New Chapter

Yesterday I celebrated my 1 year anniversary of moving to England. I have to say, it's been quite a year. From packing up my belongings and saying good-bye to the country I got used to calling home to settling down in a new country -- so much has happened. The biggest change has definitely been shifting from teaching in a university to teaching Jiu-Jitsu. As I continued to get more involved in Jiu-Jitsu training it was definitely something I wanted to do, but it wasn't something I saw becoming a reality so quickly.

celebrating my 1 year anniversary - I thought it would be fitting to wear a traditional Kuwaiti dress as a reminisced about Kuwait and planned for my future in London

The move and my adjustment to this new life has been good. I've taken it all in stride and I'm happy with where things are headed. That being said, I don't really feel like I've been myself over the past few months. I was kind of moving from one day to the next without really feeling fully focused. I'm hoping that now that I've moved into the new house and things are finally starting to fall into place that all that is about to change.

Today was the perfect day to start that change.

My 2nd year in England started with a renewed commitment to myself. I've spent a LOT of time trying to get the house sorted, doing tons of cooking, and running errands. While that aspect of my life will not change, what I want to do is reorganize how I'm handling everything. I found too many days to just pass by without me taking the time I need to get my own things done (studying, lesson planning, blogging, etc.). I also spend so much time prepping food for D and the household that I don't often take time to prepare proper meals for myself. I need that to stop. I am committed to eating 3 proper healthy meals a day. No more snacking as meals, even if it is on healthy foods. I need to eat properly.

In addition to all that, I joined a new gym! I actually went and signed up last week but today was my first day there. It felt good to be back to weight training.

The new gym is close to my house so that's quite convenient. It's fairly large - huge cardio section, a spin studio, an aerobics studio, several resistance machines and an ok size free weight area. They've got a lap pool as well as an indoor basketball court. It definitely has all the basics for a good workout. I think what it's lacking is a bit of character and atmosphere, but I'm going there to get in my workouts so I guess that doesn't matter too much. I'm also not too keen on the fact that I have to wear a wristband while I'm at the gym -- but that's a minor inconvenience too.

 a glimpse of part of the cardio section

I didn't want to take too many photos on my 1st day. 

 the wristband - is it really necessary?

I started off with a basic workout today -
dynamic stretching
warm-up on the treadmill
45 minutes weight training
cool down on the treadmill
cool down stretching

decided to wear a new pair of trainers to my new gym

It felt good to be back in the gym.

I'm hoping that this renewed focus and commitment to myself will help me reach my next set of goals.

New Beginnings

I woke up 45 minutes before my alarm this morning. I don't normally laze in bed, but I just was not ready to get up. Staying in bed is definitely the first risk of going off track with my day. As 7 a.m. rolled around, I started to think - It's so warm in bed. Do I really want to get up now? Maybe I need more sleep. - The little voice in my head would not stop! Luckily I shrugged it off and was out of bed and ready to start my day just a few minutes later.

Just that little incident made me realize how easy it is to get thrown off track, even when you've got the best of intentions! My excitement from yesterday hadn't dissipated, but still … the warmth of my bed nearly eliminated any chances of a successful, productive day.

Luckily that was not the case.

I made it to the gym for my morning workout. It had been a LONG time since I had been to the gym. In fact, I can't even remember the last time I did any weight training - probably sometime back in November or December. I definitely missed it.

After being away from weight lifting for so long, I was nervous about getting back into it. I was not looking forward to the soreness that was sure to follow in a couple of days. I was also not looking forward to noting down how much strength I had lost due to lack of training.

Still, I knew that the only way to rebuild my strength/muscle was to get back to it, so that's what I did.

back at the squat bar

The workout went a lot better than I thought it would go. I'm doing each exercise for 4 sets at 10 reps each. With the high number of reps, I wasn't expecting to be able to go super heavy ... definitely not at first. That being said, I'm pleased with how much I was able to lift today ... and I'm eager to see how the rest of the program goes.

After my lifting session, I got on the treadmill for an HIIT session. I decided to give the C25K program another try - after all, I was so close to finishing it before. I'm disappointed that I never completed it. I'm going to see how it goes - I hope my knees hold up. For today, it went well. I didn't go super fast on my jogging portions, but it was fast enough for me to be a bit breathless at the end. I'll keep upping the intensity gradually as I proceed through the program.

I ended my training with some core work, Jiu-Jitsu drills, and yoga. I had not done a deep stretching session in a long time and it felt really good. Even though I have been stretching daily as part of the whole life challenge requirements, today I spent 30 minutes stretching and using my foam roller. It was heavenly!

So my first day on my new routine went well. I was on point with my food plus I managed to cross off quite a few things on my list of things to do.

my foods for today

tea and dates in the morning, chicken, avocado, and sweet potato for lunch, shrimp lettuce wraps at night, coconut water and a banana muffin as a snack

(recipes for my meals to follow soon - they need a bit of tweaking first)