The Two Week Cleanse

So, the idea of ACTUALLY making small changes in the way I live forever is a little overwhelming, because I love eating all the things and I hate exercise with a passion. For some reason the idea of drastically changing the way I live for a short period of time is much more manageable. In my head, I’ve rationalized this as a “cleanse” where I eliminate my cravings for junk food by not eating it for two weeks. I also go to the gym every day for the full two weeks, thus enhancing my desire to go more regularly. This is flawed logic, because I’m obviously not going to do this.

Here were the rules:

No junk food

Carbs in the morning only

No alcohol

Increase water intake

Decrease coffee intake to 2 cups per day

Go to the gym every day

Eat more fruits and vegetables

By day 2 of the 14 days I had broken most of the rules… but that means that for the first day, I did really well. I’m gonna give myself a little pat on the back for that one.

I had planned a trip to Halifax starting day 2, returning day 3. Obviously for the 5 hour car ride, I would need both of my daily coffees, which means I would be drinking an extra one after dinner and one before breakfast. Also, when your host makes you brownies, you eat the effing brownies. Clearly, I did not go to the gym that day, or the following day. Because gym regimens can only start on Mondays, I had to wait until the next Monday to return…at which point, I did not return to the gym. I realize these are all excuses, and they’re not very good ones…but they’re my excuses and I love them just the same.

I quit trying not to eat carbs at night, because I craved them. If you saw someone all strung out on a street corner, toasting a bagel with a lighter… that was me.

I did cut out alcohol for the full two weeks and served sparkling water with dinner instead of wine. I learned that wine is really expensive and I’m saving a lot of money. This money is then redirected to my grocery bill, because eating healthy is expensive. Have you ever seen how much an avocado costs? I’ve actually started the process to grow them. (I know I’ll get tired of it and throw them out…but I started.)

Aside from the brownie, there was no junk food, AND on average, I did increase my water intake and decrease my coffee intake. Just not on a daily basis like I planned. All in all, the two week challenge was somewhat successful. I’ll continue to do them just for my own enjoyment…and yours. The whole month of March will be spent finding creative ways to save money. Follow me on twitter to see how that goes using #momoneymarch and #livelikeaperson.

Food Challenge 1

Welcome to the first of what I hope to be many food challenges. Basically, I started this blog as someone who would like to be healthier, but have real world limitations. I’ve often made excuses for not being healthy. For example, I can’t afford a personal trainer or organic food. I also really like the taste of regular food and would never want to give up alcohol, or anything deep-fried and covered in salt.

For example: a Big Mac meal must be super-sized (or whatever we’re calling super-sized now) with McChicken sauce for the fries, extra dill pickles and double-extra Big Mac sauce. I’m always sure to mention that they must first add extra sauce to the burger, then double that amount. If they double the original amount and then add extra, I’ll know they skimped out. This is the mentality of the healthy blogger you’ve encountered. If you’re looking for a peppy, washboard-abed, nutrition guru…you’ve stumbled upon the wrong site. I love food too much to poach meat and season it with a little bit of pretend salt.

Having said that I’ve decided to challenge myself once per month to take a dish I enjoy and make it healthy. 

There are only two rules.

1.      I cannot incur significant additional costs in making it healthy

2.       It still has to taste good

This Week’s Recipe: Maple Curry Chicken

Original Recipe

·         2 tablespoons olive oil

·         2 tablespoons butter

·         1 large onion, chopped

·         1 red bell pepper, seeded and chopped

·         1 yellow bell pepper, seeded and chopped

·         1 green bell pepper, seeded and chopped

·         2 cups cubed cooked chicken breast meat

·         3 cloves garlic

·         1 teaspoon sugar

·         1/4 cup pure maple syrup

·         1 can of Coconut Milk

·         2 ½ tablespoons Patak’s Madras Curry Paste

Brief Cooking Instructions

Cook everything in a pan. Add maple syrup when chicken is cooked through. Add coconut milk and then curry paste. Continue to cook until it’s delicious?

My Changes

• First of all, I don’t measure out cups of cubed chicken, and I doubled the recipe so I’d have some to freeze for the days I don’t feel like cooking (i.e. most days). I used 4 chicken breasts.
• Red and Yellow peppers were on sale below the price of green peppers for the first time ever in history, so I used 3 red, 3 yellow and no green.
• I got a kick-ass new garlic press for Christmas and I have been adding more garlic to everything. I have no sweet clue how much garlic is in it, but it’s more than what was recommended.
• I don’t measure olive oil and I didn’t use butter. I’m assuming I added enough extra olive oil to counteract the absence of butter.
• I didn’t use any sugar. I’d like to say it’s because I was being healthy, but really I just forgot.
• In place of coconut milk, I used skim milk and to thicken it, I added an entire tub of Activia plain unsweetened yoghurt.

Normally one would pour this over rice or pasta. I tried a spaghetti squash to eliminate all the carbs. You should probably microwave the squash prior to trying to cut it open. I got the knife all the way in the center, and then couldn’t move it. There were no adults around to help. Everything worked out in the end, but I learned that adding more knives does not solve any problem ever.

Judgement

Worth it!

The taste of the curry didn’t change at all. There is however, a science to cooking with yoghurt. Adding it while the curry is still hot causes it to curdle. I had to Google whether I could still eat it at this point. With no definitive answer from Google, I determined it was ok. I didn’t die.

I already have skim milk on hand at all times, and adding the tub of yoghurt wasn’t more expensive than a can of coconut milk. I don’t think you really need the whole pint. A cup could have done it, but the whole thing made it really creamy.

The spaghetti squash was good, but it was CAD$ 5.67 and it made 4 big portions. This doesn’t compare to the CAD$ 1.99 spaghetti noodles I get on sale that make many more portions. I didn’t feel disgusting after eating it like I would with regular pasta, and I served sparkling water instead of wine to offset the price. It was healthier, AND I didn’t get hammered and do something stupid like I normally would. 

Feel free to try this out for yourself and let me know how it goes. Also, I’m always looking for new ideas so if you have a recipe that needs fixing, I’ll fix it…or fail miserably, which I feel would be more entertaining anyway. Tweet me @scottkeenan27 and use #livelikeaperson. 

The Hot Yoga Experience

I’ve determined that the only way to really start living healthy is to step out of my regular routine and start doing new things (Mostly because the old things aren’t working at all). In the interest of trying new things, I agreed to attend a beginner hot yoga class. A few minutes before the class, I was told it is not actually for beginners, it was just a regular class. There were definitely some misconceptions I had, and some information I should have had prior to attending that I thought I would share.

Leave Your Sneakers at Home – I showed up with my gym sneakers and my socks only to see everyone in their bare feet. Make sure you clip your toenails before, because if you think they are embarrassingly long, you will be the only person attempting this in socks.

Use a Towel – You will sweat. Your mat will turn into a slip and slide, and others will be completely warranted in snickering as you slide all over the place.

Anyone Can Go – Despite the name, people of any level of attractiveness can attend. There are women of all shapes, sizes and abilities in these classes. This diversity does not transfer to men. They will all look like they stepped out of a Nike commercial (without their sneakers).

Do a Little Research – Learn some basic positions online before your first class. If you’re right-left dyslexic like I am, you take a little extra time to think about which leg you’re supposed to be lifting and you miss a couple steps. Then you just end up sitting on your mat trying to figure out how the person beside you has folded into an origami swan.

Test Your Gear – There’s a lot of bending, folding and raising your arms above your head. Be courteous to the people behind you and choose clothing that hides your ass crack, even in the bend-overiest of positions. Also, choose a top that will come back down over your beer gut when you bring your hands back from over your head.

Remember that your first experience, while slightly humiliating, is the MOST humiliated you can be as you get better each time. To be fair the people at Moksha were very conscious of the fact that I would feel like an absolute tool, and were very supportive. An excellent place to go for your first time, especially considering they didn't charge me for anything for my first session. 

Making a Terrible List

When a list of demotivational post-its can’t motivate you to stop being terrible, perhaps the problem is that you don’t know how terrible you are.  The first step to fixing yourself is admitting all the things wrong with you, and the best way to see it is to list them.  

Things that may be on your list

• Your fat pants exploded, and not because you were wearing them in a terrible road-runner hunting expedition with a faulty Acme product.
• All of a sudden you have an endless supply of money, but not because you won the lottery or married Oprah. You’re using your credit card for everything and using your line of credit to pay it off every week. It’s not your fault that for a small interest fee every month, you can live like a rock star!
• Your career development plan is still part of your to-do list under “clean the bathroom” and “do laundry.” You’ll never get to it as long as you keep buying more underwear. P.S. your friends don’t visit because your bathroom is disgusting.
• Napping often takes precedence over most other things.
• Your belt is slowly deforming itself because it can’t hold you in. At this point he doesn’t even want to be a belt anymore, and has fantasies of becoming a sock or a hat.

Congratulations! You’re kind of a mess. The real problem is that no one of these problems can really be solved without fixing all of the other problems. Basically, you’ve allowed yourself to spiral into a sedentary lifestyle where you have no real motivation to perform even basic human functions. Coming out of this rut is going to suck. You really don’t want to do most of the things you’re going to have to do. You basically have to train yourself to act like a person using a five fundamental elements.

• Fitness
• Nutrition
• Financial Management
• Career Development and
• Your Personal Life

If just saying the words made you vomit a little, then go brush your teeth, come back and get started on the painful road to living like a person. I’ll be live tweeting all my terrible life-choices on twitter using #livelikeaperson.

"I could have been boots" - Scott's Belt

Motivation

The greatest obstacle to living like a person is a lack of motivation. Most diets (fiscal or regular-type) start off really well, but quickly decline as you realize the instant gratification of buying something or eating something far outweighs the satisfaction of knowing there will be some long term benefits from abstaining from the undesired behaviour. A great way to keep motivated is to leave little motivational notes for yourself. Remind yourself you're doing a great job for a good reason. I got a little creative with mine, and pretended some friendly household objects were cheering me on.