Month: April 2015

Refreshing Orange Slice by Pink Sherbet Photography on flickr
April 11, 2015

Rx – Part 2

It’s been more than a week since I last wrote here on this blog. Here’s what my wellness coach, Mizel, had to say after presenting her with my food diary for the week:

1) No to fruit shakes and fruit juices (I broke this rule twice already. I had avocado shake with no milk and sugar with my colleague and Jamba Juice’s Berry Upbeet fruit and veggie smoothie with my mother)

2) Eat red beans – soak for 24 hours in water; source of protein along with egg and spinach

3) No desserts like cake or fruits in can or candies (except for 1 piece or slice of fruit)

4) No salted peanuts – just nuts – (I already broke this one with having it hard to find raw unsalted nuts in the groceries nowadays)

P.S. I already lost an inch in my waistline from 40 to 39. 😀

Drawing of Jesus Christ on cross
April 4, 2015

Holy Week: Quiet Time for our Reflection

The Holy Week is a Christian’s time for reflection. Some may have forgotten this but I guess that the call for a time to relax away from a very stressful work life is in order. I did not plan to go out of town this Holy Week as I knew that others needed this time more than I did. So I stayed in the house and did some household chores along with attempting to work on a project that nears its due.

I also visited several churches along with my mother – Sto. Domingo Church, the church at the University of Santo Tomas, Quiapo Church (Basilica), San Agustin Church, Manila Cathedral, Binondo Church and lastly, (I saved the best for last), Parish of the Holy Sacrifice.

I noticed quite a lot of things. In the Sto. Domingo Church, they were aiming to merge technology with the way they held their mass. The church at the University of Santo Tomas is more orthodox and kept the mass more traditional and conventional. The Quiapo Church has a lot of devout followers. I guess the Black Nazarene is a popular grantor of a lot of wishes and deep, heartfelt prayers. The San Agustin Church rightly put a sign against flash photography. A lot of people are turning churches into tourist destinations instead of taking the time to silently pray. The Manila Cathedral was airconditioned. My mother and I wondered how much they were paying for their electricity bill. The Binondo Church was quaint with a lot of gaudy colored lights. And finally, my heart lay at peace with the Parish of Holy Sacrifice at the University of the Philippines, Diliman campus. There, I kneeled the way our Moslem brothers and sisters do when they pray. And I prayed.

I prayed for the well-being and eventual recovery of my grandmother who is now bedridden and cannot move her joints that much. I prayed for guidance for my whole family and my friends. And I prayed for world peace – a green kind of peace.

I asked my mother a lot of things – why China is strong-arming her way against our territory – and I asked her why my father is still at odds with her even after the annulment of their marriage. But I remember this strongly, I asked my mother about the Holy Catholic church – why she still considers herself a Roman Catholic even after all the atrocities that the church did in the name of the Cross. She answered me, “A Church (as in capital C) is different from the church. The Holy Catholic Church is with us. It is not a physical edifice. Our body is the temple of Jesus Christ.” And I believe in that, too. I believed her.

After all this quiet time of reflection, I decided that it is time to make my next move. I plan to sign myself up with an NGO with a peace advocacy. I plan to enter the peace talks in Mindanao and help resolve the conflict between Moslems and Christians here in these islands and eventually propagate that lasting peace to the rest of the world. I would delay my dreams of game development for now for a better future for humankind and the rest of the world. That is my cause. That is my purpose.

I am now living a purpose-driven life.

April 1, 2015

Rx

I’ve just had a consultation with my nutri-fitness/body coach/yogini, Mizel, and here’s what she has to say about my quest to becoming fit:

  1. Eat a complete meal every time: veggies, meat/fish, 1 cup rice.

    Eat your veggies first then your meat then lastly rice. (try to aim for half a cup of rice but it’s okay to finish the whole cup just as long as that’s your max). And if you still have fruits, eat them last after your rice (limit only to 1 slice). *Whatever you do, don’t skip your meals. if you can eat them at the same time in the day that would be better.

  2. No fruit shakes and fruit juices.

    If you still want to drink juice, opt for veggie juice: a handful of whatever greens you choose (except water lettuce) in buko juice (coconut water) and that’s it. * No added sugar please of any kind even if it’s honey.

  3. Don’t go hungry so prepare your snacks.

    Make it yourself — a combination of nuts, carrots, apples, celery, kale chips, or seeds. I used to make a combination of almonds, cashew nuts, raisins, sunflower seeds, and muesli in a zip lock. As much as possible, raw nuts only. No added salt or sugar. *You can find them in healthy options. (a little pricey though.)

  4. Continue to write your food diary.

    Log in date, time, and your feelings for every meal. Log in also snacks even if they’re just candies or chocolate. *Goal: to find your trigger food. (I think it’s best if you have a special notebook for this. )

  5. Take a whole body shot of yourself in shorts without t-shirt.

    (front, side, and back) And give me a copy. So we have before and after shots.

  6. Start taking 10K steps a day.

    70K in a week. Buy a pedometer. Log the numbers of steps you were able to do in your food diary.

    7. And that’s it for now. By May, I plan to join a local gym with Mizel that costs only 1,000 pesos/month. Cheers to getting fit!!! 😀