#3--i'm going straight to health...

Every time I approach my blog these days, I feel overwhelmed. It is a good problem, I guess, to have more to say than time to say it. Better, at least, than the converse. I have dug my own hole, so there is no legs in complaining. With presences on facebook, myspace, linkedin, my own blog, my friends' blogs...not to mention work, family, etc., it seems that my virtual time and real time run out too quickly. Again, my own fault. I think i'll start by nixing myspace.

So, thing #3 that I have been meaning to write about.

personal training and my hatred of all things physically painful.
I assume it is perfectly natural to hate working out. right? the truth is that I have never worked out a day in my life until yesterday. Marching band in high school was probably the most physical activity I ever did for a long stretch of time; Mission Tour being the most in a short timeframe. Not to downplay the physicality of either of these, but neither of them really pushed me up to my limit (though some of those longer puppet numbers were very close). For those who did not know me in the early 90s...yes, I did say puppets.

In a fit of insanity (or complete clarity), I have decided to try and be in the best shape of my life by my 32nd birthday, not only for my own sake, but because I have a family now, and I'd kinda like to be around to see them for a few more years. So, I signed up with a personal trainer, and I am going to use part of this blog to periodically document my progress, struggles, etc. It's not that I think all people are interested in my workout habits; instead, it is all about accountability. If I am honest here in the beginning, I feel like I will be compelled to be honest in the future (including that terrible future post where I have to admit that I quit...hopefully, I will never have to write that one, but I am realistically leaving it on the table for the time being. I am in much pain tonight.).

Before I can show any progress, however, I must start with the down-and-dirty details.
Here I am:
Overall fitness score: 26 out of 100 (yah, that's not good)
Total Weight: 197 pounds
Lean Weight: 154.8 pounds
Fat Weight: 42.2 pounds (yah, that's a lot of freakin' fat I'm toting around)
Percent Body Fat: 21.4 (ugh)
Resting Heart Rate: 91 Beats per minute (which puts me in the 5th percentile, which is very not good)
After 3-Minute Step test: 130 Bpm (10th percentile; again, not good)
Pushup test: 17 (thankfully, that's average)
Flexibility test: 16.25 inches (I scored above average on this one. *whew*)

There you go. Matt in some unflattering numbers. What is the future of this post? One of two things will likely happen. Either I will re-post my health in numbers again in about 6 weeks, after getting retested. Or I will write a short, simple, and sad post some day saying that I have given up. I don't consider myself a quitter at all...however, the past two days have been quite rough, physically and mentally.

here's to the future: pain, adrenaline, healthy food, cheating, goals acheived, whining, and new outlooks on life.

shanti,
mjh