You'll know why I put this picture on top when you scroll down below. This is Maya by the way, my personal fitness trainer. =)

So everyone's writing their own Ramadhan diary in conjunction with this holy month and I've also had this same thought in my head for days now. The difference is it's the 4th day of Ramadhan already, but I have nothing visible to show for it. On this blog, at least, but I have been jotting/tracking down everything, primarily what I had for sahoor and iftar, what kind of exercise I did afterwards, any self empowerment/improvement through reading or lectures and ibadah that I'd done for the last three days.
I used my calendar app on iPhone to do this since it's easiest to track and see our progress for the rest of the month using this option.

What annoyed me was, it felt limited and cramped, trying to write down each item mentioned above, in the notes section of Calendar. So I went hunting for some suitable apps and ended up with 'My Wonderful Goals' and 'Path'. I wanted something where I could track my goals, workout progress and food intake especially and these two apps seem to do the job quite well. I take pictures and describe what I've eaten for sahoor and iftar using Path, and track my workout progress with 'My Wonderful Goals', ( I know the name sounds really cheesy, but the interface is really beautiful), since they have categories for each of the items mentioned above, I think it's damn good. ha ha. ha ha ha.

I have this suspicion that the company behind this app is either Korean or Japanese. You know their penchant for cute things? Yep.

This app is kinda awesome. My private twitter ;)

You know why I'm going through such lengths to make sure everything is documented? Well the simple reason, straight and to the point, is, I am in dire need of losing all the excess weight I've gained during my idle months staying home and doing practically nothing. And, let's face it. I was stick thin when I was in primary. Gained a helluva lot of weight in high school. And I was at my fattest and heaviest in Taylors. I realized I had to do something about it when this guy friend from high school said it to my face: "You know you're fat, right?". Yeah. And it hurt all the more coz I knew he was right. That's when I really got it into my head, I needed to exercise! Going into uni, I was really into Pilates and Taebo, training with Maya in Yourself Fitness (a PC game) and Denise Austin with her home DVDs.

She might look unassuming but Denise Austin is really, really strong. Proof from using those resistance bands. She doesn't break a sweat stretching the purple one and that's the highest level you can get to in Pilates. I can't even stretch the green on properly pfft.

Billy Blanks is the man when it comes to mixing martial arts with aerobics and dance. I never get bored with his workout routines. I even bought myself the Taebo amplifier.

The first time I knew that the workouts were making a difference was when an old badminton buddy from Taylors spotted me. She couldn't believe I'd lost so much weight. All she could say was I looked so thin! Booya! So, I believe, based on the glowing feedback, that I successfully managed to reduce my weight. I was religiously devout with my workout times. 5 days a week I tell ya. I think I even became a workout junkie for a moment there. After that I found out about Taebo and the rest is history. I'd make sure to work out at least once a week. Even if I didn't work out, I usually cycled everywhere at Uni. My BMI at the time was ideal, but on the brink of being over-weight. I told myself it must be my natural body weight, what I'm meant to weigh after puberty. Surprising how crazy my delusions can get.

Yeah, that's how ya do it! Booya!

On one of my past trips back to Malaysia, I visited this 'Healthy Hangout place' while getting my US Visa. Theirs was a cafe founded by a personal trainer and a US certified nutritionist. He claimed his health shakes could help people lose weight and define body muscle at the same time. I mean, his calves were really toned and all, he claimed, due to his 'secret' recipe power shake. I had one glass of that, and then some green tea followed by some other concoction. Afterwards, I weighed myself using this machine that claims it could measure body fat and muscle percentage. I was intrigued. He said, I was over-weight for my size.

Body type, Asians have a petite frame. I know for sure that I'm as big as some Caucasians.

He said to circle my wrist with my hand and if my wrist was smaller or within the reach of my pinkie and forefinger, I was fine-boned (yeah, as if! observation points towards the contrary) but anyway, he said, I was built like the average Asian (you blind or sumthin man? I am huge, compared to the other people out there!) but that aside, he did say the symptoms included, not being able to stand or walk on your feet for long. And this was very true for me. Reason being, I was lugging around extra kilos of weight that didn't need to be there, in the form of excess fat on my body. eeewww...on the other hand, there was some good news, he said I had a more than average muscle mass (thanks to working out so much I guess), but, I needed to lose about 10 kilos for it to really have an effect physically or metabolically. That's when I found out that nutrition counts as 80% and workouts are 20% when it comes to losing weight. When all along, I was sure it was 50-50. So it is very important to track our food intake as well. And that's exactly what I'm doing for this month. My meals will already be cut down to twice a day instead of three but I'd have to mind my portions AND start imagining MyPlate from Michelle Obama. Staying on track and devoutly logging in everything I do for the day would be the most challenging part coz I'm notorious at leaving things half-baked.

This makes a lot of more sense compared to the Food pyramid.

After graduating, I've been kinda slack in my workout routine, and I fail to regularly track my food intake. I read somewhere that it takes at least 21 days to make or break a habit. I think it was Tony Robbins. So Ramadhan is the perfect time for me to cultivate this habit. It's the surest way to maintain a healthy lifestyle and the ideal weight, the health experts would say since we could get an overview of our eating habits and fitness habits during this time. First, start with a week. Review that particular week, and then modify the week after.

It takes 21 days to make or break a habit

My plan for this week is 30-45 mins of exercise using this awesome new app: Nike Training Club (NTC) before sahoor (haven't found the will-power to wake up this early yet) or after taraweeh every 5 days in a week, leaving the 2 days left over for resting or moderate exercise. (This after reading the article on SuhaibWebb.net, about the best time for working out). Mondays and Thursdays are my traditional rest days. We started Ramadhan on Saturday. So far, I've not missed a beat. Yay! Insha Allah I will be able to stick with it the whole week.


Next, I wanna take it slowly so that I can build my workout to an hour or more a day. What I haven't done yet is take the before picture.
I wanna see for myself how I'll look like after 30 days.
Now, this is what I call a concentrated effort. To arms!

As Maya likes to say: Fitness is a state of mind. It is a state of being more energetic, more proactive in living life through each and every day.