Day 5 - TFI Friday!

Today is a little milestone, on what appears to be a long journey for me. Today marks 5 days of solid training and the highs and lows that accompany it.

This week I've pushed harder, sweated more and felt more driven. I've fallen off my wagon and got back onto it again. I've learned a few life lessons along the road, but mostly I've enjoyed it.

Early Morning Activity

Well, my take on Early Morning Activity (EMA) of any kind is that it gets your blood pumping, forces you outta bed and makes you focus before you head to work, or wherever you need to be later. EMA is as much about discipline as it is about forging a pattern, a way of being and getting fit. I also would like to think it stops me being lazy; and when that alarm buzzer goes off it should pull you from your cosy, warm slumber! You then have two choices:

1. Stay put and let your brain start to procrastinate (bad move)
2. Just get the heck out of bed and move yourself before your brain takes over and starts to try and reason with you!

I used to take option 1, now I make a really huge effort to take option 2. I hear the alarm go off, I turn on a light, check my phone, and roll out of bed. I then scupper around making my warm lemon water and get dressed for the gym. I walk out of the door knowing I'm on track.

Discipline

Thats nice I hear you say… He gets up early - whoopdie-doo! Well, this brings me to a point that is important to me - Discipline. It is vital. We wanna get ourselves feeling a little regimented first thing. We really like not having to think first thing in the morning, just do what is necessary before getting stuck into any work or activity.

Living a more disciplined lifestyle has afforded me so many things. Be being more consistent with what time I roll out of bed, I have so much more useful/productive time each day. Being strict with my diet, cutting out gluten for example, I find that I need to be disciplined and this ties in nicely with self-control! 

So, I'm trying to be more disciplined with this new routine of mine. Its helping me to create some new habits and its helping me to steer clear of the bad habits!

Focus

So, I find that these early gym sessions get me going. They help me stay focused for the rest of the day. Which is why, when I woke up this morning, I forced myself to break from my habit of revision, cram, revision (prior to my usual Friday morning exam) and I got up at 0500h and went to the gym. I did a shorter than normal workout - the purpose of my workout was to "keep the routine" and reinforce the new habit. It worked. I trained Back for 40 minutes and promptly returned to my cabin to shower and study. I felt more focused and this meant I could really direct my revision. Subsequently, I think I did pretty well in my exam and will be sure to do some form of EMA next Friday!

Legs!

After doing some housekeeping in my cabin - ironing my uniform and preparation for tonight's Wardroom Mess Dinner, I decided to take Mr P's (p for protein) offer of joining him for "legs day", and went back to the gym for a 90 minute leg workout - my first. I went through all the exercises with him, and worked within my body's limits, I listened to my body and gave it my best! I kind of enjoyed legs, so I'll be sure to maintain a day for legs each week! We did a whole manner of squats, curls, lunges and raises - and I knew I'd be sore tomorrow if I didn't loosen it all up a bit…so I went for a quick 500m swim. 14 minutes later I was stretching again! One thing I have to tell you, is I'm a self-developed freestyle swimmer and I only transitioned from Breast stroke a year or so ago… and today was the FIRST time I'd ever attempted (or even pulled off) my first Tumble Turn! I'll be sure to start adding that into my swims from now on!

Navy Tradition

Now, this post is being published late, so I felt it necessary to say why. Last night I was obligated to attend a Naval Tradition. Officers occasionally get the 'opportunity' to socialise in a formal setting known as a Mess Dinner. We all get dressed up in our 'Mess Undress' uniforms and attend a formal sit down (silver service) dinner with pre drinks, flowing wines and speeches. There's traditional things that go on during a Mess Dinner, and some of them date back to the times of Sir Lord Admiral Nelson, some new modifications to those traditions are also present. We had a formal "parading of the meat" (the stewards carried out the meat flaming on a platter), there was a lovely band playing, fantastic conversation with new colleagues and friends. There was a guest speaker, who had some very interesting stories about his career in the RAN, and some excellent advice from him to all of us! There was plenty of Port and that was awesome! I took a few pics (although I foolishly didn't get a snap of dessert).

I think its important to remember that being part of an organisation such as the Royal Australian Navy, and being a commissioned Officer within its hierarchy, that life and work are disciplined, but we have a lot of fun too (where appropriate). This was a fun occasion and its a major separator between civilian life and service. Thanks to XO for the event, and for sharing the fun of HMAS Cerberus' 100 years since commissioning with us.

HMAS Cerberus Commissioning Mess Dinner

Me in my Uniform

My Place Setting

Looking toward the top table

A View of the Vice-President

Shameless 'Selfie'

GF Tomato Soup

Sneaky Shot of Mr P

Beautiful Lamb Rack

This was and is the principle reason why I am posting this a few hours late! The function went on quite late, and then after sharing this experience with my parents (via FaceTime) in the UK, I was too tired to complete the post…. That does mean you'll get to read my Saturday (Day 6) post very soon too!