Mind matters

I had two running 30-day trials that ended not so long ago.

30-day trial: No sugar
This one ended on tuesday 6:th of november. I’ve done similar trials in the past. And each time the craving for sugar had almost vanished, and each time I started eating a lot of sugar immediately after the trial ended. This time was no exception. I did like how my body felt when it wasn’t flooded with extra sugar, and I didn’t like how it felt when I had eaten almost 3/4 of a chocolate cake (which contained 500 g chocolate, 125 g butter, 3 dl cream and 250 g marzipan) in one go. But it was delicious… cake… chocolate…

So, what have I learned from this trial? I’ve learned that I don’t have any problems staying off sugar and sugary products for prolonged periods of time, but I have a real hard time just eating a moderate amount when I do eat it! The solution seems to be to stay away from sugar forever. One that I’ve recentrly started to seriously concider.

30-day trial: Going to bed at 10 pm
This one ended on tuesday 13:th of november. This was a good one! I got much more sleep, I woke up refreshed, early and I had more energy during the day. I didn’t have any problems getting up at 6 am and going to the gym before work, something that was a gargantuan task the days I went to bed after 12 pm!

Most of my negative internal dialogue is centered around me bashing myself for not going to bed in time. This one eliminiated all the bashing! No more internal headache.

I liked to go to bed at 10 pm, but it didn’t do wonders to my social life. I chose not to go to aikido practice, and seldom felt like engaging in some kind of activity when I got home from work. It felt like I didn’t really have time for it. I had about 4 hours to socialize before I had to start getting ready for bed, which I did around 9.20 pm.

I was left with a result I liked, but with the cost of feeling like I had no time to spend after getting home from work. Damit! The hard part of this trial is to find a way to utilise the things I have learned in my everyday life. I’m still not sure how I’m going to do it.

Since monday 19 of november I’ve started a new trial. I call it Super 30-day trial. More about that later.

Okay! So I’m several days into one, actually two, 30-day trials!

30-day trial: No sugar
The first one is to lay off sugar for 30 days. Two weeks ago I discovered that big chunks of the days I was feeling irritated and annoyed/angry. When I introspected about why I was feeling this way I realised I had been eating large quantities of sugar in the form of candy, chocolate, cookies and other sugary stuff every day!

I’ve previously discovered that if I keep a large daily intake of sugar, I become irritated and annoyed/angry. So I decided to take a break from sugar (white refined sugar that is) all together.

I started this trial on 8:th of october and it will end on tuesday 6:th of november.

I feel a lot better generally when I lay off the sugar! Instead for candy and stuff, I’ve been eating chips and cheese balls. The best part is that I only have to eat small amounts of them before I’m fed up. Some days the sugar craving is real bad, but I just have to remember how I usually feel after eating lots of sugar to stave it off.

After these 30-days I’m going to try to limit my intake of sugar to one day each week. That’ll be my C-day! Candy-day! Yay!

30-day trial: Going to bed at 10 pm
This one I’ve been thinking about for a long time. Finally I’m doing it! I’m going to bed at 10 pm. That means that the lights are out and I’m safely tucked in and ready for some sleep at that time.

I started the trial on monday 15:th of october and will finish it on tuesday 13:th of november.

The first thing I noticed when I started with this was that people in my building didn’t go to sleep that early. And since my appartment has real thin walls (and ceiling and floor) I could hear almost everything that happened around me.

The worst part was that the girl in the appartment below me had a really bad cold! She and her boyfriend would get to bed around 22.20, when I almost had fallen asleep, and she would start coughing real bad! Her boyfriend, who has a really deep voice, immediately tried to console her, with his really deep voice, and they did this every night! Combine this with the fact that I like to go to sleep lying on my stomach with one ear to my madrass, which lies directly on the floor, and that their appartment functioned like a gigantic resonance chamber, and you have a great recipe for disaster!

This gave me a lot of chagrin the first days, until I resolved it by using the stereo and head phones to block out the noise

I’ve managed to go to sleep every night around 10 pm 0for the past week! One time only did I go to sleep later, at 10.02 pm!

I’m not sure if it has any effect on me, except that 8 am isn’t any longer that early in the morning. But I’m sure it will give me some more food for though concerning my sleeping patterns and sleeping habits!

Okay, it’s time for the second batch of 30-day trials! This time I’ll try to implement the following behaviours:

• Train Qi Gong mininum 15 minutes – to see what effect this has.
• In the morning, think of how I wish to feel at the end of the day, clinch my butt, hold out my right arm as if I was victorious and shout ‘YES’ – To try to implement a trigger with which I can change my feelings in an instant.
• Tell myself atleast 3 times, infront of a mirror, that I’m valuable in the capacity of just existing – This is to try to implement a sense of self value, so I appreciate myself without the input from others.
• Train for 15 minutes to deepen my voice and pick an article that I read aloud, slowly and articulated – This is to try to improve my speaking abilities

This trial will start on monday 23/10 and end on tuesday 21/11. I wont be writing daily updates. Instead I will write now and then about the progress with these, and the eventual benefits I’m experiencing.

Wish me luck!

Oh, I can tell you that the effect of the last trial is still residing with me. This weekend I got up before 9 both days! And I’ve eaten at the right intervals for the past week

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 8.00 am. Got to bed at 1 am.

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm
Breakfast at 8.30 am. Lunch at 11.30 pm.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 25 minutes.

And so ends the last day!

Okay, time for some evaluation. When I look back at the days, I’ve not been so strict at the first goal, to get up at 7 am, or getting up between 7-9 on weekends. But I’ve learned a great deal about my sleep! I’ve discovered that I can get over the initial period of adjustment, which can lead to me sleeping very few hours for a couple of days, and I also get very cranky those days. As long as I know it, I can do something about it! So, even though I’ve not met this goal, I still feel it’s been very valuable to me! Now I get up at around 8 every weekday morning, and feel good about it! I know that I can push it to 6-7 if I really need to. Will have to try someday to see how it makes me feel after 30 days

The second goal has had the biggest impact om my wellbeing. Eating at regular hours 5 days a week has done wonders for me. One of the advantages is that I’m not so addicted to sugar anymore, and I also feel healthier and have a different energy level than before! So this is a clear success!

The last goal is the one that hasn’t given me so much, even thought it’s the single goal that I actually met most of the days. I think I will try a new spin on this later, with actually setting a minimum time I wish to spend reading emails every day, those days I have access to my computer, to get my inbox empty more often.

So, all in all I’m very happy I began with this experiment! I’ve learned some great things about myself! Especially in the sleeping and food departments. I will continue to get up at 8 on weekdays, and eating at regular hours.

Now it’s soon time to start with another 30-day trial!

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 7.40 am. Got to bed at 1 am, and slept quite well! I’m amazed myself that I felt rather clear in the head and rested through the day.

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm
Breakfast at 8.10 am. Lunch at 12.20 pm.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 20 minutes.

And so ends the twentyninth day!

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 3 pm. Got to bed at 4 am, me and Ola talked and had it cozy until late Weekends seem not to be my forte at getting up. If I’m really going to make these 30-day trials work, I’ll have to muster up a better dicipline!

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm
Breakfast at 3.30 pm. Lunch at 18.30 pm.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 15 minutes.

And so ends the twentyeight day! Two days to go!

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 11 am. Got to bed at 4 am, party on friday night! This weekend I visited Ola, I got seriosly dumped on saturday evening. Ah well, this world. Now I have to start looking all over again… And I’ll miss Ola like crazy the first week

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm
Breakfast at 12.10 am. Lunch at 19 pm.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 5 minutes.

And so ends the twentyseventh day!

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 7-40 am. Got to bed at 11 pm, but kept waking up many times, still…

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm
Breakfast at 8.10 am. Lunch at 12.20 am.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 30 minutes.

And so ends the twentysixth day!

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 8 am. Got to bed at 11 pm, but kept waking up many times. Felt tired in the morning. Wonder what makes my sleep so restless, and how I could improve it…

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm,
Breakfast at 8.20 am. Lunch at 12.10 am.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 30 minutes.

And so ends the twentyfifth day!

Getting up at 7 am, weekends between 7-9 am
Got up 8 am. *yawn* Sleeping good now! Feels wonderful!

Breakfast at 8 am, weekends 8-10 am, and lunch between 11 am – 1 pm,
Breakfast at 8.30 am. Lunch at 12.15 am. Getting lazy at fixing cheap lunch, and instead buying little more expensive ones, even though I can’t really afford it. Not right now anyway. One aspect is that my kitchen is in a real mess after this weekend, so I don’t really fancy going in there at the moment.

Reading and answering e-mails for a maximum of 30 min per day
Read and replied for 30 minutes.

And so ends the twentyfourth day!