Fitness Friday's - Or Not Another Fitness Blog! Ugh!

I was working on what I was going to write for today... maybe an anti Super Bowl screed. Not because I actually hate the Super Bowl. I actually think the game is ok, the commercials are interesting, and parties are fun to go to. But because I wanted to be contrarian. There I said it... I like to make people nervous.  Now that I got that off my chest I figured I would go in an entirely new direction for today.

I know last week I posted "Fitness Friday" on my social media.  And to be honest I haven't been going like I should have been. There have been a million reasons for this. But I decided that I'm going to stop giving myself excuses and take Fridays to blog about my fitness update.

So right now I'm going to lay out all my goals for the weeks ahead, and then I will keep myself accountable through this to follow through on them. I will also be talking about the things I chose to do during workouts for the day, and the process I took doing them. Finally I'm going to be covering my meal plans. Try not to judge me too much. I still eat meat.  So I'm not turning vegetarian here but I've lost weight before without having to do that.

I'm also not giving up Diet Coke.  I'm going to take a whole paragraph for the haters of Diet Coke. If you hate soda altogether I'm ok with that. I understand your misgivings, and your aversion to drink it, especially after the video depicting the miraculous way it cleans pennies. (As does Taco Bell hot sauce and that saved someone's life before... just saying)  But for those who still drink Coke as if it's somehow a better drink, while running around telling people Diet Coke causes people to gain weight, I have a thing to say. I lost almost 100 pounds before while still drinking the Diet Coke. So for me, it's not about Diet Coke or its properties. It's about my will power. Besides, if my only vice is Diet Coke, I'll deal with it.

As far as exercising this week, I'm going to do a half hour of cardio and an hour of weights. I don't Have a specific schedule as far as working on arms, legs, or abs.  Maybe I will make that along the way but this is the first day of my goal setting so I will cut myself some slack.  My goal is to be able to go five times a week but I will be happy with four if I get back into the habit. I used to do two sessions a day, six days a week so I know I'm not pushing myself too hard, or trying to lose weight too quickly.  I'll put the specifics of what I did in the weekly blogs later.

Also this coming week I'm going to make sure my caloric intake does not go above 2000 calories. This should allow me to lose some weight by the diet alone. I don't want to lose too fast, but my goal is to get to 200 lbs by the end of June. This means regular exercise. I know this takes dedication but it can be done and I have done it before.

I'm going to track my food choices every day for the week and hopefully I will start making better ones. Planning and preparation are going to go into this and if I can inspire anyone else to doing this, I will consider the whole thing a success. This does not mean that this is going to become a fitness blog.  This is my weekly personal journal about getting into shape, preferably not the round kind.

I know that when I have my daughter, things will be difficult, and this has been what has derailed my exercise regimen in the past. But I don't intend to let that happen this time. I'm doing this whole exercise and diet for my daughter and not in spite of my daughter. I still want to be healthy enough to keep up with my daughter as she gets older and wants to do bigger things. I want to be healthy enough so that when she gets married I can do the daddy daughter dance and not embarrass her. (This might also mean dance lessons but shhhh!!! One big hurdle at a time.) I want to focus on the right things that make me into the person that draws people to me. And I believe improving my health is the start of this.

I'm not going to try to do some fad diet to then push some companies stuff on my blog. I'm also not going to try to induce some celebrity to complain about my blog to get notoriety. (Even though I know you want to Christian Bale and Channing Tatum. You.  Want.  To. Or maybe I just meant Kevin Hart.) Someone already did that with the Rock and it is not my intent here.

I'm doing this for me, and maybe to inspire a few of you. I know I'm going to screw up at times and eat a cheeseburger at McDonald's.  But I'm laying down my marker here. I challenge you to change up something that you do for the next 21 weeks. And I want to hear about your successes or failures during this time. I'll be here tracking my progress every Friday so that's my pledge to you, and to myself.

So here I am again, on the precipice of Super Bowl Sunday, signing off.

David Elliott, Single Dad's Guide to Life

If you like my writing, I continue to blog at singledadsguidetolife.wordpress.com