Blog Post #3 is here. I’m relying on my resilience to get past procrastination as I transition to regular blog posting! (Read the previous two posts to understand the reference). I’ve had a lot of great feedback from people saying they enjoy my writing and look forward to my blog posts. I’m thankful for that and am really enjoying this casual approach to regular writing. August was a busy month visiting friends and family all while keeping up with my workout program. A lot of people asked me about my workouts and what I’ve been doing to lose weight and improve my fitness. When I say “a lot of people”, I mean two…two people. So with that, I thought I’d share what I’ve been doing and what’s been working for me. I’m currently down 15 lbs (7kg) since January which is not an easy feat considering my love of craft beer and cheeseburgers (another post for another time).

For exercise, I challenged myself to workout consistently for a period of time. I work out in the gym twice a week for 20-40 minutes each session. Hey, that’s not enough!! I thought that but realized that working out an hour or more four to five times a week for a couple months and then not going to the gym for six months wasn’t working. I’ve been able to stick with this routine (and it’s always the same two routines) for over eight months now. It’s two sets of basic upper body exercises (push ups, pull ups, dips, dumbbell curls, shoulder presses etc.). It goes by quick, never seems daunting, and is now habit.

Strength training has never been my favourite form of exercise but the benefits are unquestionable. Muscle and bone strength, increased metabolism, and stress relief are just a few of the many benefits of strength/resistance training. Someone recently said to me, “Well, strength training is not for everybody.” That’s true but it is for every person who is capable of doing it! The benefits of strength training are pretty clear and all the science behind it is as sound as the theory of gravity, human flight, and light sabres.

I wish I could tell you that two strength sessions a week was all I’ve been doing. Time for that can be found. However, there’s more. Two people I have never met guide two more workout sessions which again are short and sweet. I do one cardio session focused on leg strength and a 40 to 50 minute yoga session every week. Dr. Izumi Tabata, a Japanese professor, created a high intensity interval workout now called Tabata training. What makes this workout so great is that it can be done anywhere and takes only four minutes! It consists of working as hard as you can at any given exercise for 20 seconds followed by 10 seconds rest repeated 8 times. Repeat: That’s a four minute workout!….and it can be gruelling if you put the effort in. I push it a bit more and do two rounds of four minutes with a mix of jumping jacks, seal jacks, jogging on the spot, squat jumps, jumping lunges, double knee hops etc. During my rest between rounds, I do some basic body weight leg exercises like squats and lunges. My full leg workout is done in 15 minutes…and it burns! For yoga, I used to attend large hot yoga classes once a week. Now, I am taught by my friend and certified Iyengar Yoga instructor, Brandon. He comes over to my place once a week to both teach and practice yoga in a more personal environment where I receive expert one on one instruction and encouragement. Iyengar Yoga involves detail, precision, and alignment often making use of props (chairs, mats, blocks, straps, kitchen sinks etc.) to assist with proper form. It was created by Bellur Krishnamacher Sundaraja Iyengar. You begin your practice by saying his name quickly three times stretching the tongue to its furthest limits. B.K.S. Iyengar was born in India and died at age 95 in 2014 leaving his legacy as “the father of modern yoga”. Iyengar Yoga has been great for me, a relative novice looking to maintain and improve my posture and flexibility.

So that’s what’s working for me. I can’t stress enough how important it is to do something you’re going to do consistently….even if you don’t exactly enjoy all of it. If it feels daunting, requires a huge amount of discipline, or motivation constantly wavers, I would advise changing it up, making it shorter, or find something that you enjoy more. FYI… I hate doing my leg workout but I have 15 minutes, I like the results I see, and how I feel.

With the more informative and serious tone of this post, I’m pleased to say that I have come up with an original joke….not easy, nor good. It’s cheesy enough that I expect that someone has already come up with it. However, I couldn’t find it on Google and it’s not like my jokes are going to be worth any money. Enjoy.

What made you decide to start doing yoga?

One day I just realized that I needed to improve my posture and I’m not getting any Iyengar.

Here it is! My second blog post. Prior to starting this blog and beginning to get into writing, I researched a lot of websites that explained how to become a writer. Many sites stated “START A BLOG” …so that’s what I’ve done. Several sites told me to blog every day. Blog every day? Who has time for that? That’s like a nurse showering all their six bed bound patients on a busy night shift….no nurse has time for that. Blog every day? I don’t think the internet horde is going to like that. My wife loves me and even she doesn’t want to hear from me every day. Once a month-ish seems more fitting.

It’s been a busy last couple of weeks. I had a story (my first) published by the website, The Mighty Nurse. Go to Published Work on the Menu and it’ll take you to my story. The punctuation was there when I sent it to them but somehow got lost in the posting. I’m still pleased with how it turned out and the responses it has gotten.

As exciting as my first published article was, it has also been a difficult time. My wife and I had to put down our cat, Misha May, whom had been with us for ten years. She was 11. I thought I would be ready. As a hospice nurse, I’ve seen the death of people and the immediate grief that follows from those left behind. Many years ago my very close friend died suddenly at age 31. I cried so much that day that my eyes remained blood shot for a week. How could I not be ready for the death of my cat? Pets simply don’t live as long as humans so we should all be prepared. I was not.

Misha May had been such a big part of our lives, our everyday lives, for such a long time. I should have known it would affect me significantly. After her death and the grief and pain that followed, I got to thinking about transitions. This is unquestionably a transition for my wife and I. She fed the cat every day. Misha was very vocal so we talked to her every day. Vet visits, brushings, litter box cleaning, hanging out together on the couch….she was so much more of our lives than I ever realized.

Transitions are often not all that easy…especially when forced upon us. In nursing school we covered transitions and with that looked at the concept of resilience. Resilience, our ability to cope and adapt, is a huge indicator of how our transition will go. When Misha initially died, I searched the internet to better understand the condition she had. However I soon realized that this was mal-adaptive and did not really serve a purpose. I needed to find a way to cope and transition.

I knew that living in the past and replaying “what-ifs” in my mind was not productive. I then chose to research and read stories of other people losing their pets. I found comfort in their words. I felt connected and not alone in my grief. From that I started to celebrate the amazing ten years we had with our beloved Misha. Looking at her life as whole allowed me to discover that it was worth every moment and that the sad end was such a short snippet of all she gave us and the time we had.

Change and transition is going to happen whether we’re ready or not…and even if we do nothing. “I change by not changing at all” – Eddie Vedder. With each experience like this that I have, I feel that my tool box of coping has another tool. My resiliency increases with each tool I gain and with each experience I can reference back to for healthy coping when change comes.

During this difficult past couple of weeks, I was unable to create an original joke to end this blog post. Instead, I’ve decided to steal a joke from my 6 year old nephew with my own tweak. Enjoy

Why did the banana call for the nurse?

Because it wasn’t peeling well.

First of all, thank you for visiting my website and reading what you’ve read so far. Today is the day. I’ve stopped the procrastination and am starting my writing career….well, sort of. It’s my blog which will hopefully lead to a career, albeit an amateur one…but you never know. My blog is about     fill this in later

So, as you can see, this is one of those blogs you just have to keep coming back to. If Jerry Seinfeld can hit it big writing and starring in a show about nothing, then this blog which will cover amazing topics like fill this in later will surely be a worthwhile endeavour that keeps people coming back for more.

In all seriousness, I must thank Tim Urban for inspiring me to write this post. It’s been a long time in the works….in my brain. I recently watched Tim’s TED Talk on YouTube when I was surely intending to do something else, something productive, life-altering, world-changing, or whatever. Instead ‘The Instant Gratification Monkey’ took over and I ended up watching one of the most amazing TED Talks I had ever seen. Tim speaks about procrastination, how it works, and the negative effect it has on people. I’m a former nursing student (now nurse). I thought I knew about procrastination. Tim speaks to deadlines playing a key role in overcoming aspects of procrastination but what if there are no deadlines? I have no deadline for writing this first post….or do I? As an experienced hospice nurse, I can confidently tell anyone putting things off…things they want to do….that there is a deadline! Check out Tim Urban’s blog at http://www.waitbutwhy.com and/or watch his TED Talk here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arj7oStGLkU

Back to my blog and what I’d like it to be…. Well, I’m a Registered Nurse with 5 years experience having worked in way too many areas. I’d like to think I have something to say about health. There’s way more to it than a “healthy diet” and “regular exercise”. Health encompasses so much more. Would I blow your mind if I said smoking cigarettes could be considered “healthy”? Before you send the hate-mail, know that I’m a non-smoker who does not believe anyone should smoke cigarettes. I’m just making the point that there are health benefits to smoking cigarettes such as stress management, reduced cravings, and temporary relaxation. There are even social benefits as smokers congregate together on work breaks and converse about the latest changes to the smoking laws. That being said, the negative health effects of smoking far outweigh the health benefits I just mentioned. Risk of cancer, COPD, and emphysema along with the stale smell, the hacking cough, the addictive component, and the financial hit make cigarette smoking an unhealthy habit that everyone should avoid.

My goal here is to write about lifestyle, mindset, health (including diet and exercise), and daily habits that lead to better, more productive, and happier lives. I’ll talk about what works for me. I’d also like to pass on a bit of what works for others I meet. My overall philosophy is that, unless you’re an Olympic athlete training hours a day or a Bodybuilding contestant needing to weigh all food before you consume it, we all need to find moderation in our lives. Too much of even good things can often leads to burn-out, resentment, and failure to adhere to our own principles and compromises our self-belief.

A big part of this blog will be a touch of humour. Life is both fun and funny. Laughter has been said to be the best pharmaceutical intervention that a physician can prescribe once a nurse has made them aware of an issue. So I will end this post with an original joke I wrote which was rejected by Reader’s Digest earlier this year. Enjoy.

In early December 2015, I was at a bachelor party where I asked the best man, “Why’s the groom getting married the day after the new Star Wars movie comes out? He should get married on the release date. Then he’ll always be able to say that he got married the day The Force Awakened!”

The best man said, “But what if it’s terrible??!!”

“Yeah I guess….and what if the movie isn’t very good either?”