Tag snacks

This Week

Dusty Leave a comment

So it’s been a solid three weeks since I last did this, but I don’t intend to just give it up after two habit-testing attempts, so here it comes back again. The intervening three weeks have really been more about survival: I had to finish the school year, I had to grade, I had to sleep, I had to keep my spirits up. So that’s the habit I’ve been trying to maintain every week for the last three weeks: sleep, work, live.

I’d like to report that I stuck with all three things every day for the last three weeks. I suck at sleeping — which is not news —  but it’s not a question of habit, it’s a question of stress; when I wake up at 2 or 3am, when I’m stressed, I start thinking about the thing that is worrying me. Believe me, if I could break that habit, I would; now that it is summer, the habit will be broken for me, which is nice, but kind of not the point of these posts, these attempts. I am good at the habitual grading of papers every single day; but that’s not a habit I want to maintain — and it too has been ended for me this past week. Living and keeping my spirits up? Sure, that’s a thing I want to keep doing. I’m sure it will be quite a bit easier now.

So I’m moving on to new ideas.

If you recall, three weeks ago I decided to give up snacking, particularly gum, per my wife’s suggestion. I did it for the week, and it wasn’t terrible: though I admit I cheated a time or two, once because I honestly forgot that I was doing it for the week, and I grabbed some chips at Costco and snacked on them; once at school because I wanted the snack and I said, “Screw it.” I also ate donuts at school because donuts were available — it was Teacher Appreciation week, when we don’t get a raise and people don’t treat us any better, but they do bring us food and shit — along with cake and a few other gift-snacks. So it wasn’t  a perfect abstention from snacking.

I never chewed gum, though. Not once. So, success.

Really, the main point was not to munch on my salty snacks once I got home. They’re my main food vice, and there are times when I get out the bag of Cheez-its and forget that I’m eating them until I’ve downed way more than I should have; that’s the habit I was looking to break, really. And that I did not do.

But like the video game stoppage the week before, it didn’t really amount to much. I didn’t feel healthier, I didn’t feel better, I didn’t lose weight — but I also wasn’t miserable, and I didn’t fall asleep at 8pm, which is one reason I do snack sometimes, because it keeps me awake. Basically I proved to myself that I don’t need to snack, but that I am a bit happier when I do.

The last week or two has actually been something of a better test: because I really haven’t snacked unless I’ve been hungry or craving something; and more than once, I decided to avoid snacks because I didn’t want to ruin my dinner. And that has been — just fine. So maybe because of the week without evening snacking, and maybe just because I’m steadily growing more aware of what I eat and how I eat it, I think I’ve actually got a pretty good handle on my snacking.  So again, success.

This week I think I’m going to go with exercise. I go to the gym, and I ride my bike; but in both cases I’m very on-again, off-again. A little bit because my wife likes going to the gym with me, and she hurt her wrist pretty seriously back in January and has been recovering ever since (It’s her drawing wrist, so we’ve been taking it very seriously), so she hasn’t been able to do much gym time, which often means I don’t go, as well. But I’ve also come to understand that I can go without her and it doesn’t actually bother either of us too much, so I have to give up that excuse. Again, it’s been rough trying to survive for the last month, so I haven’t really gone, and now that the school year’s over I want to get back into the habit. I also want to spend some of this summer getting into better biking shape because I’d like to get myself to work like that as much as I can next year.

So that will be this week: every day I will either go to the gym, or I will ride my bike. I will probably give myself an exception this coming Saturday, as we are going to move starting that day, so my “exercise” will be cleaning and/or lifting heavy things. But we’ll see. Between now and then, it’s every day workouts for me. (Yes, I already did one today. It hurt a lot. Part of the reason I want to get back into the habit more.)

I will report back next Sunday. Hopefully.

This Morning, This Week

Dusty 1 Comment

This morning I am thinking about down time.

Image result for candy crush

Specifically

 

This morning I played a video game for the first time in a week. I gave them up last week as part of my ongoing project to try to change one of my habits for a week and see how the change affects me. I wanted to change my video game habit because it’s been a constant for essentially all of my life; because it can get pretty invasive; and because the games I’ve been playing lately are brainless and dumb, and that makes me feel lame. I mean, if I was a serious gamer, who participated in some MMORPG  or online tournaments, then it would be a waste of time but at least I’d be involved in something; I’d be part of a cultural moment, of some kind. I’m rarely involved in those types of things, and I often feel bad about it — for instance, I’ve seen neither Game of Thrones nor the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, so everything on Twitter right now goes over my head, instead of just most of it going over my head.

So if my video gaming was at least marginally cool, I wouldn’t feel so bad about it. If I felt like the video games I played had some positive place in my daily routine, I wouldn’t feel bad about that, either — so if I had a following for my video game reviews, or if I wrote for games, or even if I played the Sims and used the opportunity to work on my storytelling, all of that would fit in with my more-complimentary views of myself. Solitaire, though? Mah-Jong? Freaking Candy Crush? How do I feel good about those? Surely I would be better off without them: more focused, more productive, more — interesting.

Turns out: nope.

The big lesson from this past week is this: I don’t veg out because I am addicted to video games; I play video games because I need to veg out. This entire week, the times when I would have been  playing video games, but I wasn’t, were all spent doing something else that wasn’t terribly productive. Mostly scrolling through Facebook and Twitter, which I did more of this week than normal; I watched far more videos, which I usually just scroll past. Losing the video games had a minimal effect on my habits and productivity.

I did try: I tried to read more, and I tried to do some research on the Democratic candidates for President for 2020 (Okay, only on Elizabeth Warren. She’s been my pick since 2016, honestly, and I wanted to look into her policy proposals more. I think I looked at  her website for ten minutes? Maybe fifteen?). But the issue was, I’ve been exhausted all week: I’ve been having pretty serious insomnia; and this is the hardest time for teachers because we have to drag both ourselves and our students through the last few weeks; and there have been stressful things going on for my friends, which has affected me for their sakes; and I’ve been trying to find a new place to live. So it was not a good week for productivity: it was, if I may paraphrase Monty Python, a week for lying down and avoiding. Even my reading, which is one of my other preferred relaxations and escapes, was no good for this week: I’m reading a history of philosophy, written by the mathematician/logician/philosopher Bertrand Russell, whom I admire enormously, but who is always more interested in math than anything else, and whose writing requires quite a lot of focus and effort to get through with full comprehension. So even reading was exhausting.

But when I did find the time and energy to be productive, I did it well: I pursued housing diligently all week; I kept up with my classes and got a lot of grading done; last night I finished a lengthy short story I’ve been working on as a present. I’ve been blogging faithfully all week, and with some pretty substantial posts. It’s been a productive week, considering my circumstances. Just — not because I stopped playing Solitaire.

Leaving behind the video games didn’t make me happier, and didn’t make me more productive. So back they come.

I did learn that if I’m going to pursue anything serious on social media — try to expand my book sales or the following for this blog — I need to improve my use of the platforms. There is no reason whatsoever why I didn’t find new accounts on Twitter and new blogs on WordPress for me to follow; I just didn’t. So I think there will come a week soon when I set aside time every day to do that, and see if I can make a new, useful habit.

Not this week, though. This week is still everything stressful: my friends are still struggling; my rental search is still ongoing; schoolwork and students are still dragging me down. I’ve slept better this weekend, but we’ll see how that goes when I go back to work.

So this week, I asked my wife what I should give up.

She said, “Gum.”

“I don’t chew gum,” I said.

She nodded. “Exactly. Think how easy it will be.” I laughed, and she added, “You think I’m going to make it hard on you? Really?”

I love my wife. And so I’m going to take her suggestion.

I am going to make it slightly harder on myself: I’m going to give up snacks for the week. I come home pretty much every day and eat some kind of salty finger food, pretzels or peanuts or Cheez-its or potato chips; and we frequently have a little ice cream or a couple of cookies for dessert. I rarely eat those things because I’m actually hungry; just because I want some comfort, something to keep me awake. I don’t think I need to use food for that. So I’m going to give all that up, and only eat the major meals, and maybe an apple in the afternoon — I am a teacher, after all; apples sort of come with the job, right?

But if it comes down to it? I’ll let myself slide on everything that isn’t gum.

That’s what my wife told me to do.