REBUILDING: LIFE OF LONELINESS

This blog post will not apply to most people, but if you are like me, I can identify.

For the most part, I have not been the most social person on Earth for most of my adult life.  I have always been very careful about who I let into my world of awesomeness due to trust issues, and because of that, I never learned the social skills that most people learn as they grow up.

"BeastWalk" on day 81.  The early stages can be the toughest.

As mentioned in a previous rebuilding post, my world was rocked in a negative way in December 2013 as one of the few people I allowed into my world and trusted for many years turned out to be not-so-cool.  As a result of what I called, "The Tuesday Incident", I went from only trusting this person to trusting no one at all.  The "Tuesday Incident" is also what ultimately planted the seeds for my rebuilding process.

Everything that I would do in the early stages, I did on my own.  Working out in my living room, going for "Beastwalks", I did it all alone.  Just me and whatever songs I felt like listening to on my iPod at the time.

As I started to see and feel results, my confidence grew.  I would no longer look down when walking passed a stranger on the street.  And as my confidence grew, so did my desire to form some kind of social circle.  The social circle building deal can be told in an entirely different set of posts but they would have nothing to do with cooking or rebuilding.  To make a long story short, after two years, I have no social circle.

Day 91.  I had the day off and my head had been in a bad place for a few days, so I got up and went on a
3+ hour BeastWalk to clear it.

After about a year-and-a-half of trying and being unsuccessful, I stopped trying to form a social circle.  There are a few reasons, but I will just stick with one.  While my lifestyle was changing and becoming more active, the people I was trying to build this social circle with were still the same.  I will be the first to admit that it is hard to get started and very easy to become discouraged.  So while I was trying to maintain an active lifestyle and include "friends", their lifestyle was, and still is more along the lines of, "I don't feel like doing anything."

I know that feeling all too well.  Unfortunately since I've become more active, I find it extremely hard to not do anything.  My days of sitting at home on days off, playing video games and watching moves for hours are long gone.  And due to my lack of social skills, it is not so easy for me to go out and meet new people, although I tried and the way I went about it was a HUGE mistake (AVOID DATING WEBSITES, GENTLEMEN!  THEY ARE A WASTE OF TIME AND LIFE!).  I joined online meet up sites like MeetUp.com.  Unfortunately, a lot of the "socializing" in those groups require paying money.  That, too, is another story.  Let me just say that I will no longer pay money to hangout with people.

Day 99.  The Ultimate Warrior had just passed away and I went down
to the site of Wrestlemania 6 which I attended in 1990 to do a tribute.

In the end, I had to come to terms with the fact that the rebuilding process can be a lonely journey.  You can find out who your true friends are and who they aren't.  It takes its toll on your head and can make you feel very depressed at times.  I have found that the best action to get rid of those feelings of depression are to use them as fuel to up the intensity of my workouts.  It works, but the feelings still come back.  Not as often as they did in the beginning, but they come back.  Rebuilding can not only be challenging on your body, but on your mind, too.

It is an emotional roller coaster.  In the beginning, there can be a lot of anger as you try to find people to join you and they either don't due to them not being up to it, or they will agree and then cancel on you at the last minute with excuse after excuse.  As a result, you get angry and eventually depressed, then angry again.  These are the times when you want to bust out the weights or put your shoes on and go for a walk.

Day 418.  Head doing a lot better.  Still get a bit down every now and
then, but Sally is more than enough for Chef Nairby!

My rebuilding came down to this:  In the beginning, the reason for getting in shape was to get the approval and admiration of others.  But as time went on, it became about being happy with myself and not caring so much about the opinions of others.  Once I got to that stage, life did not feel so lonely anymore, although I will still go through periods of depression and loneliness.  But it is nowhere near as bad as it was in the beginning.

You just need to remember that rebuilding and sticking to it puts you at a higher level than most people.  It is not that there is something wrong with YOU, it is that you are asking too much of THEM.  The things that you used to do are too boring to keep doing, but your friends are still stuck in that bubble.  Rebuilding is about fixing YOURSELF.  Fixing yourself means spending a lot of time alone.  It's just the way it is.

Chef Nairby

REBUILDING: BECOME HARDCORE

A common mistake that people make when starting a workout routine is that they go in unprepared.  Most of us want to believe that we are physically stronger than we really are.

I have always been tall, big boned and looked like someone with brute strength.  And I believed it despite getting constant back and leg pain from just walking.  Walking up two flights of stairs would leave me heavily winded, but I still believed I had super human strength because I looked like I did.  I fit the big & tall label perfectly.

June, 2010.  Flirting with that 300 pound mark.

I was physically strong, but only in short bursts, and despite that, I was still convinced that after years of inactivity, I could walk into any gym tomorrow and go hardcore for at least an hour.

This is just the mindset that I as a physically strong looking person had, and it is the same with a lot of people of all body types.  One of the most common New Years resolutions people make is that on January 1st or 2nd, they are going to go to their local gym or health club, get a membership and make new health changes for their life.  That, "New year, new me" meme that millions of people post on their Facebook and Twitter timelines on December 31st.

For a lot of people, the "New year, new me" deal ends up being nothing more than a spur of the moment thing.  They see others talking about it, it gives them a sudden burst of inspiration and they hop on the bandwagon.  And that's where it ends.  A post or a Tweet, followed by a few 'like' clicks and comments of encouragement from friends of family.  The end.

Screencap from a 2011 Facebook video.  Size 3XL shirt.  Close to being at my physical worst.

For those who actually stick to their word and do go seeking out a gym membership, they go in ready to go, all guns blazing.  Ready to tear it up.  They do some pre-workout stretches as their favorite pulse-pounding songs play on their iPods.  They grab a 30 pound dumb bell and do 10 reps.

Whoa!

"Let me sit here for an extended rest period, and when it looks like nobody is looking, I'll just casually walk over to that rowing machine over there."

Position yourself on the rowing machine.  Set a moderate difficulty level and a time of 30 minutes.  Countdown.....3-2-1, GO!

What the f***?!

"Let me rest for a second, and when it looks like nobody is looking, I'll just casually walk over to one of the available treadmills over there."

Get on the treadmill.  Set a moderate difficulty level and a time of 30 minutes.  Countdown......3-2-1, GO!  Your arms are still a bit sore from 10 reps on 30 pound dumb bells.  Your back feels a little stiff from the rowing machine.  And now your legs are starting to feel sore.  You look at your watch.  You are barely 15 minutes into your workout!

You lower the difficulty level on the treadmill.  Go for another 5 minutes.  Step off the treadmill.  Walk back the the change room in pain.  Too sore to shower, so you change back into your regular clothes, go home and collapse on the couch.  Then what happens?  The next morning, you wake up in more pain than you went to bed with.  As a result, you don't go back to the gym again.  Luckily it was just a 30-day free trial membership with no commitment.

Congratulations!  You've been brought back down to Earth!

February 20, 2014.  Day 50 of rebuilding.

You went in completely full of yourself and you gave up.  You went in trying to run when you didn't even know how to walk.

NEWSFLASH!  Michael Jordan did not come out of the womb with the ability to dunk a basketball.  Wayne Gretzky did not come out of the womb already knowing how to skate.  They became great by starting with nothing but a will to succeed.  And they started with the very basics.  They had to learn to crawl before they walked.  And it is the same with starting a new workout and diet plan.

If you want to be successful at making positive healthy changes in your life but have no prior experience, odds are you will NOT be able to go an hour at the gym, and you will NOT stick to a strict diet by practically starving yourself on day one.  Your head might be ready, but your body isn't.

You need to start from scratch.  And that means doing what you thought would be too easy and beneath you.  It means not seeing quick results.  The beginning stages of a new workout and diet routine is a lengthy warm up process, much like how we stretch before starting a workout.

October 7, 2014.  Day 279 of rebuilding.

The beginning stage is not about SEEING results quick, it's about FEELING them.  I started my rebuilding process with nothing more than 10 minutes of very basic yoga poses a day and eating more fruits and vegetables and less junk.  I still ate some junk in the beginning but less of it.  After day one, I was in pain.  The next day, I woke up in more pain.  My body had been inactive for so long that it was in a state of shock.  But as time went on, my body quickly got used to the activity.  My 10 minutes of basic yoga a day turned into 20.  My intake of junk became less and less.  As I felt my body waking up, my energy started going up.  I traded sitting on my couch watching movies and playing video games for going out and walking.

After three months, my basic yoga had gone from 10 minutes a day to 30 as I was able to hold poses longer and would add new ones.  I was feeling and seeing results and working out was quickly becoming something I felt like I HAD to do, to something I WANTED to do.  Eventually, I went out and bought two 25 pound dumbbells and started a weight training routine.  Shortly after that, I added a cardio routine by doing Tae-Bo style punch and kick workouts while I put a UFC DVD on.

I now alternate cardio and weights.  Cardio one day, weights the next.  And while I do have a gym membership, I do most of my "beasting" in my living room.  My gym equipment consists simply of a yoga mat, two 25 pound dumb bells and a pair of MMA gloves.  Everything else comes from inside which was locked away for many years and had to be woken up and charged.

Home "home gym".  Simple as this.  Yoga mat, two 25lb dumbbells and MMA gloves.
(The gloves are for when I get energized and bang my fists together.  It happens.)

You need to crawl before you walk.  Walk before you run, and run before you sprint.  You don't start hardcore, you BECOME hardcore.  You ARE as strong as you think you are, but you need to give your body a chance to catch up with your thoughts.  And every minute counts.  If you are only able to go a few minutes during the beginning stages, a few minutes is better than no minutes as you are at least keeping your body active.  BECOME HARDCORE!

December 18, 2015.  Day 716 of rebuilding and still going strong.

Don't tell ME that YOU can't do it!

Chef Nairby