Finding Myself (and maybe Nemo)

It has been a while.

I guess you could call a period of time just under 2 years a while. Time is subjective after all, and to be honest, it only felt like yesterday that I had written my last post.

Sometime between this distant yesterday and today, it has felt like so many things, and yet nothing, has eventuated. If I try very hard to remember, I can recall turbulent times when my body felt its worst, when I was physically and mentally exhausted. There were happy times too, and times when I began doubting every decision I had made in the last 2 years. Was it the right choice to give up music teaching, knowing that I am good at it? Was it prudent to begin a brand new career path in a completely different industry, unsure of my own capabilities?

I guess in the end it doesn't matter, because I am here right now. When I stopped writing, I stopped doing many things. Running, yoga... it was partly because I was busy, partly because I had injured myself from running yet again. Then, the excuses started to build, and once the habits were lost, I couldn't get them back. All the questions I had about myself wouldn't leave so I chose to abandon myself.

I'm not sure when I changed my mind, but it was a thing that just happened. When I was a little girl, I would throw up every single night. No reason... it happened without fail, every night, for a few months. Then, one day, I walked up to my mom and said "Mom, I'm not going to throw up anymore." And I didn't. Ah, the mysteries of the human spirit!

In the same mystic fashion, I suddenly decided that I was going to begin rebuilding other aspects of my life again. I had begun the career that I was gunning for, but other parts of my life were still derelict with neglect. At first, it was a pledge to begin playing in a community orchestra... to honour my original intentions of swapping careers, which I had told myself was so that I could play more. I think I surprised myself when I began pulling through with this promise... I am possibly the laziest violinist I know. Then, began the yoga.

I owe my restored passion for yoga to Gretchen Rubin's book on habits, Better Than Before. When I began reading the book, I began to yoga once more. I remembered how amazing it felt at the end, how serene life is when you bow down at the end. And so, I started an almost-daily habit - wiser, stiffer, and humbler than before.

I believe there is a transition period in everyone's life when you grow from being a young adult into the next phase of adulthood. I think that was what the past couple of years was for me, discovering my edges and most importantly, learning the art of letting go.

Till the next time fellow spiritual warriors, whenever that may be.

Challenge: The Happiness Challenge! and the British Military Fitness challenge

What an apt challenge to take on in the New Year! It's not like I've been particularly mopey or depressed, but everyone could do with a little more happiness in their lives. Plus, a quick look at the Gaiam TV's connect2happiness challenge requirements for Day 1, and it seems that this touches on a lot of self-exploration such as "What makes you happy" type questions and on how you can bring these things into your life.

Screenshot from the email I received... I'd love to be Happy every day!

I will be keeping a diary with every day's challenge questions answered and explored, and will post up my final results after 30 days. Will you be taking the challenge with me?

A happy body is a happy mind. What better way to keep your body fit and happy than this challenge by Tribesports? It's apparently created by serving or ex British armed forces personnel :O so if you fancy yourself saving some Private Ryans, then check this challenge out. (Ok, Private Ryan wasn't British... I just couldn't think of any British military TV shows... besides the last season of the Black Adder)

Click for a larger image, or visit Tribesports

You will need the space to do it though, those 10m lunges won't be easy to do in your lounge, or that 20m sprint for that matter. It's a mini-boot camp, without the price of a boot camp :)

Well, I'm taking up both of those challenges. Let me know if you'll be doing it with me.

Getting some weight off my shoulders

When I was a not so little girl, I grew up thinking that I was fat. For most of my high school years, I was 160cm, and 53kg. That's a BMI of 20.7 people (nowadays, even BMIs are not an accurate depiction of health). Back in primary school though, we had to go for physicals every year, and on the back of our physical examination book was a little chart which told you what ideal weight you should be at. An adult female of 160cm should weigh 46kg, a number which has stuck in my mind for many, many years.

It's hard being the fatter kid in Asia. Shopping for clothes was never flattering... I always had to shop for Large and Extra Large sizes. At most boutiques, they would only ever have one or two sizes for clothing, and most would not fit me. This was in the 90s - I do believe, and hope, that times are different now.

Moving to Australia was probably one of the best things to happen for my self esteem. For one, I was a size 6, before vanity sizing was even around! I was also away from some people who would constantly remind me of how "large" I was. In college, when my depression hit hard, one of my few joys was that my weight had plummeted to 48kg, only 2kg from my ideal weight!

It's scary, but true. I was a product of a weight-obsessed society. It's the same society that led to this girl losing 8kg to become 38kg, because at 46kg, she too, felt like the fatter girl in Asia. (See, it's not just me!)

A few things have changed for me this year. I'm not sure if it's because I'm just too old to care about body image issues, or if I really am older, but wiser, or if it came about from reading Nia Shanks' post. I began building up my fitness this year, initially wanting to lose weight. I mean, I was 50kg... that's 4kg overweight in my mind! At the start, I did lose some weight, but then the weight piling began, and the kilos weren't coming off. The last time I weighed myself, I was 54kg.

But you know what? I really don't care. I have never felt stronger, faster, fitter, and I like the muscle definition that I have going. I may be heavier, but I am leaner. I can do amazing physical things, and most importantly, I feel great.

Want to know why you shouldn't just weigh yourself?

Read the whole article on Tribesports

That's right. The TL;DR of that article is that weight is just a number, it can't tell you how awesome you are.

Clothes size-wise... I'm now a size 8, because my shoulders and chest are too built to squeeze into a size 6.
And guess what? I'm actually pretty proud of that.

The year that's been and the year that will be

I can't believe it's so close to the end of 2012! It only seemed a few months ago that 2012 had begun. 

Random fact: As you age, the days fly by a lot faster because your memory compresses all the mundane activities that you do (eg. going to work, eating etc) so time seems to have flown by when you look back. So, if you want time to slow down, start doing some X-treme activities! :P 

I've felt that 2012 has been (mostly!) a good year for me. This year, I 

• ran my first 5km (and busted my knee and foot doing it... but oh well!) 
• returned to my yoga practice, and successfully can execute my headstands and crows again. I think I'm at the level I was at when I stopped because of injury. 
• stopped using foundation, which has done tremendously wonderful things for my skin. 
• home-make about 80-85% of my meals 
• started this blog! 
• had a financially sound year. I have money in my piggy bank, woohoo! 

Here are my 2013 resolutions. 

I will stop making injuries worse! 

I just can't help myself. I keep wanting to exercise through injury. It's like I see it as the Universe presenting me with a physical challenge, and I always rise at a challenge. I've had so many joint injuries (and they are never any fun)... what I've learnt since is that the Universe is presenting a challenge. The challenge is to take it easy, and back off for awhile. That's definitely something I'm not good at! 

I will cut down on sweets. 

Hard to keep, but I know they're not good for me. It's hard being a teacher, because all students give you are chocolates! 

I will majorly cut down on my online time. 

Ideally, this should be about 1-2 hours a day. No more. 1-2 hours a day sounds like a lot of time. But in comparison to what I'm spending now, it really is a mere nothing. I read The Winter of our Disconnect not too long ago and it really inspired me, I was all ready to pull the plug and everything. Then, practicalitiy sank in and I realized that I would go absolutely bonkers. I reckon it's as hard as quitting smoking... 

I will not intentionally go over the speed limit when driving. 

I'm one of those people who just have to drive at 5km/h above the limit. No really, I even keep my eye on the gauge to make sure it's exactly 5km/h, talk about OCD! I think this has a lot to do with my personality type, of trying to rush through life... so I'm literally putting the brakes on! 

I will cut down on alcohol. 

I've been quite good this second half of 2012. I'm not sure if that's been because there have been little opportunities to drink anyway! In the New Year though, I'm going to monitor how much I drink when I'm out. 

I will be more charitable. 

I haven't decided how I will do this yet. Maybe some volunteering, although I'm not sure if I have the time! But isn't that what everyone says? I already have charities that I regularly donate to... but I feel like I should be doing more than just giving money. 

I will be kinder to everyone.

Apparently, this year, there have been moments where I have been overly aggressive to certain people. Unintentionally and unawares. I would like to have the compassion and strength to give everyone in life the respect that they deserve. 

Those are my 2013 resolutions! Do any of those echo with you? What are your hopes and dreams for 2013 and how do you think your year has been so far? 

To all my readers, have a wonderful holiday, whichever wonderful occasion you are celebrating and a Happy New Year. 

(Source)

CHRISTMAS GIVEAWAY

In the spirit of Christmas, I am hosting my first giveaway, which is Louise Hay's You Can Heal Your Life. This is an amazing book, full of positive affirmation activities. It helped me to get through some really tough times in life, and I can't think of anything better than to have it help someone else in their hour of need.

For reviews and testimonials about this amazing book, have a look at the Amazon site. This giveaway is currently only open to Australian residents, and closes 7 December. A winner will be drawn, and the winner will have 48 hours to contact me, after which a new winner will be drawn. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Eating A Farmer's Backyard

Alongside becoming a flexi-veggie, I've recently begun Sadie Nardini's 14-day detox program. I'll write a review on the program once I've completed it... in the mean time, here's what I had for lunch today.

You're looking at 3 carrots, 1/2 a cucumber, 1 cup spinach, 2 celery stalks with leaves, and 1/2 an apple. I even added some lemon juice, and then popped it into my liquidiser to make my smoothie. 

Unfortunately, my liquidiser doesn't blend as well as a blender does, so it ended up still quite clumpy and I had to eat it with a spoon. Not the best feeling in the world, eating vegetable mush out of a glass! Tastewise, it wasn't so bad, the apple taste was quite pleasant, and made everything a little sweeter. It's meant to be a power alkali green juice, but I thought it tasted suspiciously acidic.

The amount of vegies the recipe required yielded not one, but THREE low ball glasses worth of smoothie (or vegie pulp... whatever you prefer to call it). I only managed to get through one and a quarter... and that was through sheer determination.

On another note, my new reformed diet has really yielded a change in my skin. It's a lot clearer and today, I braved putting on loads of makeup, and am only going to work with tinted moisturiser and mascara, something which I haven't done in a long, long time.

The Herbi-Omnivore

I had a really bad tummy episode last week. Non-stop heartburn for over 24 hours, excruciating stomach pains... So, I decided to give up meat. Only during the week, I'll still have meat on the weekends or the poor bf won't cope I think, haha. I figured it'll be healthier, ethically more correct, and hopefully might help me lose some kilos. And not to mention, improve my skin!

It was a tough decision. I've eaten meat my whole life, and I love meat. All meats, to be honest. Luckily enough, I also love my vegies. I hope to at least be able to start working through this diet for a month. Little goals promise better success :)

Today, I made this very yummy Asian Ratatouille. I wasn't sure if I'd be full on it, but it's surprisingly quite filling, and oh sooooo tasty.

I'll make a post in a month's time to discuss how this new diet is going. I'm feeling positive, that's always a good start!

The Yoga Retreat Closest to Home

I've been feeling like I needed to get away for awhile, and longed so much to go to a yoga retreat. I went once to the Ghost Hill Road Retreat on one of the yoga detox packages and it was ah-may-zing. Beautiful scenes, delicious catered vegetarian food every day, fresh breakfast using home grown vegies and herbs...

After wallowing in self-pity for a bit, I had the lightbulb moment:

The home yoga retreat! 

In fact, it's not hard to create a yoga retreat at home, particularly if you are someone who lives alone. It will cost about 10% of the cost of going to an actual retreat, and you can do it all year long!

Suggested home retreat ideas: 

• DIY pamper session once a week. Light some candles, dim the lights, and have a warm, relaxing bath. Follow it with indulgent body butters like the Natio Meditate range.
  
• Do a yoga session a day, even for 30 minutes. If you're familiar with yoga and can work your own routine, then do this. Otherwise, check out inspiration on The Yoga Journal or yoga videos. My current favourite is Kundalini Yoga with Maya Fiennes: A Journey Through the Seven Chakras.
  
• Squeeze in 30 minutes of meditation daily. It's really not a lot, and there are many kinds to be explored. I'm currently in the process of checking out the Transcendental Meditation method.
  
• Go for a walk 2-3 times a week. Take a new route to the supermarket, or drive to your nearest regional park. I'm lucky enough to live by the beach... once on my walks, I saw this and it made my day.
  Envious much? 
  
• No take out food, no junk food. Prepare all meals yourself and enjoy the process!

Hope you find some benefit to establishing your own yoga retreat. Any more ideas to add?

Rebirth

Today is Day One of my brand new life. I decided to give my life a rehaul when a few nights ago, I discovered that I had been teeth grinding so hard in my sleep that I had cracked all the teeth in my lower jaw.

This calling is probably long time overdue. While I have not been unhappy in my life, I think a huge part of how I have dealt with past unhappiness has been to suppress and deny it. I really believed that if you didn't talk about the elephant in the room, no one would notice it is there, especially since it's the elephant in my private quarters, barred from the prying eyes of the public, where no one but me is allowed to tread.

And that's where the problem lay. I could see my own elephant, and while I refused to acknowledge it, subconsciously it was gnawing away at my inner peace, disrupting my health.

Recently, I've been feeling a heightened sense of isolation and loneliness. Perhaps this was what made my anxiety levels sky rocket, perhaps it was something else completely. I still do not know what it is that has made me so stressed that it is affecting my sleep at night.

I've always wanted to reform my life though, so tonight, I started my new program of eating healthily, yoga, meditation, exercise and taking time to appreciate everything I have in my life.

Today's meditation session lasted for 10 minutes. I'm still exploring the best meditation method to suit me. I've found meditating to music so far to be most preferred, although even with music, my mind was constantly scattered. I found thoughts of the past and future battling to dominate, and every now and again, I'd remember to be in the now. I felt calm when I finished though, and it left a positive vibe around the room.

So, these are my thoughts on my journey. I'd like to say something philosophically astounding, like it's not the destination that matters, but the journey... however, the destination does matter to me. I know where I would like to head and hopefully, I will find my path there.