Life Challenge Week 1: Charlene Stubbs

Day 7: Body attacked

I woke up this morning full of energy. I took my dog for a walk, got my stuff ready for the beach and grabbed some coffee. By 10.30am I’d already achieved what would usually take me all day. The house was clean, dishes washed, clothes put in the washing machine and I did a spot of de-cluttering. I was obviously still on a high from last night’s Body Attack, but suspicious that my body had such a spring in it’s step.

I was fully expecting to be racked in pain from the minute I woke up. What I didn’t expect is that my body would lull me into a false sense of security: tricking me into thinking it was fine and dandy. Pain struck around 1pm. First in my shoulders, which didn’t surprise me as Jurgita had managed to include an arm exercise in just about everything we did, so ridiculously sore shoulders were definitely on the agenda.

What I didn’t expect is that after indulging in two hours of a box set action (Downton Abbey is highly recommended), I wouldn’t in fact be able to get up off the sofa. My hips refused to move and my legs had lost the will to live! Not looking forward to Body Combat tomorrow.

Day 6: I’m a survivor

After a disastrous attempt at making my first fitness session on Tuesday (leaving the office late, not being able to find a park, or find the Core Direction studio), I finally started my new ‘get fit’ regime today.

After meeting with Core Direction’s Dylan last week, he advised that if my objective is to get fit and lose a few kilos, then the only way to do that is to actually put in the effort. Damn it! He suggested Body Pump, Body Attack and Body Combat classes as these really work you hard. Secretly I was hoping a bit of yoga might do the trick!

I dragged Louisa along with me as I get quite nervous at the thought of group gym classes - lots of buff people in tight lycra is a big turnoff. But, when we actually arrived at the Body Attack class, I was pleasantly surprised to see lots of normal looking people.

Instructor Jurgita certainly put us through our paces. I don’t think I’ve ever moved that constantly for an hour, or in fact, sweated so much! But, every time I felt like throwing in the towel, I just had to look around the room at all the other red, hot, sweaty faces just like mine. Annoyingly every time I looked over at Louisa she would shout, ‘This is great!’. I don’t think I’ll be taking her again… An hour later I hobbled home feeling like I’d put a huge effort into the class – you’re only going to get out what you actually put in, and very glad to have just survived.

Day 5: Anything is possible

After yesterday’s low I woke up this morning with a new spring in my step. For some reason I feel really positive today and I’m already starting to look at things in a different way.

I’ve had a few thoughts today about the future and normally in this situation my mind races ahead and automatically puts up barriers to stop me even imagining that whatever I’m thinking about could be a possibility. In my head I’ve flashed forward three years and created obstacles that don’t even exist!

But today, for the first time, I really have a feeling that the things I do want in life are possible. And if I feed that image to my subconscious then that’s what it will believe to be true. Genius!

Day 4: Changing my belief system

I would have loved a biscuit today! My timeline session with Shana was more emotional than I had expected and so today I’m feeling very fragile and sad. The session was really successful in terms of clearing out the junk, and visualising my past was a lot easier than I thought it would be.

It was amazing to hear the clear messages my subconscious was telling me and being able to pinpoint when I first experienced a certain emotion was fascinating. Finally letting go of those emotions is a huge relief but I didn’t expect to feel so raw afterwards. I think realising that I’ve been the cause of my own pain over the years and not functioned as the ‘real’ me is huge! And it makes me feel sad that just a few incidents in my past built the foundations of my belief system.

At the moment I suppose I feel a little lost as to how I now go about life. It’s like I’ve got a clean slate. I can start again. Be who I want to be. But what I feel really happy about is that I’ve got rid of those beliefs that don’t serve me in a positive way, and with Shana’s help, I now have the tools to process new emotions properly so that I don’t make the same mistakes again.

Day 3: October 3

My new fitness schedule starts tomorrow – I’m signed up for all sorts of body manipulation classes. This is the area that will be my biggest hurdle: my fitness levels aren’t great and I make every excuse in the book not to fit exercise into my daily life. I’m sure the guys over at Core Direction are about to change all of that… I’ll let you know tomorrow…

Click here to read how Charlene prepared for the challenge

Day 2: October 2

 I have my second session of the NLP Personal Breakthrough Journey with Shana Kad this evening where we’re going to address my timeline – when and where certain beliefs and patterns of behaviour have formed – and hopefully we’ll be getting rid of some of them!

Day 1: October 1

Today, I did my first healthy-eating supermarket shop, which took me an hour longer than normal as I was scanning the labels and selecting healthier options. As recommended, in order to lose a bit of weight, I’ve also started counting calories. I downloaded a calorie counter app and today I consumed only my permitted 1,200 calories.