Convince yourself to start fighting against FAT - By Uncle J

It has been a year++ since I started to fight to lose fat! More or less, I have learnt something from workout and gained some experience on fat loss.

Here, I am not going to talk about kinds of workout, methods, foods that can help you losing fat and I don't think that I am qualified and professional to tell about those yet.
I would like to share some thought of mine which move me forwards and little knowledge of mine that bring me forward step by step, hoping that it can at least help you if you are reading this😁

Let me brief a little bit about my fat loss journey, or you can read my previous post😀

• I am Malaysian Chinese, 30 years old (2017), standing at 163cm 😑.
• I was an active bboy when I was at my college (19-25 years old).
• I started to gain weight and flabby when I started working.
• I got dad bod at my 27 and 28.
• I started a real fight against my fat at 29 years old 😆

The above-mentioned are brief stories about when did I get fat and when did I decide to make a change. How to start? You have to take your first step out.

First Of All - The reasons to choose fitness workout

Tired of being called a fatty, I decided to make a change. So the first thing of all, you have to ask yourself: "What do you want to do to slim down?" I believe there must be a lot of answers. In my little knowledge, there are options such as: Slimming companies, slimming products, diet plan, sports, and etc. Among many answers, I decided to go for fitness workout. In my humble opinion, fitness workout is a good choice for me because of following:

I can do it alone

Some sports or exercises may need you to gather partner or group to start and play. My job may send me to work in different places which may be far away from my friends. So, I have to learn to live alone😢

I can do it with little or no equipment

It is arguable. I will need a lot of gym equipment to really build muscle and look good. But I can complete many kinds of workout without ZERO equipment too. Other than that, some sports require balls, rackets, or etc.  

I can do it anywhere, actually

As above, having workout in gym give me many varieties of training, but there may not be any gym nearby. So I can actually do it at home, parks, garden, kid's playground or etc at neighborhoods. Beside that, other sports need a pitch/sport ground to fulfill the activity which may not be available everywhere in Malaysia.

Time

I used to think that I was quite busy with my daily activities. I did not believe that I have much time to spare for exercising. 

1. 8:00am-8:45am: Wake time.
2. 8:46am-9:20am: Driving to work.
3. 9:21am-6:00pm: Work...
4. 6:00pm-7:10pm: Driving home + Traffic jam.
5. 7:11pm-8:00pm: Short rest at home + shower.
6. 8:00pm-9:30pm: Dinner (including driving/walking to eat outside)
7. 9:31pm-12:00am: Meeting friends / Rest at home after a long day.
8. 12:01am-7:59am: Approximately 8 hours sleep.
9. Repeat~ 

This is my daily routine during working days. So you can see that I have free time after 9:30pm (as per wording in Blue). Okay, now ask yourself, do you see any spare time in yours?

Everyone has own reasons and excuses. Before I really started, I had a few excuses also:

• I am tired after working all day long.
• I need a rest.
• I need to relax myself after a long day.
• I should not increase my stress after all the pressure at work.
• I have to spend some time with friends.

Do you agree? 

If you insist that your lifestyle is fixed with standard daily routine and can not make any spare time, you don't have to expect any change. How can result come without any effort?  

All you need to do is: Try to figure out, "What can I let go to go for a workout?" Your daily routine is totally under your own control. You are the boss to fill in activities at different hour. It is not an easy choice, but the decision is on your own. You can arrange to workout 2~3 times in a week, and you still have 4 days to hang around and enjoy your life.

Mental Preparation

If you have convinced yourself as I did like above, you should have been one step closer. I can still remember how did I feel and what did I think at the beginning before I went to gym. Based on my personal experience, there are a few "Frequently Think Question"😆:

• Will there be someone laughing at me?
• Will there be anyone bullying me?
• Is it embarrassing enough that I started to workout in this body shape?
• Am I started too late to do this at my age?
• I know nothing. What can I do?

I wonder if anyone has the similar worries, but I personally thought of these when I started and I realized some of my friends did so. It is normal for a newbie but these thoughts must be forgotten soonest possible because they are something unnecessary. Everyone has to start somewhere. All you have to do is to focus on your aim when you are on the way to somewhere for workout. You should think that you are in a mode of "I AM ON FIRE! NOBODY CAN STOP ME FROM TRANSFORMATION", and you just don't give a damn about how others' view.

Of course, you have to do something if you really know nothing much. You may look into following:

• Personal trainer
• Experienced friends who can teach you workout
• Research
• Copy from what others are doing😆

I started my workout alone and I prefer to workout alone actually. 
Without much experience, I just did some research online, searching at Google and YouTube. Occasionally there would be some posts about workout at my Facebook news feed. I made a record of those workout variations and gave a try in front of my laptop/phone to find out if I could do it. 
I strongly recommend to start with beginner workout if you are alone, then slowly increase the difficulty when getting stronger 😊 It is to ensure you are not over-stressing yourself when you are still not sure how strong you actually are.

Conclusion

The beginning of something new is actually very challenging. People are interested in it but tend to give excuses to avoid it because of unfamiliarity. However, I made my move, and I believe everyone can do it too. I share my thought above because I hope that It can at least help someone if it is read. 

If you are having similar worries as I did, I hope that this post is able to make your mind and convince you to make your first step. Thank you for reading.

My Fat Loss Journey

It is just a story about the war between FAT & me and i would like to tell about my little experience gained on fat loss with workout since 2016. So, let me start with my body changes from the age when I was having much active time to limited active time. 

Skinny Lean Uncle J

I started breakdancing when I was 19 (Year 2006~2013). I was really in "good shape" and being lean at the time when I spent most of my time on dancing (although I was not doing really good in dance actually). So I looked like this when i was a bboy and when I was really small and lean =D

Flabby Uncle J

At the age of 24, I slowly reduced my active dancing time due to work. Being a salesman, I spent time in office sitting at working desk, spent time driving "sitting" behind the steering wheel, spent time sitting down meeting clients eating and drinking. Having this kind of lifestyle most of the time, my ass was getting lazy to dance and being active.

When I was 25, I still went for dance practice twice a week instead of 4-5 days practice per week at younger age. However, I did not realize my body was getting plump and still believed that I could rip if I dance more WHEN I had time. So, did I make my move?

Slim but Beer Belly Uncle J

I made my decision to focus more and being more committed to my new job as a project manager in interior renovation when I was 26 because I would need to work at random time at night or even holiday. Furthermore, I was getting really lazy to get my ass moving whenever I was home from work. But I did try to lose some fat by having new interest in fitness workout. In 2013, I started to go for fitness center and paid membership with zero knowledge.

Not bad right? I changed new hairstyle! 😄😄😄. Working out of town for projects, I had very few friends there and my time became a lot more after working time. Therefore, I paid for gym membership to force myself to go for diet with exercise during free time. BUT, I could not stay long in this condition after the 6-months projects end.

DAD BOD Uncle J

In year 2014 and 2015, I was like giving up myself. 

1. The number of drinking alcohol in week kept increasing.
2. Zero Exercise.
3. Heavy food and drink at anytime.

"Welcome bro, you were joining the Dad Bod trend". I have never been this fat and I was totally looked like a father at my age of 27-28 while I was not married yet.

Yes. Can you still see some shadow at my abs? This was how i comfort myself with some good lighting and keep flexing when taking photo. The fact is I was fat, really fat, really really fat.

In the years, many comments about my body shape around:

"Bro, you are sooooo fat now!"

"Wow, you are getting healthy!"

"You must be having a good life now!"

"Hey fatty............"

"How cute are you, round and short!"

"Uncle J is soooo fat"
"Uncle J why are you so fat already?"

These comments were seriously making me sick. I hate these! I don't like these!

I don't want to be called a fatty! I don't want to look fat! Do I really have to look like this for the rest of my life? 

Body Types

There are quite a few of body types being called as trends but there is no standard on describing the body shape.
In those few years, DAD BOD has become a trend. What is DAD BOD? "Dad Bod" is a male body type that is best described as "softly round". It's built upon the theory that once a man has found a mate and fathered a child, he doesn't need to worry about maintaining a sculpted physique. Having a "dad bod" is a nice balance between working out and keeping a beer gut. (ref:Urban Dictionary). And I just don't know why it has become a trend and some ladies find it attractive → Maxim- Woman find the 'Dad Bod' more attractive (2/11/2016. 

By the way, fitness body was getting common in my circle and I always saw posts about fitness, going to gym, workout, or etc in my social media feed. of course there are also quite a numbers of celebrities making a trend and inspiration with their ultimate body transformation. I believe some movies are really inspiring all the time such as:

I believe most of the Chinese or Asian know about this movie. Aren't you? Alright. If you know nothing about this, you will find this in YouTube and see some scenes at Unbeatable Movie Montage. It seem like it is a normal movie about MMA. But the cast in the movie has become a trend in Chinese market and their names have even become a term to describe body fitness. Why? It is because one of the actor is very famous in Hong Kong and he proved that he could make it to transform at the age of 45. From a comedy actor to dramatic, from a normal body to fit, he made himself transforming throughout the years, and I idolize him very much for so many years!

Of course I don't want to be in that Dad Bod forever! I need to make a change!
So the first step to make change is: Take your first step out! Take your first STEP OUT! TAKE YOUR FIRST STEP OUT!

Year 2016 - The beginning of the war between FAT and Me

In my personal opinion at that time, my belief on fat loss is as following:

1. Exercising and sweating are the best way to lose weight. ╳
2. Weight loss equals to fat loss. ╳
3. More abs workout will cut away the beer belly. ╳

At the first quarter of year 2016, I used to do push-up & crunches at home. I weighed 69kg but height is 163cm. The heaviest weight I have ever had. There I heard a lot of comments that I was very very fat during the time. I swear that I really need to do something about it. 

March 2016

My target was very simple: I want to slim down my waist. No more beer belly please!

I started to look around at my friends and tried to learn from their method to keep fit.

The most common suggestion to me is JOGGING.

Arghhh... I hate jogging because of my bad stamina. But many say it helps weight loss. So I keep doing by running slow for 20-30 minutes every time, 2-3 days weekly. At least I did something.

HIIT workout was quite a trend at the moment and it is still popular nowadays. One of the person who make it famous for Malaysian is Jordan Yeoh , a Malaysia fitness trainer whose videos are spreading wild in Facebook because of his look alike with Jay Chou. So I decided to follow this method and did it at the small gym room average 3-4 days per week.

May 2016

Basically there was no change at all 😭😭😭 

Most probably it was because my food intake was still really heavy and my workout was not intense enough. By the way, my strength and stamina were getting better. My arms were a little toned. That's all.

I really had to do something because I was stuck there. And I did research online and study again on workout to lose weight. So based on my simple and simply studies, I told myself a few points:

1. Weight loss doesn't mean fat loss! I need to know more about fat-burning.
2. Result comes slow at first few months because I workout to boost the metabolism. My metabolism had been slow because of inactive lifestyle and ageing. Speeding up metabolism will help to burn fat.
3. Sweating doesn't equal fat-burning.
4. Abs workout helps building six-packs, but you have to burn away the fat at your abs to see them.
5. Food intake is a key. 
6. Weightlifting burns more fat than jogging/running.

OK! All I need to do is: Be consistent, be patient, keep doing.

After 6 months of doing home HIIT workout, lifting weight in small gym room with very limited equipment, jogging at treadmill after workout, my friend started up a business and open a gym Underground Fitness Malaysia and it's at my neighborhood. I took a membership and force myself commit to it!

Welcome back to life in gym after 3 years, hopefully it is not a 3 minutes passion!

August 2016

I told myself: "I am not fooling around this time! I really have to make it! Once I started, I will not stop!"

I have been going to gym more frequent, averaged 90 minutes-120 minutes, 4-5 days per week. I spent time studying more on weightlifting and workout to burn fat. I have been spending time going to gym after dinner time which is the only free time for me after working hour. It is really tiring and killing me actually. But I still keep going because the will in my heart is getting stronger.

October 2016

November 2016

Some friends feel that I have gone mad and some said I am kind of boring person spending most of the free time at gym after dinner. But why you want to slow yourself down when you are about to reach your target? It wasn't the best, but at least I am on my way. 

January 2017

March 2017

Maybe it doesn't seem to be much different in your view, but I feel slightly better with getting rid of my beer belly. Of course my journey would not be as inspiring as others that a person transforming into 'bodybuilder' or perfect type of body. However, I would like to tell that, it is just a matter of DO it or NOT, and I will always try my best to keep doing. I still stick to what I mentioned earlier, "I am actually looking for a slimmer body, no more beer belly please!"

Everyone keep fighting. Trust yourself. Result may not come very soon, but good thing will come if you keep doing the right thing. Be passionate and patient 😃😃😃