Polyglot Fitness Challenge 2021

[pinkyslippers]

Hello

I hope I am not treading on anyone's toes by starting this Challenge thread. This Challenge was started last year by IronMike but apparently he has left the forum so I thought I would continue for 2021. Having the accountability of checking in on our language progress, whether through challenges on this forum or your own language log can be very motivating, and I like the idea of extending that accountability to health/fitness too. I should say I'm no polyglot so feel something of a fraud already but thought it was too confusing to change the name

The rules:

The rules are super simple. You just need to have a minimum of one fitness challenge and one language challenge to complete during 2021. You can have more than one if you want.

A language challenge can be as big or small as you want it to be. You might want to reach a certain level in a language (either by passing an exam or through diagnostic testing), or it could be to read a novel in your target language, or to have one language exchange a month...

Same goes for the fitness challenge. You might want to train for a marathon, or get a certain number of steps per day, beat your previous PB in a sport, begin a yoga practice... It's also fine to add health-related goals too, they don't necessarily have to be sport-related if that's not your thing. You might want to establish a meditation habit, or do meat-free Mondays...

You can change your challenge at any point if life gets in the way (injury, family commitments, pandemics...), just post it on this board to let us know.

Let me know if you want to join!

[pinkyslippers]

Participants (in alphabetical order of username):

富士山
alaart
Cavesa
Cèid Donn
clara
coldrainwater
Deinonysus
devilyoudont
humerusthings
IronMike
jmar257
Kaha
LunaMoonsilver
Mista
pinkyslippers
tangleweeds
tungemål
Ug_Caveman

[tangleweeds]

Ooh, I'm on this one! Or, at least maybe I qualify?

Both my language and fitness goals tend to be rather fluid because I'm an inveterate wanderluster, perhaps more a student of linguistics than any particular language, and my state of health and therefore my ability to focus varies day to day (unfortunately at something of a nadir at the moment, but I'm working to rehab that).

Because I have a strong tendency to focus on reading and listening, I'm going to make my language goal to do some kind of output daily in both speech and/or writing. As my capabilities vary from week to week, this could be anything from writing a journal entry and/or recording some basic spoken output when things are going well, to merely doing some written exercises and/or using some software that allows me to record myself to compare my pronunciation to a native speaker model when my capabilities are low.

And I'm going to try something similar exercise-wise, with my daily target to do both something to get my heart rate up (running, dancing, stepping, hooping), and/or something to balance my system out (yoga, pranayama, MELT, Wim Hoff breathing).

I'll aim for the and rather than the or in these options, but as stress worsens my neurological symptoms, I need ti to hold my impatient and self-critical tendencies in check and be more accepting of my limitations, as my tendency is to get overexert, then relapse.

Does that sound reasonable?

[pinkyslippers]

I'll aim for the and rather than the or in these options, but as stress worsens my neurological symptoms, I need ti to hold my impatient and self-critical tendencies in check and be more accepting of my limitations, as my tendency is to get overexert, then relapse.

Does that sound reasonable?

Welcome! Sounds absolutely reasonable, no boot camp here! Thank you for joining the challenge with me

[pinkyslippers]

My challenge goals

Language challenge:
1) Read 25 novels in Spanish (print or audiobook)
2) Read 5 novels in French (print or audiobook)

Fitness challenge:
1) Do one proper, good form pull-up without having one foot on a chair or using one of those giant elastic band things (I'm a middle-aged, overweight woman and I use my chin-up bar mainly for hanging clothes on - this goal will be much harder than it looks! )
2) Meet the weekly minimum UK Chief Medical Officers' Physical Activity Guidelines (150 minutes moderate physical activity, or 75 minutes vigorous physical activity per week).

(Edited to modify fitness goals slightly, 25 January)

[Kaha]

I'm in! Thanks for starting the challenge, pinkyslippers.

I'm prone to wanderlust but I really, really, really want to learn Chinese this year. Which is why I won't make any long term goals for other languages.

I don't have any measurable fitness goals. If the gyms were open, I could point to my training plan and have fun with numbers. But they have been closed for two months and I can't even guess how many months they'll be open this year. So I'll stick with the 'do something every day' approach instead of trying to reach some milestones. Nevertheless I like a bit of planning (or is this prodding?).

Language Challenge:
a) Learn all Hanzi from Heisig's Remembering Simplified Hanzi 1
b) Work through enough newbie lessons on DuChinese to be able to understand lessons of the next difficulty level

Fitness Challenge (starting tomorrow and only if I'm fit):
a) Do one Challenge from Darebee every day as long as the gyms are closed
b) Do 15 minutes of stretching or yoga every day (preferable in one go)

[pinkyslippers]

I'm in! Thanks for starting the challenge, pinkyslippers.

Welcome! Thank you for joining the challenge!

[alaart]

Goals are very undefined, I may edit and write something more concrete, but I'll join.

Currently:
Currently I go running once per week, and I do some exercises irregularly, I have one language exchange per week for Korean, but I'm searching for a second one. Don't study much of my own currently.

Goal:
I'm thinking of a "consistency is key" approach, with flexible outcome.
3 times Korean and sport per week. - that would be an honorable goal.

I'll aim at 3 month for now , if I make it maybe I can convince myself to go with you guys for a full year.

[pinkyslippers]

I'll aim at 3 month for now , if I make it maybe I can convince myself to go with you guys for a full year.

Welcome and thank you for joining! With the way the world is right now, committing to a shorter time period and seeing how it goes makes a lot of sense to me

[jmar257]

I'm in. Hopefully this year is a bit smoother than the last.

Language goals:
1. Starting taking iTalki lessons in Spanish (and later French). This is more so about finding a good timeslot I can consistently make it to.

2. Finish FSI French

3. Start German (once done with FSI French)

4. Complete the SC I'm signed up for (Full for Spanish, half for French)

Hard to make concrete goals as far as progress given that I don't plan on taking tests in any of these, but I feel like a goal to keep consistent study will reap benefits.

Fitness goals:
1. Continue counting calories - I've been good about this the past few weeks, although with a break during Thanksgiving and Christmas because life is to be lived. Need to keep this going

2. Find a balance that doesn't burn me out - I started back doing martial arts last night (BJJ/Muay Thai) and will be trying to balance that with lifting. In the past I didn't have as regimented a schedule and this always caused me to feel guilty skipping one or the other, so I'm planning this a little better now (and not going to try to fit in running and whatnot, although I'll do it when I can, but I won't feel bad about skipping it). I have a 5 day split I'm going to stretch over two weeks, with 2 power days one week and 3 hypertrophy days the next, with two days of martial arts in between (ideally a MT class followed by BJJ). This will have me a bit sore and I can always move lifting days around to accommodate, the trouble will be once I start doing more things on weekends (especially traveling) and trying to maintain a social life.