40 Days to Personal Revolution

This week I found out that more than 2 people read my blog! YAY!!! I know, I know this is supposed to be a travel blog, and it's named after my bike so I should write about cycling, but instead all I do is talk about YOGA. Well, this post is no exception! (Don't worry, I'll be traveling again in no time! Plans are in the works...)

I love Yoga.

This is from the Yoga Aid Challenge!

Anyway...back in January, I was depressed. SUPER depressed. My boyfriend had just left me, I had family drama, and I hated my job. Basically, I was running out of reasons to get out of bed in the morning. And then I heard about a program through my yoga studio called 40 DAYS TO PERSONAL REVOLUTION. Aghhh, self help. Well, I needed some self-help in my life so I enrolled!

The 40 Days program is based on a book written by Baron Baptiste that guides you to look deep within yourself and discover what isn't working in your life. You do yoga 6 days a week, meditate twice a day (which get incrementally longer each week), have weekly group meetings, shift your diet, answer in-depth self excavation questions, and oh yeah, read the book.

Not to be overly dramatic or super cliche, but the 40 Days program saved me. Not that I was near death or anything, but it saved me from a life of misery.

I already knew I was on the wrong path, but throughout the 40 Days I realized that I was the only person who had the power to change my path. And it was then that I found the courage to rid myself of the things that weren't serving me to become a happier, healthier person. I wanted to be free.

I found a new place to live, I distanced myself from caustic friendships, I tossed the clutter, and then I put in my notice at work and bought a ticket to Peru.

In February I remember saying, "I just want to wake up one day and be leading a completely different life". And now I am! Yoga hasn't changed my life. I've changed my life because of yoga.   

Nothing and nobody has the power to change your life besides you.

And now I am enrolled again in the 40 Days to Personal Revolution program! I have completed Week 3 and so far so good! I've managed to make it to yoga class 5-6 times per week. I'm meditating once a day (twice a day got to be overkill once each meditation session hit 20 minutes. baby steps...), I have rid meat and store-bought beer from my diet, and I am working on being more present and noticing my reactions.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up NOW is that tomorrow I start a 3-day Fruit Fast (cleanse?)~!  oh scariness... I opted out of the fruit cleanse last time because it was January and there was no fruit! 

I'm nervous/slightly paranoid that I'm going to starve to death. eeek!

I'll keep you updated!

Wow, yoga is hard.

The Day I Pretended to be a Food Blogger

For me, cooking is a means to an end. I'm hungry, thus I must throw something on the stove and stir it around a bit so I can eat. I pretty much only know how to make 5 things well so I make them over and over and over and over and over again. Eating in restaurants isn't really an option because 1) it's expensive and 2) it's not very exciting to eat out alone. And since I prefer eating whole healthy fresh food, most affordable fast food type eateries aren't an option for me either.

I'm a little bit of a food snob... but I can't cook! Shameful...

The type of food I usually buy.

Anyway, lately I've been reading food blogs, well one actually. My friend Jenna actually makes a living from writing a blog! Can you BELIEVE it?!!! Amazingness. Since I'm not working much, and would rather than procrastinate than write my grad school application, I started reading her posts everyday, mostly to look at the pretty pictures of food and fantasize about eating such deliciousness.Yummmm.

And then yesterday after staring intently at her deep dish pizza recipe and wishing I create such a concoction, I had the epiphany that maybe, JUST MAYBE, I should actually tear my eyes from the photos and read the recipe, and (dare I say it) use the oven!

To me, the oven is a foreign object who's entire mission in life is to burn my food. So I've stopped using it altogether.

So last night after yoga I stopped by Trader Joes and picked up some dough-making supplies. And here I am, nearly 24 hours later, attempting to make a deep dish pizza!

Make dough... check!  Let dough rise.... check!  Slice toppings... check!

I put the pizza all together just like the recipe said. But I added basil because we have a ton growing in the garden.

I put it in the.... OVEN. eep!

And now it's ready to eat... but how will it taste? I'm afraid to find out. It took like 2 hours to make! Although during that time I brought my computer into the kitchen to listen to Pandora and I also washed ALL my dirty dishes of which there were a TON (I dislike washing dishes even more than using the oven and grocery shopping... wow I could NEVER be a food blogger!). Oh how I digress to avoid tasting my own pizza.

and.......... 

....

.......

.........

IT'S INCREDIBLE!

....

.......

.........

............ I'm still eating it. oh my god, it's sooo good.

I definitely consider this one a success! Does this mean I'm going to throw out my dreams for travel and become a food blogger? No way, Jose! But I may investigate more into these so-called "recipes".

High School Reunions Are Weird

I came. I went. I conquered... my high school reunion that is. Which was just this past weekend. And let me tell you, it was STRANGE.

I had seen Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion enough times to know what to be prepared for. Not to mention, I also watched Grosse Point Blank and Peggy Sue Got Married to get me ready for this grand affair. So I knew what to expect: PROM - but 10 years later. It seems that in every reunion movie, the event takes place in a large ballroom or the high school gym. A group of bitchy girls hassle the protagonist. And a boy who was not hot in high school shows up looking completely gorgeous and sweeps you off your feet declaring his undying love for the high school version of yourself.

This did not happen.

First of all, the event was held in a fancy hotel, but not in a ballroom. Most of the action centered around the bar. And no one danced. The Mean Girls that terrorized my childhood didn't show up (except for one and we didn't even address each other). And many of the guys were alot cuter in high school than now - 10 years later.

But the part that surprised shocked me the most was the extent to which I got hit on! I'm not used to being hit on at all, let alone by the boys that ignored me back in high school. All through the night various males approached my friends asking if I were single and saying things like, "wow, Melanie got pretty". And guys bought me drinks all night, to the point that I had to ask them to stop buying me drinks!... This has never happened in my life.

I tried to make sense of it all... because I look EXACTLY THE SAME as I did in high school. Well, my hair is darker now and has layers. But other than that I look the same. So what changed? And then I realized, I didn't "get hot", what I got was self-esteem and confidence.

Before I went to college, I was timid and had low self-esteem. When a football player made a wisecrack comment I didn't know how to retort a witty comeback. I continually compared myself to other girls at my school and wished I could be like them... more athletic, more popular, more stylish, more outgoing, etc. But over the past 10 years I've gained a ton of confidence.
Rather than wishing I were like someone else, if I wanted something I'd jump through hoops in order to achieve it. For example, when I wished I was more athletic, I became a triathlete. When I wished I was more fashionable, I sketched the outfits of other women until I learned how to put an outfit together. When I wished I was more well-traveled, I bought plane tickets.

Now I walk with my head held high and there is no one I'd rather be... but me. And THAT is what those boys (men?) noticed. Confidence, not physical appearance, is what makes someone stand out in a crowd.

Friends :)