Sharkasm at it's Finest

 I am generally not a New Years resolution type of person. If I am being honest with myself, I am too lazy and too fickle to stick to any regiment. I feel it is silly to set expectations for myself that I know I will just forget about and give up on. I don't know if that makes me a pessimist or and optimist? I feel indifferent about it, I believe. The new year is at the end of a long holiday season and generally realize my good habits slack during the holidays, especially in regards to eating and health. I know enough about myself to admit that. So, I guess I know I need to respond to this waning of dietary discipline and refocus my efforts on getting myself back into a healthy state of nutrition and body awareness. I just want to feel better and be less self-conscious about my body. It really is taxing and robs a ton of joy from my life.  So, I am once again "working it", by counting calories in my phone app and making sure to cut out as much sugar from my diet. I have b...

Back at it again. 242 pounds currently. It is 2022 and I have some weight to lose once again. I have some new goals for myself this year and I want to really dial in my weight and exercise routine.  I am looking to start counting calories again an focus on creating a deficit each day to trim up and get lean again. This time, I want to also add more cardio and maybe some weight lifting.  It is my goal this year to get leaner, stronger and play more golf. This year will hopefully be the most active I will have been in many years. Onto a lighter me!

 It has been several months since I posted last, but I wanted to provide an update on my weight loss status. I relaxed my efforts over the holidays a bit, but I am happy to say that I only gained about 5 lbs. I am very happy with this. I used this time as a way to see if I could maintain my weight for an extended amount of time. I feel successful in this and I am now ready to start the last stage of my weight loss journey. Currently, I am at 220.8 pounds and pushing to create calorie deficits each day. This will be the hardest stretch for me as I know I am beginning to plateau in my ability to just control my intake. I am looking to add a light workout program that will create additional calorie loss and hopes that it will get me to my goal of 185 lbs by May. I am excited and motivated to get this goal met. Onto a lighter me!

It is has been a rough few months, but at the same time very exciting.  My family and I have moved into a brand new home this Summer and that is amazing. But, the stress and anxiety of moving during a quarantine was not easy, especially with the accelerated time table we had to sell our old home. It was just hard. Then there has been the California fires and the inability for us to go outside for over a full month due to smoke. It has been a double whammy of isolation and it has taken its toll on our family as I am sure it has on other families.  My personal weight loss goals had been on pause as I was trying to continue to work from home and parent full-time. During this whole time, I have not been able to lose weight at my desired rate, but I am thankful that I have not gained any weight. That is a victory! That changed as of this last week. I started to aggressively watch my calories again this last week and I am happy to say that I am now down to 214lbs! That is a total of...

I did it! 50 pounds lost! Throughout this process of losing weight, I have learned many things about myself and my lifestyle choices. Specifically in regards to my eating habits and the general lack of care for my body. I felt ashamed at the start not only because of my obesity, but also the lack of care for one of the greatest gifts God has given me, my body. I have learned that I need to not take my body for granted, because it is the reason I am alive. I want to live and I want to be around for many more decades to enjoy this life with my God, wife, children, family and friends. Life is never guaranteed as each day can bring whatever it does, but I feel better today knowing that I am trying my best to take care of my body so I can take care of my loved ones. Today I celebrate this accomplishment and boy it is a great feeling. I really am proud of myself for hitting this goal. I still have a ways to go still, but this was a milestone that I have been looking forward to for a long tim...

I am down to 226lbs! The lowest I have been in over 6 years! I am so excited to reach the 225 mark. That will mean 50 lbs lost! I still have a ways to go, but I am getting there. 😊 Onto a lighter me!

Perseverence is the key to success. I have heard this quote before used in many contexts, but it has become a reality for me lately. During this unprecedented time of Covid-19 quarantine, I have been challenged in many ways. Challenged to be a good husband, a good father and a good employee. It has not been easy and it has been a heavy burden to carry. I have struggled to maintain the balance of all these things and I have failed more drastically then when I was able to leave the house each day to separate these responsibilities physically. It has been a learning experience for me in how to control my thoughts, speak only after thinking and generally controlling myself when I get frustrated or tired. But, it has not been all bad. I have had more time to spend with my family and that ultimately is a good thing. This season has reminded me to be more present and more involved in the day by day routine of our household. Learning to share the responsibility of looking after our child...

In seasons like we are currently in, it is easy to become afraid and forget about others. We focus on ourselves and our own needs. This only leaves us with a concern for our own well being and there is hardly room for the thoughts and needs of others.  I am convinced that the only thing that will give us peace in times such as this, is to think of others before ourselves. It is there that we can raise above our own problems and our hearts will feel the peace of doing something that truly matters. If you want to bless others, I would encourage you to donate to support those in need. You will feel good about doing it and others will be blessed.  Here is a great organization to support our youth.  https://twitter.com/eatlearnplay If you own a computer and want to donate it’s processing power to help find a cure to Covid-19: https://pcmasterrace.org/folding/  Bless you.

It is February 2020 and I have now officially lost 35 pounds since September 17th, 2019. I updated my weight the other day and I was presented with the following congratulatory message from my LoseIt app. Really? I have lost 140 sticks of butter worth of weight! That is both disgusting but also amazing!  I feel good today and I am encouraged by the progress I have made with my weight. Still have a long way to go. Onward... to a lighter me.

I weighed myself this morning and I am now 252.5 Lbs. I am knocking on the door of 20 pounds lost since September. My clothes are starting to fit looser and I can see in my face and in my abdomen that I have lost weight. Also, the loss of weight has relieved the pain in my knees, especially at the end of the day. This is a great encouragement. I feel good about my progress and look forward to losing more. On to a lighter me!

This last week I spent 5 days in Hilo Hawaii with my father and brother Eamon. We harvested over 1400 cacao pods. We then cracked over 2000 pods and collected the beans for fermentation. It was a great time connecting with each of them and catching up. I experienced emotions that I have not felt since I was a young boy. Spending time with my dad was interesting. I felt feelings of anxiety caused by his behavior that I have not felt for a long time. I wonder if I do the same thing to Luke and Arra? Overall, it was a great time spent and I feel I connected with each of them in ways I never have before. I would love to do this more often (maybe a couple times a year). I want to prioritize this in order to assist my dad in his business, but also to be intentional about connecting with him. I definitely want to take my family there so they can see all of the stuff I experienced this last week.

I weighed myself this morning and I am now at 260.2 lbs! 😁 Since 9/23/2019 I have lost an additional 10 lbs! My clothes are starting to feel lighter and my body feels good. I am very proud of my progress and I still have a long way to go, but it is feeling more like a routine now. I have been very good about counting my calories throughout each day and I now have logged 40 straight days in the Lose It! app. I am excited to continue this journey and see the results as I move into a more healthy Ryan for my family, my God and myself. Onward... to a lighter me.

I recently weighed myself after a rather long time. It was not encouraging. I weighed more than I ever have. 279.7 lbs to be exact. I was shocked, but at the same time knowing. I had let myself go. This prompted me to start to take my health more seriously. I need to change my eating and exercising habits if I want to live long to enjoy my family and serve the Lord. I have gone through this before, but not at this amount of weight. I knew I needed to set a goal and stick to it. I re-installed my "Lose It!" Android app and began to count my calories for each meal. I set my target weight at 185 lbs and told the app to forecast my caloric intake for 2 lost pounds each week. That was a week ago. As of this morning I have lost 9.5 pounds just by watching my diet and trying to walk more. I now weigh 270.2 lbs. Onward... to a lighter me.

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. Romans 15:13 ESV I received this passage today serendipitously through my verse of the day notification. It was quite timely as I had a moment with my Father that I have never had before. We had a good moment remembering his sister Karen and it led me to become very emotional. I was in my truck pulling out to leave for work, but I felt I needed to give him one last hug. As the garage door opened, he was waiting for me there almost expectantly. I felt compelled to hug him and I lost my nerve. It was one of the most  amazing moments of my life. I cried, he cried and I just sobbed in his arms did not let him go. It was only a minute, but it felt like a whole life's worth of my emotions came spilling out. I needed it and part of me knew by the glassy look in his eyes, that he needed it too. It was a God moment... One that I could never have imagin...

I often find myself speaking because I feel the need to say something. Whether the circumstance determines this a good thing or not, it is a mixed bag. What compels me to open my mouth and speak? Is there something really of worth to share? Might I just be taking a liberty when perhaps I shouldn't? Too often people feel the need to speak. I believe that words are very powerful. I believe they have the potential to encourage, heal and to also hurt. I wish I knew with certainty that I would only offer my words to encourage. Only to love and let those around me know how much desire for them to succeed and grow. I fail in this. Perhaps I should also forgive those who make the same mistakes. Who am I to hold this grudge against anyone?

It is a weird season. One that I hope to look back on and glean some profound truth from. It just feels like chaos most of the time. I have been learning my whole life to think, act and feel like an adult and not a child. Now, as a parent I am supposed to jump into the mind of a 2 year old. Freaking frustrating and... extremely amusing at times.

If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?"                -John Wooden Lately it seems that a lot of web services have been making some major snafus. Both Yahoo and LinkedIn have been compromised over the last couple months and sites like Facebook and Google are constantly experiencing bugs in their services and interfaces. This makes me wonder, "Is it acceptable for big companies to make mistakes?" When I was a little kid, my mother had a sewing area in our family laundry room. On the wall above the sewing machine my mother had hung this quote: If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over? Whether I was doing long division or drafting a mechanical spec drawing, I was instructed to do them correctly by aligning my number columns correctly and drawing my lines straight and with consistent line weight. Taking time to do things correctly f...