Day 7 - Free Day or No Free Day

On old diet plans and workout plans, I had a free day. I kind of thought. Hey why not do that? Then I realized. Any day is a free day. I am being grateful for what I do every day. Should I need a total break, I will be grateful for that break. Should I feel continued inspiration in the arena of this plan, then so be it. To that end, I am grateful to have danced for 6 songs (20 min.), drank four glasses of water, eaten a small brownie in addition to four servings of fruits and vegetables, I journaled (forgot to mention that I did that yesterday, too), did my meditation and did my reading. Feeling very awesome.

Gratitude List
1) Brownies!
2) Mangoes
3) Poetry
4) Music
5) Paintings
6) Roger Federer
7) Daniel Craig
8) My long hair
9) electricity
10) French manicures

DAY 6 - My eating habits are really great

Wow! I spent a lot of time today watching tennis. Great fun. I'm very excited to mention that my back is really holding up nicely. I feel it getting a workout and those little cracks like in the physical therapy and even some muscle soreness so I'm building those muscles, but NO SHOOTING PAIN at all, and none of the unbearable muscle tightness either. I have other muscles that are more sore than my back. Yahoo! This is such great news. It means that I'll be able to get the most of my stick fighting lessons when I start. Maybe I'll start sooner than two weeks. I'm just too excited about it. IMAGINE! That will count as an entire HOUR of exercise, and I'll be learning something Filipino AND self-defense. It's amazing how the nature of WhatIs really takes care of things better than I can plan it. Today I drank all EIGHT glasses of water, danced for 12 songs (48 min), stretched for two songs (8 min) ate all SIX servings of fruits and vegetables, did my meditation and read my chapter. It's amazing. The closest thing I came to eating junk food today was a piece of white bread with a very little bit of peanut butter on it and coffee with some sugar and creamer in it. By switching my focus to what I'm doing instead of what I'm avoiding (because I'm not avoiding it, I can eat whatever I want, anytime I want) things just take care of themselves.

Gratitude List
1) Peanut Butter
2) scrambled eggs
3) Coffee
4) Tom
5) Lee
6) Monday night class
7) My MacBook
8) online banking
9) E-mails from readers of my website
10) Beautiful house designed by my Mom

Day 5

Yay. I've made it to DAY 5. I danced to 8 songs (28 min), did my writing, meditation, read my chapter, ate four servings of fruits and vegetables, and drank 5 glasses of water. I've gotten to talk to my friends and family a lot today and yesterday (like six hours total), so perhaps my drive to blog is a little less than normal. But I'm still here. Focusing and celebrating what I did do instead of what I didn't. Yes, there is always room for improvement. But I'm building on my successes. I'm feeling really great. I better hurry up and take before photos. I have some other before photos from when I started upping my spiritual work when I got here. Maybe I'll post those. MAYBE. Oh wait. Nobody is reading this anyway. :)

Gratitude List
1) My friend Briana
2) ATM machines
3) Kris Coleman
4) MySpace
5) Murphy's Flaw
6) The sound of the rain on my roof
7) Mom's dog, Fluffy (pronounced Floppy if you have a Filipino accent)
8) Favorable exchange rate from USD to Filipino Peso
9) http://www.my-thank-you-site.com
10) God-Spirit-Love-Universe-the Nature of WhatIs

Stick Fighting - Day 4

Happy Fourth of July everybody! Today while I was at our lawyer's office here in the Philippines, Mom and I were talking to the security guard. I was excited to discover that he teaches Filipino stick and knife fighting to the local police and gives private lessons. I have been dying to learn a martial art, and he is available for daily private lessons. In six weeks of daily lessons he says (even with my spinal condition), I'll be able learn some of the basic self-defense moves for stick fighting. I am even more eager to get my strength and physical stamina up to par so I can make the most of my lessons. I could never afford daily, private lessons in the States. So, for the next two weeks, I'm really going to work on my stamina and strength training so I can be better prepared to learn Stick Fighting. I may even get to learn Knife Fighting basics after that!

To me, it is amazing, because I've always been a bookwork and as my friend Jeremy Kramer used to say a "mathlete." When I was on the road a lot for standup, I felt really vulnerable driving around late at night. Now that I'm planning to go on the road more when I return to the States instead of just performing in Los Angeles, I'll feel so much safer if I had some self defense techniques.

Today, I had 5 servings of fruits and vegetables, 5 glasses of water, did my meditation, journaling, ready my chapter, and danced for 10 songs (40 min.).

My Gratitude List
1) Discovering a teacher
2) Air conditioning in my bedroom
3) Stamps.com
4) Joel Goldsmith
5) Bethel House
6) My newfound dedication improving my fitness
7) DKNY perfume "Be Delicious"
8) long baths
9) Wimbledon on television
10) Josie our housegirl

DAY 3 Claiming a victory

It is 3am here in the Philippines. I am claiming a victory today, because that is what this is all about. There is tons of room for improvement, but this is about what I did do--not what I didn't. And TODAY I ate all 6 servings of fruits and vegetables. Drank 6 glasses of water. (and as a result have had no diet coke. Weird. I drink anywhere from 1-2 liters a day. My head hurts a little.) Danced around my room for 7 songs (30 min). Stretched for 2 songs. (7 min) and did some VERY light work with the weights. My meditations are done, and on Tuesday mornings I have a spiritual class I attend via teleconference so I will be subbing that for my chapter today as the lecture is an excess of an hour with a discussion.

The interesting thing about counting what I do instead of like saying not eating sweets or junk food or cutting down caffeine is really interesting. There is this bag of chips on top of my refrigerator. Now, I am able to eat a bag of chips on this "plan" thing I'm doing, but each time I looked at it I actually said in my head, but if I'm hungry I can eat that banana over there and have another shot at getting in all my fruits and vegetables today. The same thing came up at dinner. It was asked what I would like, and I thought, "Hey if I can get a vegetable dish as the main course I could totally get all my fruits and vegetables in today." And I did. No sacrificing. No temptation. Just a switch in focus. I could go and eat that bag of chips right now, but I'm actually too tired from working out. :)

Since no one is reading this, I am feeling like I may take a before photo. Sometimes I wonder how much this is going to work and then I remember, it's always exactly enough. You are enough always.

Gratitude List
1) water
2) bananas
3) iTunes
4) Skype (cheap long distance)
5) the modern wonders of teleconferencing
6) google
7) chop suey
8) Adam Waters
9) Suzette
10) Robb

Day 2 Feeling very silly and but I'll keep on stepping

I'm feeling very vulnerable and silly right about now. There are several things that I am actually very proud about, but I feel silly writing about it. I started this thing yesterday at 8pm. I'm proud of myself, because I could have waited another day, you know, to "start it right." But I did not. There is no right. I read somewhere that the only thing you have in the world is this moment, yourself, and a choice. There is a flaw in that theory, but there is also a lot of truth. I'm grateful that I did choose to just start. This is about not being perfect and just doing what I can as I can. There is so much to write about it every bit of it and yet none of it seems relevant. It's hard to describe what I'm doing. I may not even know. But yesterday, I managed to eat four servings of fruits and vegetables, dance around my room for a half hour, did five minutes of stretching, and drank four glasses of water. Plus, I read a chapter from one of my spiritual books despite not being in any mood to do so. Oh and I did my meditations and journaling on both days, too.

Today, which is not over, I've eaten five servings of fruits and vegetables, drank three glasses of water, danced for forty minutes and done five minutes worth of stretching. I'll add some weight stuff tomorrow. Very light stuff.

Here's the deal. I've never been very active, but always had the good fortune to take my good health for granted. I was in a car accident a few years ago and suffered some nerve damage on my left side and spinal injuries. It types a lot more drastic than it sounds, but it really screwed with my head. There were some very scary days when I couldn't move and walk. This is not about those days. It is about how those days affect me now. I've been grateful to be able to walk and sit up without pain. There are entire days when I don't even hurt and even forget that it ever happened. (except when I get into a car, of course, but that's a whole other story). Quite simply, exercise hurts sometimes. I learned in physical therapy, which pains aren't serious and other pains that are damaging. One really good physical therapist explained to me in a way I could understand. She told me that I don't do the exercises to decrease the pain, I do it to increase my functioning. Then as a side effect of increased functioning, I will hurt less. But now that there are days that I don't hurt, I like it. And some days, I'm a little afraid to hurt again. Like I just don't want to. But I cannot afford to go for temporary comfort and miss out on the bigger picture, you know?

Anyway, at the time of the accident I was surprised to realize that I did not have a great deal of advanced coping skills for pain. My thinking was to just pretend like it didn't hurt. I wound up getting re-injured during my many months of physical therapy. I learned a lot about the way I deal with emotional pain as well. My plan has always been, everything is fine, keep on moving. When that didn't work, I was wrought with fear and babied my injuries to the detriment of my improvement as well. But, I've learned a lot about me. And I've been opening doors to a lot of buried grief, sadness, and even anger. It has been an amazing, frightening, and enlightening experience. I did not realize that holding in all of those feelings also kept me from experiencing joy, happiness, and love. There were days when great things would happen, and I would think to myself, "Why am I not happy? Why don't I feel anything?" And yet, since my recovery from my accident and other things, I have felt an amazing amount of joy from just walking down the street or saying hello to somebody or buying a soda at the 7-11. It's so strange.

I think of it as a well of feelings that I've never felt just opening up. It has been an amazing experience. I am grateful for it. Some days, like today, are very emotional. But, I don't think all this coming out is a bad thing. It couldn't come out if it wasn't in there, and I've found that the most difficult thing about pain, be it emotional or physical, is the fear that I will be overwhelmed and consumed by it and never come back. But I'm no longer as afraid as I once was, and am very grateful to have this time to be able to realize that there is enough time to take care of myself. And that I don't have to be better to be worthy or be happy. I just am and there is no need to judge it. And yet, if I believed and was able to realize all that was true, I highly doubt that I would feel so embarrassed and silly about this blog. But I keep on going, because this is what's next. A person I hold in high regard described the spiritual journey to be something like walking up a staircase in the dark. You just keep on stepping up, never knowing which one is the last step. So here I am typing to no one or maybe just me or just you--stepping in the dark.

Today's Gratitude List (Goal To do 10 or more daily and try not to repeat)
I am grateful for:
1) This time to work on myself
2) Internet connection
3) iChat
4) My friend Brett
5) diet coke
6) Tears
7) My Mom
8) blogger.com
9) SiteSell
10) My Sister
11) My brother
12) Memories of my Dad

Okay it's July 1st, here in the Philippines, and I'm doing a gratitude experiment. Being grateful in my life has really helped me find new coping mechanisms to life's challenges and deal with a lot of grief and old bottled feelings from the past. I'm in the Philippines taking a break from Los Angeles and stresses of being an artist and attempting to adapt to working in corporate life. I've started my own business and have been focusing on my spiritual program for the last three months. I now am feeling ready to try and tackle, with the help of a power greater than myself, an attitude of gratitude in the arena of self-care as it appears in my physical body. This journal is going to document that progress. I'm experimenting with posting photos to see if I can take some before and after pics. I've been inspired by a guy named Adam Waters who's program is very inspiring and INTENSE. I am not so intense for a number of reasons. But if you really want to see somebody go all out and really GO FOR IT, (because my way will be significantly more me and hence a hell of a lot let disciplined) you REALLY HAVE TO CHECK HIM OUT. Plus his page has got tons of photos and stuff. He's super cute, too. I'll outline my plan, which involves keeping track of my meditation attempts, spiritual reading (haha a fitness plan with a reading list) incredibly light weight training, stretching, cardio in the form of how many songs can I dance around in my room too (yeah that's right), and my diet plan. (My goal is to eat six servings of fruits and vegetables a day and 8 glasses of water.)

Here is the rule. I get to be down, I get to be happy, but I get to be grateful for any ounce of progress (and here's the kicker) refrain from beating myself up at all costs. I've been learning to appreciate and be grateful for all of my little quirks and peculiarities and even my flaws, and so, I'm going to keep pushing on regardless of outside numbers or momentary setbacks and really taking to heart a phrase that has allowed me to turn my life around, "progress not perfection." If you're reading this. I thank you. Let's see how much it works.