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Trying to maintain a form of grace amidst the pains
Keeping regular updates are extremely difficult when I’m on tour…working 17 hour days. And then the brief two or three days I have off are filled with circus training, other work and attempts to rest. Therefore, now that I have been graced with a PlayBook…and finally figured out how to use it in a semi workable fashion, I am undergoing the challenge of updating in between dances at my emcee work. You heard me, I am doing crazy multitasking. As if I am not making things tough enough for myself already… Result? I already threw numerous tantrums over the past weeks.
Part of me wants to put the last couple weeks of my 90 day challenge on hold until I finish this gig…because my physical body, if nothing else (and there are obviously other things) is being affected despite my best efforts. I sit on my bum for hours on end, don’t eat my regular diet, don’t sleep enough, and I am stressed stressed stressed! I look in the mirror, and I feel ashamed. I feel frightened that my body will revert back to its old shape, having once been so comfortable in it, just like all other times. Working on the idea of acceptance is much harder amidst the slim and toned figures of dancers and also my circus colleagues. What has helped me make it easier, is knowing that everyone has something they are self conscious of. Furthermore, in the words of a colleague and friend, nothing is more beautiful than seeing the confidence of a larger girl rock them short shorts on the stage of this dance competition. That power is one in a million, and declares all bodies are beautiful when they are respected and cared for, and can dance with the presence of a goddess.
But as someone who wears their heart on their sleeve, and used to communicating about all emotions and issues, I have been feeling smothered by this current set of situations. My work environment is tough, my relationships are tough, my circus is tough, and finally, finding the strength and staying present despite it all is tough. Devastatingly, I already have fallen below the line and acted like a raging tween in moments of weakness. Funnily, I then got more upset because I knew how immature it was, and that others witnessed it (“I am NEVER like this!!!” I exclaimed in rage to a fellow colleague after a cry, “I’m usually the blunt one! I’m the leader! $?@#!!!”), further perpetrating my public demise.
Body rebelling a bit here…but it’s from the mind
Damage done, I can only leave those pieces behind like discarded snake skin, and move on. What I realize, and I encourage you all to hear me, that no amount of words will ever fix what has happened. In fact, it often comes off like excuses, or a crutch. Last thing anyone wants to be considered as, is one who “talks the talk, but doesn’t walk the walk. “
It’s a challenge. Many of us, and certainly I, are victims of the spotlight effect, where we think everyone is laughing at us behind our backs, judging our unwashed hair, or strategically leaving us out of activities. Oftentimes, they are merely fictions of our own mind. And if not, do we frankly want a fulfilling relationship with them anyway? Easier said than done, but from my same colleague with whom I’m working, we need to learn sometimes to put that temporary wall up to protect ourselves, and brush off our own personal issues. It is the ultimate demonstration of our professionalism. And also from her, “believe only half of what you see, and none of what you hear.” Brilliant words.
Not to say it is simple. Even she has had really huge moments of struggle, and I have seen her tough times, but in offering words of advice, it helps us to remember those practices ourselves.
I cannot undo what I have done, but in the practice of acceptance, I will not continue to mope over it. Carrying the burden will only lead to a bleaker future. In the practice of being present, I will stop creating stories, and focus on my own self and my duties versus a reflection of myself through reading everyone else around me. I remember my qualifications, my talent, my strength. If people do not believe me (either from my past or, sadly, because they are judgmental and demeaning), I will demonstrate it. I will show that I am better than my demons, and also can change for the better. Actions are more powerful than a thousand empty words, no matter how well meaning. Let the world see that I can stand taller despite my past, despite my priors, and that I am definitely someone people should keep an eye out for. There will be a spotlight on me, but this time it is on my terms, and I will welcome it.
Last 90 Day Transformation Entry
Another week just loaded with so much to do that I’m behind on my posts. But here it is. I blame the tax season.
I think that this post might be directed at me more so than at any of you, dear readers. But please take what you may from it, because whatever I feel, someone else must feel it too, right?
This has been a week full of challenges. And when I am faced with a challenge, I always meet it head on. Attacking any new challenge usually ends with one of two results for me personally – success or failure. And as I struggled with the muscle conditioning class of my brand new circus training, and squeaked and wailed as I tried to pull myself up on the spinning hoop, I felt an immense sense of failure. I consider myself a rather strong woman. My weight training, backpacking, martial arts and yoga is testament to that. None of that strength showed its face when I struggled pathetically through my classes. Despite the encouragement of my instructors, and being assured that I’m really strong for a beginner, I could not help but burst into tears when I failed to haul myself into an inversion yet another time in hoop class. I had to walk away, take deep breaths to calm myself, and then put my mind back into a You-Can-Do-It set.
I had not felt so utterly defeated in a long time. And I felt it more so because of the confidence I had in my strength. I don’t think I would have felt so deflated if I had failed at something I was
And sometimes...we need to see where we began, to know what we have accomplished. I had felt a little defeated in how slowly my body has been changing, and so I thought I'd put it in perspective.
completely unprepared for such as…advanced accounting. What happened at circus really attacked my ego.
And then my friend, who has been at circus much longer than I had, asked me, “Why are you so afraid of failing?”
I uttered the usual reasons, fear of judgement, fear of not being worthy, fear of not belonging…etc. etc. And then she said, “You can’t be afraid to fail. You can’t succeed unless you fail. People aren’t going to stop loving you because you failed.” Something along those lines.
And then she told me that I am way, WAY too hard on myself.
What I know about myself is that my fear to fail stems from levels of external security. I think my unwillingness to fail is definitely a weakness. She is correct. Without failure, we cannot change and develop. When I competed in chess years ago, my instructor told me that we learn a lot more when we lose a game, than when we win a game. I have associated the word failure with so many other negative attributes, that I forget that failure also means opportunity to grow and learn.
Last Week’s Blog Entry
Back in the day, before I knew how to battle exhaustion properly!
Whew! Has it been one heck of a week! Performing 15-16 hours a day as an MC for 3 days is a pretty intense job! We were up at 5:30am in the morning, and did not leave the theatre until past 11pm. Do not get me wrong, it was a very fulfilling experience, as with all my performance work, and I got to see some astounding young people dance like I have never seen before. But by mid-Sunday, I felt very justified treating myself to a small Coffee Crisp and also a Sweet and Salty nut bar.
Being an MC is a challenging experience. Especially when doing competitions because things change around all the time, and I have to think up speeches on the fly when suddenly a dance is put on hold, an item is missing, calling a studio, etc. etc. And I have to do it calmly and concisely, even when the rest of backstage is in chaos. Not only that, my cold reading abilities had to be absolutely spot on, which becomes difficult when I hit a low point in the day, and my exhaustion finds its way to my tongue. I am born in Canada and fluent in English, but there were certainly moments when I felt my ESL come through as words wrapped their way around my tongue and then knotted it.
When we are working such long hours and under stressful conditions, it is so important that we remain alert, calm and focused. However, we are increasingly relying on a variety of crutches to carry us through the day(s), and we ultimately pay the price at the end, whether that end is after a show, or 30 years down the road.
For me, with only 1-2 cups of coffee (and the second cup was a dark roast always, much lower in caffeine and never past 4pm) and those two treats on Sunday, I knew the practice of how to stay focused during long stressful hours. I packed a multivitamin drink that I consumed every day, packed my Vega Optimizer that I shook up in a smoothie cup for snacks, and when we ordered our lunch and dinners, chose as wholesome a meal as possible (eg. fish with no butter, salad, vegetable soup, whole wheat veggie wraps). I packed clean protein bars, Manuka Honey for my throat, ate nuts and drank lots of herbal tea.
But that’s not easy for the average person to do. As I observed over the weekend, I watched people deteriorate before my eyes as their coffee intake increased, smoking increased, drinking pop increased, the energy drinks got busted out, junk food habits increased as they found any method possible to try and spike their energy in the midst of exhaustion. And when their blood sugar crashed after all this processed and refined food, they had splitting headaches and they would reach for painkillers. And such would continue. In moments of exhaustion, it is so simple to do what we had been conditioned to do for years, consume more unhealthy stimulants until our body says, “NO MORE!” and we crash spectacularly. It is almost like we are looking forward to that giant crash where we vanish for 24-36 hours post productions.
Except that one day, that crash will be rather permanent.
Those cycles of exhaustion do not merely last those 2-3 days when we are filming a movie, doing a production, studying for an exam and so on. We carry the burden and body stress of that cycle with us when it is all over. Our bodies take at least 21 days to reset our metabolisms; thus, that would be the absolute minimum time required to flush all that junk our of our bodies, if our bodies don’t shut down first. Health problems like back aches, kidney problems, liver problems, systemic inflammation…all arise as part of not respecting our bodies in our highest points of stress. Thinking logically, if we are under such huge mental stress, the last thing you want to do it make your body go through stress as well.
Examining the less extremes to just the daily life of those who sleep late, and work 9-5 jobs…those cycles will eventually carry over many years, and at the ripe age of our 30s and 40s, we become ill.
I can go on and on but I still stop. I think we get the idea. Small things can accumulate into big things until whammo! We don’t get sick because we turn 50, we get sick because of the things we did when we were in our 20s and 30s. Take care of that body. We only have one body. There are many other ways to fuel it. I’ll drop a short list here:
- WATER – Hydrates the brain! Also the body. We often mistake dehydration for cravings/hunger.
- Nuts – Good fat. If you’re going to be eating chips and getting all that fried oil, you might as well be eating nuts.
- Fruit – Sugars, but far better than refined sugar, and you get nutrients and fibre too.
- Tea – If you need a bit of caffeine, green tea. But herbals are fantastic because you get some flavour and it’s more hydrating and detoxifying.
- Protein bars – Look for ones without refined sugar. I like Genuine Health, Vega, or Simply Bar. They provide a quality snack and the protein keeps you fuller longer. I wouldn’t eat more than 2 a day though. Many protein bars have too many sugars…and it’s still a processed food.
- VEGETABLES – Like water, this should speak for itself. Rich in nutrients, fibre, water and…well…c’mon it’s a vegetable!
- Vitamin C or Electrolyte Drink – I take Emergen-C, or my MAX multivitamin. Powder to liquid supplementation is always best because your body absorbs it right away, and it gives you a healthy boost of energy and providing the nutrients your liver desperately needs under high stress.
- CLEAN energy drink – if you REALLY need one, only then do I recommend taking an energy drink, and I would get one without refined caffeine as their energy source. There was one I took years ago but I cannot remember the name anymore sadly. The one I currently take is MAX ATP, which is a clean cellular energy. It doesn’t spike the body as much as eliminate fatigue, which is awesome.
Getting happy! It's almost spring! Shed that winter fluff!
In a nutshell, break that cycle! You do not want it carry over into years.
I really feel I am making headway with my body transformation. My clothes are looser on me, and I recently did an audition video in short sleeves. I’m usually very, very self conscious of the size of my arms, but when I saw the video, I was taken aback by the definition on them. I felt very happy. Also, when borrowing my mother’s coat today, I noticed it fit very nicely. I had been hesitant to wear it because I remember how it bulged the last time. Glorious moment!
Career wise? I’m overjoyed at my MC gig…I’m being paid well, and I get to use my voice, which is a fantastic stepping stone towards my superobjective as a voice actor. I had an audition for Young People’s Theatre today, and I think I rocked the audition. Even if I do not land a position (but I think I will! Crossing fingers!), no regrets because I performed my heart out. More auditions to come!
I do not remember if I posted this, but I got officially nominated as one of the Leading Edge Artists Under 25th for the Kitchener Waterloo Arts Awards. I am so honoured by this opportunity and it truly justifies all that I have been working hard for since I changed my career path when I was 16 from becoming an electrical engineer to the arts. I submitted all my supporting paperwork and media last week, and so now it’s in someone’s hands until June. I thank everyone who has helped me on my journey, and supports me til this day.
Last week’s post! Check my blog page for the rest!
- 90 Day Transformation – Week 8 – Planting Seeds of Success (mirokitong.wordpress.com)
This is going to a teeny tiny post compared to the long monologues I tend to write. It’s been a really, really busy week and soon to be busy weekend! It does not help that my condo is nearly 30 degrees Celsius since they have yet to turn off central heating despite the unnaturally warm Toronto spring.
My announcer gig begins today, and I’m rushing around trying to finish packing before heading off to Chatham with my new team! I’m really nervous and excited. After lots of time spent on the floor and in proximity of others in a Butoh Workshop this past weekend (hopefully I will have time to blog on it cause it was fabulous!), I got myself a sore throat. But with the lovely help of manuka honey, oregano oil and Cellgevity, I was able to nip it in the bud in two days! 3 cheers for natural products!
What has happened this week, I realize is the skyscraper building itself on the foundation I had laid over the last few months. It has been a struggle…but we all know that while the foundation of a building often looks extremely unimpressive, it is the reason why 30 stories of building can remain standing. Business for the company for which I’m an associate is picking up, as people come back to me expressing interest. These are people I had spoken to back in November and December. I remember thinking, with 2 months of lack of interest, I wondered if I had made the right decision to join the company. And while I kept the faith, because I truly believed in the quality of its products, this sudden roll of success is the justification for all that I had
I forgot to draw a face this week 
stood for.
I remember when I took a workshop with one of USA’s largest casting directors, Jane Jenkins (Transformers, Harry Potter, Jurassic Park), she told us that attending an audition is not always about getting the role. It’s about meeting the people, and leaving a favorable image as we leave. Laying the seed for a future role.
And in relation to my body, it is the same thing. Before I can run 10km, I have to learn to walk. I took a friend out running this week, in my support of him and his journey to better health. After ten minutes of running, I had to drop him to a power walk. What is important, however, is that he was doing it. It does not matter if we are running, or walking. We all have to start somewhere. Fitness athletes did not get to where they are from overnight. When I first started my practice of yoga years ago, I could barely touch my toes. Now, I can fold completely in half.
Success doesn’t just happen like a miracle. It takes steady work, tenacity and laying the seeds. Like a garden, it needs a little TLC to grow.
Last Week
My new shoes! 
Asics Gel-Kayano 17 - Stability Runners
I don’t think it’s talked about often enough…but after getting a new pair of running shoes, the proper equipment can REALLY go a long way for fitness! After one run, I had upped my speed by 0.3 miles/hour on average for both my slower pace and also at my fastest pace. I was also able to also extend the amount of time I ran without fatiguing.
Running shoes should be replaced every 6-12 months, or 500 kilometres. Whether we notice it or not, shoes, like everything else, break down over time. If we are going to be putting our full 110-200 pounds of body weight on them everyday, and making them carry us everywhere, should we not treat them with respect? And forget the feet, think of everything else in our body that improper footwear will also affect! Ankles, knees, hips, back, butt, neck…to name a few. There is never just ONE thing affected when we do something to our bodies. In fitness, where we are putting our bodies through physical stress (good stress!), lifting weights and so forth, the last thing we want to do is damage it. Too many permanent sports injuries already exist…let’s try to eliminate it. Besides, imagine how many more calories we can torch when we are running faster! Invest in good footwear! You can wear an ugly t-shirt. It’s going to be sweat stained and smelly anyways by the end of the workout.
How to find out what shoe is best for you? Go to the Running Room and get yourself checked out! You don’t have to buy the shoes there, but at least the trained staff can take a look at your feet and running gait to determine what kind of shoe is best for you.
As I’m struggling with some post PMS water retention and bloating this week, and also taking responsibility for my “treats”, I’m feeling a little desolate about my body shape. I can hear Geneen Roth’s (Women, Food and God) words to me over and over, “It’s not about the weight, but it’s not about the weight.” Our relationship with food and our bodies should not centre around our physiques alone. It’s about our core happiness and health. I remind myself that despite not “transforming” as physically fast as I wish (and I’m an impatient biddy), I definitely feel more flexible and strong than I have since I’ve started. I’ve also been running consistently faster and longer. Those should be the results that matter.
Head looks sorta big in the profile picture...
Sometimes I think that the mere stress over my weight is what is keeping the weight on. Stress is a major factor for abdominal fat…and I am a HIGH STRESS individual. Adding more undue stress about my physique just seems silly. And yet it happens. Recently, when such thoughts take place, I go to the mirror and stare at myself. In the past, the moment this happened, I hated myself. REALLY hated myself. Thoughts like, “You stupid fat cow” or “God, you are ugly” tracked through my head like a loudly tooting train horn, just waiting to take me off the mental cliff. So now, I practice staring at myself. If those thoughts go through my head, I let them run until they stop. Eventually they do, because as I stare (and even if it’s forever), I stop seeing the subjective visions of my body, and it just becomes a body. I might even forget its mine…a body is a body. And when I return, I practice acceptance.
People have talked to me about affirmative speaking. I am not a believer of that; regarding my body anyway. Acceptance is easier. It means taking myself for what it is, right now, faults and all. And once I accept, I can develop. We cannot move forward if we don’t accept it. Because not accepting it is denying the reality or the truth. Accepting means also taking responsibility (and I blurbed about this briefly before). So yes…it’s not about the weight but it’s not about the weight…
I sometimes think of a colleague’s words to me, “All babies are born perfect in the world. There is only one like him/her, and there is nothing more special than that. Babies value themselves completely when they are born, and are not afraid to do what they want to do.” I’m not a baby anymore. But sometimes, I think I need to be reminded of the values that I had as a baby. Education, society, media and who knows what else distorts my vision and opinions…but those are external influences. I think that’s most valuable is the vision we had before anything came to ruin it.
Some great transformations to note this week:
- Had some one on one connections with new people..and scheduled some one on ones for next week.
- I completed two grant applications…a feat and laying the foundation for the future
- Working on songwriting/composing again
- Officially nominated as Leading Edge Artist for the KW Arts Awards this year (if that is not the marking of a transformation of career, I don’t know what is!)
- Running faster and longer
Past Posts of 90 Day Transformation
I feel really ashamed to say that I missed writing an entry last week.
The hardest thing about transforming my entire life, physically, career wise, and mentally is that oftentimes I get stuck with only one focus for a period of time while sacrificing other aspects.
My mind has been fried these past two weeks. I also have been having stressful dreams every night, which left me tired and grumpy. Reaching that fantastic PMS time of the month as well was the cherry on the proverbial cake.
The strangest thing is that I do not feel that stressed when I am awake. I move from task to task to task with the same energy and dedication that I always do without feeling frazzled. My mind was constantly whirring, but not until last Friday night did I feel overwhelmed. Only in my sleep did the stress make itself apparent. And in my skin…I broke out in pimples that I could not merely blame on my hormones.
Running out of funny faces to make!
In terms of accomplishments, I feel like I’ve done a lot. I have been attending a good number of auditions, meeting with many colleagues and friends and I’m always on the go. But what I need to learn is how to value my rest time better. At the end of this week, I am feeling rather drained. I don’t think it would have been that bad if I had decent sleep…but no decent sleep means an unhappy worker. The reason for poor sleep is stress (whether I was aware of it during my waking hours or not). And stress is because I had been overworking. The solution? I need to schedule a little time off for myself. That does not mean sit around at home all day, but it means at least I’m not out of the house at 7am and back in it at midnight every single day. The last time I tried to do a whole day of nothing, I actually ended up feeling restless all day…I do not mind spending one day doing some exercise and writing. So, still active, but to my terms.
A few weeks back, I mentioned that I was going through a change that I didn’t want to mention yet because people close to me did not know. I handed in my notice to the health food store I was working at and I officially finish this coming week. I had been there for a year and have bonded with many people, and learned so much. It has been a hard decision and even harder to part with everyone. But I had become distracted from my career as a performer, and now is the time to return.
I will struggle a bit financially (and I feel embarrassed when I say this because I have always been one who was self reliant), I will make it through. I’ve been auditioning a minimum of two times a week, which is pretty good considering my busy work schedule, and I also recently did my first paid film gig. In the land of small films, indie films and student films, I’m rather proud. Sometimes we just need those small justifications to keep us going. I have been keeping a log of what I have been up to, and I have been up to a lot. I had merely forgotten in my exhaustion. Sometimes, we just need to sit down and write down the history of our work in order to recognize our accomplishments, instead of writing lists of what needs to be done. Then, we can appreciate all that we have done, and learn to respect ourselves more.
Speaking of logs, I did my monthly check in on my scale. As I said earlier, my bloating from PMS symptoms had left me feeling rather desolate about my physique in the last week or two. But my scale changed my perspective. I have dropped a whopping 5% in the last month! FIVE! That’s monumental considering that I had been struggling nonstop to drop 1-2% for the last 7 months…and oftentimes is it more to fight the gain. I am very excited and inspired by the results of my work, and it pushes me to keep going. Sometimes it’s not about the physique; it’s about the health. I need to remember that the changes I want to make over these 90 days is about my lifestyle. And that should be vital enough.
Previous articles on my 90 Days:
Do...NOT...eat...!
As this week draws on, I’m scared that I won’t look much smaller by the time Thursday rolls around. This past week has been extremely busy with nonstop auditions and film shoots. Heck, I even ended up booking a back to back shoot on Saturday the night before. I spent the morning in the freezing cold, and then whisked off to another shoot immediately. I booked some auditions so fast this weekend, I would receive the call to go immediately to the audition and wing it.
Last week I spoke about stress. There is nothing that can mess up a healthy body and mind faster than stress. On Friday, after a long and grueling rehearsal, I was up until 3am in the morning trying to redye my hair back to black. I nearly had an anxiety attack as the dye stained my hand and refused to come off regardless of alcohol or even acetone. I had to shoot in the morning. All thoughts of health went down the drain as I dove into cheese, cookies and take out Chinese. It was as if the amount of nervous energy that was pent up in my body needed an outlet, and the outlet was to use my hands to pick food and my mouth to eat it. Coupled with an exhausted mind, no willpower was left. Moreover, an exhausted mind usually functions on autopilot, which does not help when there is finger food like a box like cookies.
And did I mention that stress makes our body retain fat as well?
Add the following days. I was constantly tired from the driving around, waking early, sleeping late, and the fast, fast pace of the day. All the symptoms of a tired mind translated and multiplied when it came to food. Despite packing my own healthy food, I could not resist the box of cheap chocolate bars and Chinese food available at the film shoot. I was also often starving at the end of the day since I had little time to eat, and would gorge myself.
I think the most upsetting part of this journey is that I have take responsibility for what I did. As someone who preaches a lot about healthy eating, I really don’t want to take ownership for my failure (and who does…really?). But I this is how I can move forward. By accepting that I do cave into poor eating habits when stressed will help me become more aware of myself, and try to find alternative ways of alleviating that stress.
We all have to be honest with ourselves when something is not working out. Whether it be a relationship, becoming healthy, career success…everything in life is our responsibility. I don’t think enough of us take responsibility for our actions. Most of the times it’s unintentional – we are not aware of what we have done, or in my case, I don’t like the idea so I reject it completely. I often hear externalization and victimization, instead of acknowledging the problem and empowering themselves to move forward. “I can’t help it. I want chocolate. I’m stressed out.” The fact is, I can help it. In the end, we always have a choice. And whatever choice we make is something we need to take responsibility for. Yes. I am stressed/tired. Yes, the cookies look much more appealing. But no, I don’t need to take the cookies despite all cravings. I could drink tea instead. My body doesn’t need the cookies. Unless I literally had not eating all day, not eating cookies will not kill me.
And if I do end up eating the cookie. I need to accept it and move on. Take responsibility and remember for next time. There is no point crying over the spilled milk, unless I felt like throwing up the food, and we all know the issues with that. I think taking responsibility will make us less self destructive in the long run, because we take that sting of the failure and move strategically to something better. There is no denying that we get upset, but to mull over it and fall into destructive habits is painful and blinds us from the new opportunities. When we don’t recognize the opportunity to change, we just keep eating the cookies. And keep feeding the self loathing.
Not doing too badly...
And taking responsibility also means setting the right priorities. Knowing that I’m working hard all day means that I am going to hit the sack earlier. This is a difficult commitment for me because I used to believe that if I slept more than 4-5 hours a night, that I am lazy. When I read bios of inspiring people in magazines, I often read things like “She’s a go getter, living off only 4 hours a night…etc. etc.”, and I feel as if I am not going to amount to them unless I do the same. But perhaps she is in top health. Or perhaps her day is not as fast paced…or perhaps the magazine does not mention the 2 week holiday she takes every few months. Or…perhaps they do not mention that she’s always feeling sluggish and tired. I cannot create my path based on the image of others. I can only create my own image. And my image right now needs a solid night’s sleep. After my digestive health issues last year, I need more rest, and I will honour that. Missing a night out drinking or a party will not destroy my relationships. This applies to those in university right now (and I am saying this because I have sisters in university right now and I just had a similar interaction with them on the weekend). If your peers respect you, then they will respect that you want to stay in and study. Set your priorities, and set them right.
Now down to the physical. My body is definitely trimmed some by Week 3. Still much more to go…I still feel those rolls when I sit down, and can grab my love handles, but looking at my pictures from Week 1, I think I’ve coming along just fine. I never really relied on pictures before, but they really are helpful over just trying to use my memory. It also provides the inspiration to move forward.
Past Weeks
A week flies by so fast! I am already taking my week 3 photos this Thursday and I don’t even have my week 2 photos up yet! And so without due, I am rapidly putting them up to show you the comparison.
The changes are more obvious in the actual photo…but as you have read in my previous post, I’m a little too self conscious to show myself running around in my birthday suit. I certainly have less fluff around my middle in week 2, although I wonder if it’s because I’m less bloated. During week 1, I was enjoying that special time of the month that is reserved for females only, which turned me into a bit of a balloon. Not to say that I’m not losing fat, but I think it will become more apparent over the following weeks (I hope!).
Ack! Eek!
The thing I am struggling with the most right now is seeing only little changes every week. I realize that as I get older, the faster I want to lose weight. When I first started trimming down in my youth after a year of depression, even doing competitive martial arts it took 3 months to drop about 15-20 pounds. Now, I expect myself to drop 10 in less than a month, which is ridiculous in some sense unless I train 8 hours a day. It probably contributed to why my weight yoyoed so much over the past year. I would restrict my diet to ridiculous standards and exercise a ton, and then the moment I treated myself, it was like “BLAM!” binge binge binge cause the body was screeching at me. If I had to be dead honest with myself, I might have been bordering on bulimia…and that is an awareness of myself that I am devastated to admit.
I always prided myself on my strength, and how fit I was…and my weight gain last year made me feel ashamed, because how can I possibly prove that I am a fit and strong woman when I looked like a couch potato? I also attach many stigmas to how I look when I’m overweight (“Oh, of course she’s a geek/nerd, look how fat she is” or “Fat Asian girl=super unattractive”), which is awful because these thoughts are clearly products of media and society’s pressure. Nobody should ever feel that way. I always preach against it, and yet I made myself a victim of it.
So a shoutout to everyone who is reading: It’s super hard, I know, but NEVER judge yourself based on how you want social norms to see you. Change if you…YOU…are truly unhappy with something, but not because you feel unhappy because of how SOMEONE ELSE sees you.
I am currently making the effort to change because I want to feel healthier, and because I personally want to return to a level of fitness that I used to represent. I also want to train my body to eat when I actually need to eat, and not pig out just because I am stressed or because I like the food. I am still battling the “outside voice”, and I know it will always be present in my life especially given the industry I work in, but I try not to make it the prominent reason why I want to become trimmer. As I roughly paraphrase Geneen Roth (and she’s brilliant!), losing weight will not solve life’s problems.
Speaking of stress, it seems like I cannot make a transformation in my career without suddenly making myself ten trillion times busier! Upping the number of auditions I get, the number of places I volunteer at, the number of networking events I attend, the number of one-on-one meetings I set up. Suddenly, I can’t get my ideal 8 hours of sleep…I am not eating on time, and I am on the go go go.
I still practice mindfulness as I go through the day, and other things like yoga…but enter supplements! Almost every supplement I take is some sort of brain booster or stress reliever…adrenal drops, magnesium, B-complex vitamins, liver care…to name a few. When my body and brain is going through so much, it needs the extra help. Regardless of how healthy I eat, stress depletes many of the major nutrients in the body. My sister is concerned that I should not be relying on supplementation to manage my stress, and should cut back and dedicate more time to rest.
The struggle is choosing how to balance out my life. Do I want to work less, and therefore slow my career growth in favour of resting more to manage my stress…or do I want to work hard and have external aid (aka supplements) to manage my stress. Either way, the end result is about the same, my body achieves a stable state. Obviously, there are many more factors, but I’ve broken down the bare bones. What do you think?
I think I’ve spouted enough about my health to my friends over the last year to bore an elephant. I’m certain my 60 trillion goals, plans to lose weight, new diets and other resolutions that I have told them are beginning to lose their oomph. In fact, I’m sure that many of them roll their eyes at me by now and think, “Oh, there goes Miroki again…trying to lose weight,” and know that I’m going to fail.
Last year was extremely hard for me. I had probably gained more weight than I’ve had in my entire life, and hormonal changes deposited all that weight in areas I’ve never experienced before until now: love handles, butt…
I’ve always been more the belly fat gainer, and bra bulges (urgh), but these new spots added on top was a huge down turner for me. I was an Asian actress, and I was (in my eyes) obese. I think the most frustrating part was that I was eating mostly raw vegan, and was wondering how could I be gaining so much weight eating friggin green smoothies all the time.
Well…I found out back in July (7 months later since a hardcore raw vegan regime) that I’m one of the small percentile of people that cannot digest raw food. And it literally burned out my stomach, small intestines, kidneys, liver and thyroid. Go figure… and the result? Weight gain, which fueled bad skin, which fueled my blue mood. And I was blue for most of last winter (you probably also notice a huge gap in my blog posts back then too).
I had intended to write a detailed post about Raw Veganism, since it has been such a huge trend in the holistic market, but realistically, I’m a crazy busy person, and to sit down and carefully structure out my blog posts will mean I’ll never get to them at all. So I thought I’d touch base on it quickly, and perhaps write more on it later.
Now, I know my weight gain was more than just being raw vegan. Outside of the smoothies, I did do a lot of unhealthy bingeing, which I tried to counteract by fasting, which lead to more bingeing. I was taking handfuls of supplements a day trying to “help” myself (I wasn’t). I was extremely stressed out and slept very, very little. Weight gain is nothing more than a symptom, a response, to all the emotional and mental things I was going through as well. Each were perpetrating the other into one vicious cycle.
It’s complicated, the ideas of weight gain and weight loss. It’s more than food. It’s more than exercise. If one is stressed or unhappy, one turns to unhealthy food. One feels sluggish and doesn’t want to exercise. And then…the mental rape begins as we turn into pools of self hatred.
I don’t like telling these stories about myself. I want the world to think that I’m a thriving, successful and driven performing artist. That I have it all together. And you know what? I still am that person. But I have to be honest with myself and my issues surrounding my health. And I want to share it with you, my literal and metaphorical audience, if nothing else but to make my next 90 days an obligation to not just myself, but to the people around me.
2012 is the Year of the Dragon. My year. Only every 12 years do I get this opportunity. So I believe that with this opportunity comes the greatest power to grow, to change, to prosper. Already around me I am noticing a HUGE tumult of things happening that is throwing people’s lives into chaos. I think once the dust settles, and we start reassembling the pieces, that it will be a very good thing.
I have a lot of things hinging on the precipice right now of my life: my career, my finances, my health, my physical appearance, my mental clarity. All these things are now are balancing finely on a thread where if I make the right switches, it will make or break me.
I intend to flip the switch so that these changes will augment my prosperity, my growth, my power.
Inspired by a 90 day transformation set of photos that my bootcamp instructor posted on her Facebook, I intend to do something of the same. But more than just working on my body (because as I said earlier, the body is also a response to the tortures of the mind), I am going to focus on transforming my mind, my career, my soul. It will take many small steps, and in no way does the journey end after 90 days, but these 90 days will give me a bit of a goal to work with, a jump start.
And so, I share a little outline drawing of the photos I took of myself in Week 1. I admit I’m too conservative and self conscious to outright post images of myself running around in underwear, but the outlines should give you an idea of where I’m starting physically. I acknowledge that I’m not horrifically overweight, but as someone who used to be a lean mean fighting machine, I could stand to drop a few. In the meantime, here are some things I’m doing for this week…
- FlorEssence Cleanse – a gorgeous and gentle natural cleansing kit that I recommend to anyone. I was advised against detoxing (something I was also obsessed with doing last year) because of how much it was throwing off my body, but this is very, very gentle and I wanted to give my body a boost in releasing the toxins I accumulated over my Christmas feasts.
- Getting together with a good friend of mine to work on a 5 year plan together (her suggestion, which came at an awesome time).
- I went out and connected with a bunch of people, both former and new networks, either one on one or at events. I need to surround myself with the people who are important to me (and my career, but I like to think that I’m not merely just seeing them as a stepping stones – I truly value the people I am with).
- Sleep more.
- I made a big change recently, but I won’t share it yet because I haven’t made it public even with my own community. But I will soon. I just wanted to write it down so I know where and when I did things.
Anyhow, thanks for joining me on this personal journey. And perhaps my story will give just the tiniest inspiration for others to take part too. I think it will be fun to great a small group of people supporting each other on their transformations.
Welcome to the Year of the Dragon.
It has been nearly 3 weeks since getting back on track with my raw food and veganism. I know it has been an unstable journey since I started writing about my diet, fitness and health over the last months. I’ve been wanting to write in more details about the experiments I’ve had with food and working out. But since Vega issued a challenge to write about their Thrive 30 lessons in September, I thought I’d share what I wrote with you:
My Gmail is loaded full of starred emails. Many of them are either important emails that I do not have time to reply right away, recipes or other valuable things. Thrive in 30 Lessons are one of the items that have that lucky star selected in my email account.
The combination of lessons, and the opportunity to meet Brendan Brazier at the Toronto Vegetarian Food Fair have inspired me to change my nutritional ways more permanently than my many past attempts. While I have gone raw and vegan in the past months, it had always been an on again, off again thing. It was mostly due to cravings, eating unhealthy vegan, the stress of a car accident, spending a long time in China where veganism was near impossible, and so forth. Since September, I have started again, relying strongly on what I have learned from Thrive and from Mr. Brazier’s inspiring talks. I’m proud to say this is the longest I have continued on without an “off day”, and this is including the elimination of fish, something I had originally opted to keep in my otherwise vegan diet.
Of all the lessons, there are two that I constantly go back to repeatedly for support and inspiration: Lesson 3 – Myth-Busting and Lesson 8 – Superfoods + Fitness.
Lesson 3 is the best wake-up call to any person obsessed with the concept of diet (once endearing referred to by Garfield as DIE with a T). Thrive effectively destroys every diet fad that’s existed out there that urges us to cut out carbs, fat, and then overload with protein. I think it has always been an eternal question about how much of each should end up in our diet, and I don’t think anything we have ever been taught has been correct.
I have been faulted to intake extremely low carbs and huge quantities of protein, believing that such was the optimal way to lose weight and build muscle. Heck, even fruit looked daunting to me because of their sugar content. Learning from Brendan how high protein can actually suck our bones dry, and that we need carbs for our brain and yes, muscles, was the most liberating thing. I’m certain it was the low carbs in my diet that kept driving me to crash and binge on junk food all the time in an attempt to rise my carb levels. Moreover, to hear that he only intakes about 40% of the government/fitness recommended intake of protein and is unaffected in performance proves that protein intake is not about quantity, but quality and efficiency.
Lesson 3 has helped me balance out my nutrition, especially in the carbs and protein area in relation to fitness.
Which brings me to Lesson 8. Nothing is more helpful than an organized chart to tell us exactly what to eat for what kind of workout. I’ve always experimented and wondered what I needed to eat pre and post workout. I work out extremely hard and push beyond my limits. That usually means feeling sore for days afterward and never seeming to recover very fast, which meant I was likely causing even more damage by continuing to work out.
Not only did Lesson 8 introduce me to a whole variety of new foods to optimize my fitness such as dulse and chlorella, but it also taught me when to eat certain foods (like sugar!).
I had no idea that carbs should be the first thing to consumed after a workout. Reading about the effects of stress on the body and the use of simple carbs to refuel, I added a few dates to nibble on right after my workout. What a difference it made to my routine. First of all, I didn’t feel overwhelmed as guzzling a protein shake right away did, and it certainly helped my energy levels post workout. But to be honest, I just love how I can bring back sweet, tasty food such as dates and agave nectar into my fitness nutrition. Delicious.
Thrive 30 is not just for vegans. It’s 30 days of benefits for absolutely anyone and everyone. Brendan Brazier does not preach veganism; he is someone who is merely trying to optimize our health, and it just so happens to be a plant based diet. I mean, it’s pretty obvious that vegetables are supposed to be the foundation of our food, right? Somewhere in the last years, we have forgotten that. Time for us to remember.
You can join the Thrive 30 Challenge for free. Do check it out. It’s inspiring.
Related Article – Dear Wolverine…the new plant-based candidate. I loved this when I read it.
- Big, buff and vegan: Packing on muscle in a healthier way (theglobeandmail.com)
