Yeah, sometimes it takes that health scare to have the right motivation to proceed forward. I had noticed some strange behaviours when tracking my health stats over the last few years. I'm hoping that it's not more than that, but I started taking precautions anyways.
The type of minor adjustments I used to do would sort of work, but the results wouldn't maintain like it used to. I also started getting certain ill effects ranging from body pain/seized muscles, mind fog, headaches/migraines, stomach issues etc. with higher frequency. I pride myself with a pretty good body quotient (BQ) but I couldn't help but feel like something was wrong in how my body was communicating to me and reacting to my day to day (which in all honesty hadn't really changed much over the last few years/decades other than kids). IMO, it was like my body was slowing down and needed much more persuasion than before to rev it back up to do what I know it is still capable of. So I started devising the fundamentals to a plan.
My greatest goal is basically continue to do what I currently do for the next 12 years without major changes, even though things are constantly changing. I want to lift my kids, play sports with them etc. for a while yet (into their teens) and not let my body say no to that physically/injury or stamina wise. I started with a dumb and rough idea of what I'm going to do. It's based on what I've done before and what I felt worked for me and didn't. It won't work for everyone, but I didn't devise it for everyone. It's customized to me.
1. Gamify vs Scientific approach vs rule of thumb self motivation via Newton's third law.
Spoiler!
I really hated the scientific approach when I did it. Counting calories to a highly accurate level I'd done before, but then it seemed like a type of hyperfocus with diminishing returns on accuracy. I had friends like this and they'd tell me how they isolated 100-200 calories on a few days that they had missed to fix their approach, blah, blah... Personally it just felt weird treating myself like a flask and seeing if the chemical reaction at the end was pure enough (so to speak).
So I moved on to gaming the situation (ie: tracking on activity trackers, comparing with friends, prizes for meeting milestones etc.) which was more interesting, but honestly speaking, prizes didn't motivate me and I realized my goals were more than purely weight and calorie reduction vs my friends typically didn't have those side goals.
So I moved on to the next idea while retaining some of the best parts of gamifying my health... "Every action has an equal and opposite reaction" (ie: Newton's third law). Like I said, my goals were more than weight and calorie reduction. I'd literally get sick and feel physically off with headaches/migraines and stomach issues the worst part of the whole ordeal vs missing weight targets. That balance was far more important to me than the seemingly linear approaches that many of my friends had. It's not to say the other methods are useless. It's that most friends only had simple issues to address, so a simpler approach was required. I have more complex issues to address, so a more complex approach to deal with week to week differences was required.
For me, this Newton's third law type approach works far superior for my situation than the others, and figuring out "tricks" to meet those goals was part of the fun.
When I get the reactions of horrific hangovers, then the game was to reduce drinking (including socially) to reach the goal of less headaches, stomach issues, body pain etc. and do it in a way that either others didn't notice, or if they did, they might be intrigued into copying it.
Sometimes it meant cooking less food and carving out the excess calories as the portion my kids eat VS cooking too much (by adding a portion for them) and then "finishing it off to avoid wasting food". Other times, it was intentionally cooking extra and allowing myself that extra as a "snack" vs migrating to other things as snacks that were not as good for me.
Other times, the goal was better internal balance. I could just feel it. I could hit my calorie targets, but sodium and sugar felt off. I'd cramp or energy crash like crazy etc. So then the healthy balance so that I could actually do my exercise properly without my body stalling out was the goal.
Sometimes it meant doing pure raw fruits/vegetables to stuff myself with a goal to kill off that hankering snacky feeling. It really depended what was going on with me and my schedule, if I'm trying to finish off food to avoid waste/reset my fridge/freezer etc. That extra challenge aspect makes it harder but more rewarding to me to the point I focus on it more often. Because I have to factor my family into the equation and I am not consuming in isolation, there's more ups and downs. But my main goal is to incrementally focus on slowly going down vs slowly going up. Rapid downs aren't good for my personal scenario.
2. My brain/body is messed up. I need to fix it or trick it with specific habits for longer term success.
Spoiler!
My brain and/or body constantly tell me I am hungry or craves certain foods. I've often believed that sometimes the opposite of what everyone else is doing is more effective than doing what everyone else is doing. Sometimes I also look at bigger picture. Like Hartley's 7 game series vs siloing every single day and flipping out when a single day was horrible. I'm pretty sure my mind and body were latching onto that. But if I stayed calm and looked at the remaining 6 days, I hoped to teach my body to follow that.
For me, I've found that when diet, instead of "Eat less", "Eat more" can be more effective. Most people kinda get it, but it's honestly harder to do than most realize. Instead of eating less food (pure calorie deficit), eating/drinking more of the right stuff is better longer term. Trying and stuff myself more with stuff like oatmeal and plain vegetables/fruits rather than just eating less pizza. "Feasting" on non-calorie dense foods as a meal or stack was kinda weird but it works to tell myself that I wasn't starving myself. It wasn't too hard to then change the raw veggies or fruits into a more interesting parfait or stir fry and then that parfait concept into a pie shaped parfait or that stir fry into fried rice or noodle dish. Changing the state of base foods to give myself variety kept me from that boredom state where I would start thinking of alternative foods.
The other issue I found, chewing. Seriously, chewing. I paid more attention and I found that I'd chew 2-4 times prior to consuming my food. I intentionally would try and increase that to 5-8 chews prior to consuming especially for flavor dense foods. I found that I could consume less and feel satisfied if I did this. I also found that slowing down and enjoying my food allowed me to say no to more food. As a parent, I guess somewhere along the lines, my wife and I would feast/famine and basically inhale food so that I could quickly resume parenting or other obligation I had on my checklist. That means a lot of my food entered my body in a denser state/lower volume vs being of higher volume with it being broken apart physically before being consumed. I recall reading there's a delay in between when your body tells you you're full. So eating slower means that your body says, "No more" before you put extra into your stomach.
The chewing part is a trick that combines well with other tricks, especially with flavor dense foods. As I mentioned earlier, sometimes I did it more often. I'd often break the portion down into 1/4 or 1/3 and consume it that many times over a week. We sometimes don't realize how much food we consume without tasting it and this trick for me could accomplish multiple goals simultaneously.
Instead of less charcuterie, I would do it more often. A single charcuterie board "serving" broken down into 1/3 and consumed 3 times in a week makes more sense to my situation than just having less charcuteries for a week if that was what I craved. Plus, how can you buy small charcuterie stuff? It's there and then you tell yourself not to waste it. I'd cut it into much smaller sizes (ie: 1/4 size normal smoked meats, cheese pieces etc.) so instead of each intake as a full slice of salami for instance, it's a triangle slice with a smaller piece of cheese and a smaller cracker. It takes 4+ times as long to consume a slice of the smoked meats. Chew it longer and you're getting that same level of flavor in your mouth that is desired. Then a reduced sip of wine at the same ratio of the food intake for congruency purposes also helps that goal. Like I said, I'd do that 1/3 portion and do 3 times that week. But after a while, I could drop it down to 2 and/or no longer crave charcuterie board as a snack.
I realized that for me, sometimes snacking was to pass time. It wasn't necessarily for hunger. My body, I guess would just use hunger to tell me I was bored because it became a habit. A smaller, slower charcuterie board for me was helping to pass the time, but re-training my body to enjoy each mouthful vs inefficient consumption of flavor via larger portions with less chewing helped me.
I do this for snack things like chips as well. I'd intentionally break certain large chips and eat them over 3-4 repetitions and I had a rule where I was not allowed to consume chips over the size of a loonie as multiples. Anything over the size of a loonie/twoonie ish had to be consumed as individuals items. Cake, same thing. Smaller slice, and smaller amount per bite and just chew longer. Again, I could have those snacks multiple times a week vs only on certain cheat days while maintaining a reasonable calorie count for each day. I wouldn't have to lie to myself by rounding down, worried about the next time I might consume that delicious thing etc.
I've also stumbled on a sexagesimal numeral system concept. If I were to do weight training etc. I'd push myself towards more of that type of pattern rather than the typical base 10/decimal type of thinking. I want to see if there's a way to better train/trick my body in thinking in more base 60 type of patterns (ie: Our time concept is already based mostly on this) and if doing so has a positive effect. For instance, always trying to do reps at base 12 vs base 10 is 20% extra. That extra would add up quickly over time and that extra length would also add a layer to the things I work on.
3. Exercise.
Spoiler!
I've never been a gym rat. It just doesn't do it for me. It has never motivated me. I've always liked team sports or doing my own thing like jogging/running and/or doing my own thing at home. Hot yoga was the rare exception and when I did that, my migraines/headaches (weather or otherwise) often weren't an issue. With the "third law" idea in mind, I decided I wanted functional strength in all conditions vs pure strength and I wanted to feel good not just physically, but health wise. I felt that pure strength would clash with my issues with bad ankles, knees, hips, back etc. from all my years abusing my body while playing sports which would clash with being a child jungle gym where I could easily tweak something with a weird weight and resistance in odd directions.
Yoga and calisthenics were more my jam than weight training. Some of the other side goals could also be met using this path vs the gym path.
4. The deadline.
Spoiler!
Recently, worrying about death motivated me at first, but the more I thought, the more that I realized that specific deadline goals motivated me in the past than the unlimited journey that had seeped into my approaches in my later years. Accomplishing certain goals were easier when it was things like, a wedding or maintaining health that had less headaches etc. But for situations where it's ongoing until the end, I find it's harder to get onto that long term track. So, I decided to manufacture a deadline. I don't know how or whether it will work, but I think it'll be more effective than without.
I've set for myself a 12 year goal of reaching the end with no reason to have any regrets at the end. It's more than just health. In 12 years I want to reach financial goals, check list goals etc. as well. If I die at the end of 12 years, it was a life well lived. If I survive, then I guess I'll just set new and loftier 12 year goals to work on over 12 years. Why 12? I was thinking 10, but then zodiac animal cycle and stumbling on a sexagesimal numeral system concept... it seemed like a better way to give it a go. Plus 10 years might go fast and the extra 2 year buffer might make it less stressful or practicing how to stay on track without losing focus.
The unknown duration makes it harder to figure out. I guess I picked it up as a concept when watching the survival series, "Alone". Those guys can easily go into the woods for a set duration of 3 months as training, but with an unknown duration competing against each other, stress trickles in within the first week.
For me, with a fixed time of 12 years/taking life 12 years at a time, it's easier to know what the end goal is and how long it is and what needs to be done to stay on track. With an unknown goal of "until I die", it's easy to lose track and derail a lot earlier than I know what I am capable of. I can always do it tomorrow, until I cannot. If I succeed after 12 years, then I can tell myself whether I can do it better than the previous 12 years. Some have commented how morbid it seems to act like I only have 12 years remaining. But without that belief that things are finite, it's harder to motivate against time. Honestly speaking with the health scare, it's possible there is less than 12 years even if the doctors are positive it's more.
Good luck to everyone on their journeys.
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