Day 18: Meditation update challenge

So yesterday, I had a very good meditation. After my meditation, I slept well & woke up early in the morning around 4 am for my workouts.

However, I didn’t have as good a day as I had hoped it to be. I felt a little exhausted throughout the day, probably because it was too hot. I hate sitting in AC all day. But don’t have much choice these days.

By evening, I felt so tired that I watched a movie on Netflix for a bit & also tried to sleep. I also didn’t eat properly today. I was in general a bit miserable. I hope tomorrow will be a better day.

Today, I am going to keep it short.

Day 16 & 17: Meditation Challenge update

Ideally, this should have been two posts, but I couldn’t manage to write one yesterday. The reason is yesterday, I had to go out for a haircut, which obviously takes a lot of time. Plus my house-help decided to not show up. I also had workouts in the morning. By the time, I came home, I was super tired. I just had an early dinner & dozed off. I woke up around midnight & completed my meditation. So, I at least completed my meditation, even if it was in the middle of the night.

The meditation on day 16 was at a better time. I completed my meditation before 9 pm and had a restful sleep, so woke up well in time for my workout session at 6 am. Early in the morning, I walked to the gym. It takes about 15 min to do that. It’s not a pleasant walk as the area is a bit crowded & not very clean. But I like the cool morning air against my skin & the changing blue colors of the sky. That moment of watching the sky turn from the dark of night to the light of morning is my favorite time of the day.

While walking back from the gym, I walked to the beach for a minute to catch a glimpse of the sea. The way the sky and the ocean meet in the morning, melding into each other, with fishermen out in their boats & people walking on the beach is quite a relief from the busy streets of Mumbai.

These days it’s quite warm throughout the day, almost impossible to be out or sit without air-conditioning. So, it is good to be able to experience the cool morning breeze before getting into the hustle & bustle of the day.

I think I will now go and sit for my meditation

Day 15: Meditation challenge update

Wow! I am at the halfway mark. I am loving this challenge now. Because I have learned that no matter how tired I am, I can sit through meditation & go back to sleep. Even if I sleep through some of my meditation, it’s okay. Instead of watching Netflix, it’s better to sit for meditation & then sleep.

The immediate health benefit, which I have observed is that my sleep is better & I do wake up on time mostly. Some days I wake up an hour or two later than I normally like to do.

I am also getting more organized in my other chores. I have more energy throughout the day. So, instead of procrastinating & feeling tired, I manage to complete my work.

My concentration is much better, so I can complete my work in a shorter time. I still have a long way to go. But now I know that I need to continue with my meditation & that it was a good challenge to take on for this month.

I also am more mindful of how I am spending my time during the day. So, this challenge is helping me a lot.

If you’ve never tried meditating, you should give it a try, even for 15 min.

Okay, now I will sit for my meditation. Until tomorrow

Day 14: Meditation challenge update

Yesterday’s meditation was good. I managed to do it a bit earlier too so I got a good amount of hours of sleep.

But today didn’t go as planned. I gave in to an occasional impulse to go shopping for some workout clothes. It was almost a year since I haven’t bought any workout clothes, so it was time. But I am not sure if I should have gone today. Tomorrow is another busy day as I have planned to go for my haircut. These are the mundane aspects, which I have never bothered about. But ever since I started working from home, such activities have become an occasion, which don’t bring me joy anymore. I do them as a chore.

Until the pandemic changed my life, I used to find such activities very routine. But now things have changed. I spend more time at home and I enjoy it. The last two years were difficult as my productivity slowed down quite a bit. But now I am aiming to get back to my usual self. I keep telling this to myself every day. Sometimes, I think it’s good to remind ourselves about things we need to do.

In the last few years, I have painted & learned about health. Both these are very different from the kind of activities I used to engage with. So, while I have discovered a new side of me, I now, want to reconcile my two sides – one side, which was forever engaged in work in a competitive world and the new side, which wants to venture out into unknown areas of life. Is it possible to reconcile yourself? Sometimes, I wonder.

Have you ever faced such a situation?

I think I will sit for my meditation with this thought. Maybe I will find some answers

Day 13: Meditation challenge update

Yesterday, I completed my meditation a bit earlier than usual, so I was happy. I slept well & woke up early enough to go for a nice walk just as the sky was changing colors. The dawn colors of the sky are my favorite time of the day. The city is usually quiet so I really enjoy looking at the colors changing from dark blue to light blue.

Although the day started well, somehow I was a bit tired by the afternoon & almost sleepy. This was a busy week as I started my workouts & I exercised for 3 days a week, so was somewhat tired by the weekend. Yesterday, I had one meal after a 24-hour fast and today also I ate after an 18-hour fast. So, I think eventually, my body needed time to recover. I wanted to sleep early but I had phone calls to make so got delayed. I have a lot of pending tasks to complete that I am finding it hard to even get started on some of the pending stuff.

My life will get more busy from tomorrow, so I will need to remain more focused. Today, I was talking to a friend & she is also interested in trying the low-carb diet with me. In fact, both she and her daughter may do it together. It feels good when people want to make efforts to better their life. In my view, everyone should try this way of eating, because it brings benefits only. I will write more posts on this topic later.

Today, I want to remain focused on my meditation. One thing is true, meditating every day almost always changes my life and it is doing it this time too. I feel that if exercise is necessary for our body, meditation is for our mind. Today, I ate my dinner a bit later than usual, so I was a bit worried if I will be able to meditate. But it was very light so I think I will be able to. Every day I worry, if I will be able to complete the challenge. But then it happens. That is the beauty of this life. Things happen, we just have to believe in them.

So, now I am off to meditate.

Day 12: Meditation challenge update

Yesterday’s meditation was good. I again slept halfway. But now I am beginning to enjoy them, even if I sleep through some of it. I definitely get ready for my sleep & even if I am tempted to look at social media & Netflix, I don’t feel as interested. So, don’t waste my time.

Even during the day, my engagement on social media & apps is getting less. I remain more focused on my goals/ tasks for the day. These days I am helping another client transition to a low-carb diet. Although it’s not tough, some people face more challenges than others.

Transitioning from a high-carb to a lower-carb diet can be challenging as many people are addicted to sugar & or carbs. What I have also noticed is that most people have diets that are deficient in proteins. So the tricky part is to convince people to stop having carbs & focus more on proteins. Once people understand & start seeing the benefits, they sincerely make an effort to adapt to the low-carb way of eating.

I really enjoy the process of helping people make this transition. Because the impact of such a way of eating is life-changing for some people especially those who are dealing with a metabolic syndrome.

Now, I will sit for my meditation. So, until tomorrow.

Day 11: Meditation challenge update

Yesterday, I meditated before sleeping and it was great. I again found myself sleeping halfway through the meditation, but it was good. At least, after the meditation I wasn’t too tempted to check my socials.

Today, I have largely wanted to stay silent. I did become active on Twitter for a little while, but by and large, I wanted to remain quiet. So, instead, I decided to spend my time making a mandala. Making a mandala is also a form of meditation for me. And I can easily lose myself into it.

These days, I don’t want to go out on social media much. So, I definitely need to manage that too by setting up a limit for myself.

Right now, I am at a place in the challenge, where I usually want to give up. I have experienced this with the previous challenges too. After a week or 10 days, I want to give up. So for a few days, I have to force myself to continue. Once that period passes, it becomes a habit.

This is what happened with protein & walking challenges too, even now, I find it easy to go out for a walk for 30 min each day, even if I am busy. The same is true with protein, I tend to monitor my protein intake more diligently now.

However, there is another task which I was supposed to do, but haven’t done. I hope I can become regular with that too. Have you ever done 30-day challenges? How does it work out for you?

Day 10: Meditation Challenge update

Yesterday, too, I sat for my meditation very late. I could have sat earlier but I was fidgety all of yesterday. Probably, I didn’t have adequate protein so I decided to have a good amount today. I started working out this week so now I need to be careful about eating properly.

One good thing about sitting late for my meditation was that I went to sleep straight after my meditation. I didn’t have much time to look at the screens.

The meditation challenge, overall, is helping me stay away from screens. This is helping me stay on the tasks at hand. Every night, I plan on doing 3 important things the next day. This is in addition to all the regular stuff that I do.

Today morning, I realized that I spend a lot of time thinking about food in the morning. So, I am going to change that. I will now plan my meals at night. These days I am eating just 2 meals a day so it’s not very tough.

I want to keep my mornings thinking about my work. However, in the last few months, I had to spend more time thinking about food as I was trying to heal myself, particularly my gut. Now that I am on the road to recovery, fingers crossed, I can now focus on other aspects.

These last few months have been difficult because my gut issues completely impacted my brain, making it difficult for me to focus on work. I have felt weak & fatigued unable to sit for long hours. Finally, I feel much better.

When I look at some of the posts from before I started my healing process, they are all about my health struggles. It was writing on this blog about my health challenges & numerous visits to the doctors, which made me realize that I need to change something. And I made massive changes in the way I approach food, nutrition, health & diseases.

Writing is a great tool to help us get clarity on things that we need to focus on. Try it! For now, I am focusing on meditation, which is really helping me become more observant.

Day 9: Meditation challenge update

Yesterday, I meditated around midnight. I, literally started my meditation around 11:30 & was done with it by 12:30. It was late, but worth it. I had a good sleep & woke up refreshed at 5:30 am for my morning workouts. I didn’t feel drowsiness or tiredness at all. I had also finished my dinner by 6 pm so even though I was awake until later, I didn’t feel hungry at night. I think meditation is helping me with my hunger levels also.

Fasting for 16-18 hours on most days, eating the low-carb way and now meditation is certainly helping me get my life back.

Yesterday, I also talked to Dr. Shabnam Das Kar in preparation for the Metabolic Health Conference 2.0. I will be hosting a session with her on how low carb can help women address hormonal issues & mental health issues.

I usually don’t like to add a lot of news to my meditation updates, but I wanted to talk about my talk with her as she is also a certified Tiny Habits coach. I told her about these habit-forming challenges that I have been doing each month since February. She said that it’s a good strategy. Once I have time, I am going to read the book, Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg, which she recommended.

I posted about these challenges mainly on Twitter, so if you don’t follow me on Twitter, you may not know about it.

But in short, in February, I ran a challenge to eat a minimum of 30 gms of protein for one meal at least. This doesn’t mean that I ate only 30 gms of protein in that meal or that day. I usually eat a lot more on my low-carb lifestyle. However, having at least 30 gms in one meal ensured that I focused on my nutrition intake for the day.

In March, I ran a challenge to walk at least 30 min every day. Although I was already walking more every day, once I started the challenge, after a week, I wanted to take a break. But I kept at it. At times, I found myself walking late at night, after dinner, just to complete the challenge. Even walking after dinner, helped me sleep well.

This month, I am doing the meditation challenge. So far, I am finding it really beneficial. Even though I spend almost an hour meditating every day, I can see the benefits during the day. I am more clear-headed, focused & productive throughout the day.

So, if you want to get better at something & think that time is an issue, try a challenge. Usually keeping a certain time aside works, but initially, you can just commit yourself to doing a task for 10 minutes every day, for a month. You can even do a weekly challenge, but I prefer monthly challenges.

Try it & let me know if it works for you.

Day 8: Meditation challenge update

Yesterday, I did my meditation at night. In fact, now I look forward to my meditation sessions.

Each day gets better & better. I feel more calm & less noise in my head. My mind doesn’t feel crowded as much.

I also like staying with my meditation experience as I sleep. So, when I wake up in the morning, I usually feel refreshed to take on the day.

My only regret today is that I didn’t complete one task that I was supposed to do. So, tomorrow I am hoping for a better start to the day.

I hope you have a better day and or night. I now need to sit for my meditation. It’s almost midnight, but I will do my 1 hour meditation before sleeping