.

People at the turn of the century were smaller and leaner and I doubt the term diet had even entered the American lexicon. I think we all realized that people for the most part were more active and that most households had a stay at home mom who cooked. Even so, stories of generous portions of potato and white bread and butter were common from my parents who were born close to a hundred years ago now and were both very lean as young people.

What factors explain the lean, strong America of the past that did so without any apparent special effort and the obese and floundering America of today that spends half the gross national product on diet plans, foods and gimmicks?

We are so obsessed by weight loss and so desperate for a quick cure that we have become innundated with half-truths and lies that we now have a difficult time recognizing the truth among the forest  o nonsense. Choosing a weight loss strategy can seem like picking a path at random to get unlost from a wilderness only to find after days of trailblazing that you are back at the same rock you started at.

I believe I have found, if not the path, at least a method for avoiding the circuitious routing habit of the past. I have now lost thirty pounds in the last month. I don't say this to brag but in sheer amazement. I am leaner, stronger, more alert and not suffering from the cravings and rampant appetite that had hounded me in past diets. AS I said previously, I understand that you have heard this before. " I have more energy, I'm not hungry" , etc,etc...... as we have all tried diets in the past, I think initially we have had this kind of response and it is completely understandable that you are waiting for the bubble to burst. WHY is this any different? 

We are tired of having our expectations dashed like the homemade raft thrown against the rocks as we are attempting to escape Devil's Island. The other prisoners try to temper there enthusiam, "They'll never make it". But if a boat actually makes it past the relentless waves and appears to have momentum the prisoners start getting excited, "They're going to make it" , "Go you crazy buzzards, Go". 

Well, I am going to make it and then you are going to believe. Praise be to God. This is not my clever imagination or my determination or some secret easy formula although there are elements of all those things, but this is God's deliverance allowing all the elements to come together at the right to save my life and hopefully my fellow prisoners as well whoever you might be.

While I don't expect to lost another thirty by the cruise, I do expect to continue to drop wight steadily. I eat plenty of food each day, monitoring my calorie level and also the breakdown aiming for a 60 - 65 % complex carbs, 20-25 % protein and 10-15 % fat balance.  Much of my protein comes from beans, lentils, tofu, whey powder, egg whites, with occasional fish and chicken. 

I try to use a variety of fruits and vegetables each week, the fresher and more organic the better. Nuts and seeds are also good. It is really important to me to weigh and measure everything accurately. 

Daily exercise is critical. I realize that since being laid off it is easier for me to find the time. That was especially true at the beginning,  but honestly by the second week of the weight challenge, I was already at the point where I couldn't wait to get to the gym. It has gotten so easy that I barely think about it. I don't go and socialize. Bang, in and out. 30 minutes treadmill, go through the weight machines..bang, bang, bang and another some extra sets and an extra 30on the treadmill if I have time and then out the door. 

One last thing, at first I thought it would be a lot of work to cook differently. I also thought it would be way more expensive. Wrong on both counts. There was some initial cost in both \money and time to get setup and adjusted but on a weekly basis it has proven both easy and economical to eat this way.

"Do not grow weary in well doing for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness..."  I just want all you guys to know, I am there for you. When you start to see my boat leave the island and pull past the waves and belief and hope start to rise within you, I am there for you. I will be happy to share recipes and strategies and whatever I know to help you succeed. I want to help you pull free from all the untruths that may attempt to rob you of hope and keep you chained to unhealthy habits. You can get free. You are not the hopeless victim of genetics, illness or food allergy. YOU CAN GET FREE......

 

Pizza and Beer

Wednesday night I met some old friends from the office and we made two kettles of beer at Deja Brew in Shrewsbury. We made an Oatmeal Stout and a recipe called Backporch Pale Ale.

It really is a lot of fun. One of the guys went and bought pizza and I had three slices. Along with a few beers etc., not a great night as far as calories go, but you should be able to do those kinds of things and enjoy them, just not every day.

I feel great and I am finally over the cold (at least 90%) but I probably won't make the gym today becasue the schedule is just too hectic. I'll try to get something in tomorrow and back to the gym Monday.

I hope you are all doing as good as you hoped, more so in your walk with God but also in your life choices. I love you all. 

Pops

The post superbowl post

Well, the Cardinals came up just short, but not for lack of effort. It was actually a pretty entertaining game, what I saw of it. I spent the entire day yesterday, except for a short time to go to church, catching up on homework and rebuilding my computer. 

It has been needing it anyway, slow and quirky, but man! My mac is broken :-( 

So I took the easy way out and got a new hard drive,  installed it, created four partitions, installed xp on the first one, windows 7 beta on the second, and Fedora 10 Linux on the third. The fourth is for ????? at this point. 

I also had to install and configure all my goodies on the XP partition, Office 2007, antivirus, etc. including a C compiler for my programming class.  

I did not count what I ate yesteday, but I ate all good things ...OK maybe a little too much bread pudding, but it was home made...and I am down 25 overall. 

I am skipping the gym today, because I caught Mom's cold and feel crappy. I don't want to spread my disease around the gym either.

I hope you are all finding some success in your diets. I don't hear much from you'se all????

LOVE YOU ....................................POPS

Week 5 and stronger that ever!!

Wow, my mind is blown that we are starting week 5. I am officially down 9 lbs but more importantly, my body is at peace without any wild, unhealthy cravings that I have to constantly fight. That, my dear family, is a huge victory for me!! I can only attribute it to the fact that I am FINALLY tuned in to giving my body what it needs with the healthy food choices and cutting out excess white flour, sugar and most importantly sodium which seems to drive a lot more unhealthy habits than I EVER realized.

Anyway, I just wanted to hop on quick and post an update. I'm not sure if anyone is still keeping up with the site, but don't you dare give up! If you've had a tough time staying on track or coming up with a plan that works for you, don't be discouraged. It's never too late to move forward. Remember that it's the baby steps that count. It's one baby step at a time that get you pointed in the right direction. Remember the rudder on a ship is the tiniest part of the ship but has the most impact on the direction that the ship ends up going in.

Dad and I are here if you need prayer or help with suggestions. Love you lots!! Hang in there. I know life is throwing many trials toward a lot of you, but don't despair, your Father in heaven is your ever true source of strength and courage and help in the time of trouble. Just ask Him, he's only a whisper away.

Psalm 37:9 "But the salvation of the righteous is from the LORD; He is their strength in time of trouble."

~M