The magic of the holidays

The holidays, I used to love this time of year when I was a child. No school for two weeks and presents, did I mention presents, and for a while there as an adult I hated this time of year. I used to think it was because I worked retail, but that wasn't the case, it lost its magic for me. I think thats because I started loosing the loved ones that I would spend my holidays with, high school is when my family started loosing loved ones in a dramatic fashion. Each loss to the family took some of that magic from it, and then it seemed like one day we just kinda gave up on the holidays and celebrating. I think the most important part of this time of year is the family and the loved ones that you surround yourself with, thats the magic. 

I remember one of the christmases when I was a child we were at my auntie Linda's, and she got me the best gift ever. You guys know what its like going to relatives house for christmas even as a child you never expected much. I went to her house with the same expectation, and man was I wrong she got me the matrix on DVD. The movie had just came out and she totally blew my mind with that gift. As a boy growing up in the 90's could you think of a better present, I couldn't. Shortly after that we lost her to lung cancer and it was ugly, cancer is always ugly even if you mange to beat it that journey is not a fun one. 

As a child I thought that was such a great gift because of the gift itself, and now looking back I know that wasn't the case. It was because she new me and it showed with that gift, thats what made it magical. Growing up as a child you find that not all adults get you, and the ones that do get you are family. They talk to you they love you, and are interested in what your interested in. 

I think thats why I have been so happy the past couple of days, I have friends and family that know me and love me for me. I have fond the magic of the holidays, it sure isn't the presents, as an adult i never expect to receive any materialistic gifts. Most people complain on how materialistic the holidays have become. I used to share the same thoughts, but now i get it when any of us buy a gift for someone we expect something in return. If your not a materialistic person then that thing you expect is a smile of appreciation, you don't need to hear thank you or that I love it. Seeing the look that a child would have when getting the toy that they want, in the face of an adult, is magic. Often times its not a gift that you can buy in a store just being there and spending time with those you care about is the magic.

May your holidays be filled with magic.  

Javi's Secret Project 

Haven't Been this Happy in to Long

The last couple of days have felt a bit weird to me, and I don't know why. I have been happy, and a lot happier then I have in a while.  I am not sure why I was unhappy to begin with, and now I am not sure why I am happy now but it feels great. Being unhappy for a long period of time is scary, makes you just want to give it up on it all, now I am not saying that I was suicidal or anything like that. I was content with laying in bed all day and night, I was taking myself farther and farther away from all those around me. Now I feel invincible I can do it all, and nothing is out of my reach. I think I know what it is that makes me so happy, maybe its my friends, family, and weight loss.

Like I said I was sad for a while, its been years since I have been truly happy. The last time that I could remember being happy would have to have been in high school. High school was back in 2008 that was 6 years ago, not sure what started this but as time went on it got worse. I was a ghost for six years of my life just existing, I was just simply there and thats it.  Most of you would be surprised that was the case if not all of you, I put up this facade trying to pretend to be happy and for a while there it worked. I never wanted to go out and hang out with friends, I was never comfortable enough with myself to go out in the world. See I have never really accomplished anything of my own, I would ride on the coat tails of those closest to me.

How am I supposed to go out into the real world and survive when, I couldn't accomplished anything on my own. I have never said that out load or thought it but its how I felt, it was most apparent with the ladies. I was so insecure with myself that I couldn't see why any woman would want to be with me. " I don't even like me why should she" I would talk myself out of hanging out with the woman that I was talking to and make something up so that I wouldn't have to hang out with them. See then I didn't know that I was sad, I did know that something was wrong and that I needed to change that. I thought that it was just because I was lonely, but being lonely was a side affect of my sadness.

I had to fix my sadness before I could look at anything else, this is where Javi's Secret Project (JSP) came in and brought me back from the darkness. Like I said I have never really accomplished anything on my own, I was always sacred of failure and ridiculed for my failure. I thought that JSP would be that thing that I could accomplish on my own (ironically the first thing I did was bring in my best friend in on the idea) . First it was a business plan that i wanted to sell to nike, focusing on selling the idea of nike for over weight (or fellow fluffs) people rather then just athletes (still think this is a brilliant idea, consider it a free be nike). Well other then having a good idea how was I supposed to get my foot in the door with Nike, first thought was to build a fallowing on youtube which would Hopefully get Nikes attention. We had to figure out how was I supposed to get a good fallowing, we decided the best way to do so was to build a community on youtube. This was the evolution of JSP, then Adam asked me why not keep it for myself why sell this to some one. These were really good questions, I do like helping people and inspiring them. It honestly makes me feel good to help someones outlook on life for the better. Now JSP is mine with no intention of selling it, its about me getting healthy and hopefully in the process helping others to make their lives better in someway, to be Happy.

So it began, I first started working out in my backyard, I had a gym membership but I was to afraid of being "that fat guy" at the gym. The backyard workout consisted of shadow boxing for 12  three minute rounds with a one minute break in between each round. Oh and this is about 6 or so months after I "started" JSP, with the help of Adam we had created the 1st episode and that was about it. I did the shadow boxing for a while not really on a super constant bases but I was moving and loosing weight. That didn't feel right like I wasn't doing enough, I didnt have to push myself enough doing that. So I looked to running, I had this Magazine from Jamba juice teaching an inexperienced runner how to train for a half marathon. This was a crazy idea to me, and probably why it was so intriguing to me and so it began.

That was the best thing for me, running allowed to to accomplish something each time I ran. My first accomplishment was that first run/walk, it was 2 miles and I had to destroy myself at least thats what it felt like. It was 3min running fallowed by 1 min walk and repeated till i hit the 2 mile mark. Holy shit that was tough after that first 3 min run I was doubting if I could do the whole 2 miles, but I said fuck it i just have to finish. I couldn't have done it with out my run partner, Cris kept pushing me making sure I kept breathing and I kept moving forward. I'm sure that I would have given up on the run if he wasn't there to push me, but still I had to do it I could have easily said fuck it I'm done but I didn't that wasn't an option. 

This project involves so many people other then myself and together we have accomplished so much. All of the people  that ran with me, recorded the color run, liked any one of my JSP related post on social networking sites, or bought tamales every single one of I owe you so much and I am so grateful for your support. Thanks for being yourselves and thank you for helping me accomplish things that I have never thought I would be able to.  

Writing this blog entire has made me reflect on this past year, and I now know why I am happy. I accomplished many great things, I have helped inspired friends to make their lives better, I lost 71 lbs, and I have friends and family that love me. I cant help but be happy, my future is still just as uncertain today as it was a week ago. The only thing  thats different is that I am no longer scared of facing my future I am no longer alone. 

Tomorrow is a big day and a day that is worth celebrating, it is going to be the first my first color run and my first official 5k run. Thats exactly what I am going to do, I'm gonna have a party after the run. The party really isnt to celebrate me having completed the run because I know that I can already. Its for those those of you that read this blog, those who liked my status when talking about my weight loss and those who have left a comment of support or advice. I couldnt have done this without you guys, my support group,my friends.

If you havent heard already the party will be at my and will start at 1pm its a potluck so bring something preferably something healthy.

115 cardinal ln
vallejo ca 94589

Thank you all!

Color Run by Color Vibe

Today is December 12th and the day before my first timed 5k run!! Kinda of nervous and scarred, to be honest I haven’t ran in 2 weeks and Im hoping that I wont kill myself to bad tomorrow. I know why I haven’t ran, its because I’ve been stressed over some things, and yes that is an excuse and those are not expectable. Thats not whats important, whats important is that I keep my head up, and instead of “running” from the stress I need to find a better way. 

So for those of you who don't know already I’ll be running a 5k color run at marine world (discovery kingdom) with the Color Vibe. The weather report says that the rain should stop around 7 am  which is when check in time is, so IF the weather report is correct then we should be good. I got an email from Color Vibe saying that the event is rain or shine, and Im totally ok with that. I set my mind to it and I am going to do it the rain wont hurt me just make me a bit heavier and make the run a bit harder but I got this. 

For those of you that are going to run with me or anyone that is interested in running I have some tips for you that helped me get better.

• Breathe; This is the most important thing, you want to maintain a nice steady breath.
• When you are breathing in pretend like your smelling flowers, nice steady full breath 
• When exhaling pretend that you have a birth cake in front of you an you are blowing out the candles. Never exhaling so hard you spit and making sure you get all the air out of your lungs 
• If you are breathing really heavy, where it almost seems like you can’t get enough air in your lungs then slow it down, 
• Running for distance: don’t push to hard till the end, after all the goal is to make it to the end not having the fast first mile.
• Make sure that you are at a pace that you can maintain for the whole run
• If you don’t know what that pace is (like I did when I first started running) then start at a decent pace and do a run/walk plan 
• Run for 3min and walk for 1
• during the walk if you are out of breathe then put your hand on your head and take two really deep breaths try not to exhale right away, then go to a regular breathing pattern 

Those are the biggest things when it come to running that helped me the most, granted the proper running form and technique are a great help. The breathing and pace are the building blocks needed to get into enough shape so that you can focus on run technique and form later. 

Scariest Day of my Life

You'll never guess what happened to me today, this morning I had the worst headache that I have ever had. It was defiantly a Migraine, I know that it was a migraine, for one the amount of pain that I was in, two it made my vision blurry and any bright light or sound was like someone jamming an icepick into my temple. The last thing that told me that this was a migraine was the fact that i was throwing up and dry heaving all over the place. It was by far the worst thing that I have experienced to date, the only thing that seemed to make it feel better was sleep, because while in sleep you don't register the pain in the conscious mind.

It all started last night when I first started getting a headache, I had decided that I didn't want take anything because it really wasn't that bad. That was the big mistake the next thing I know I am waking up at 7 in the morning and my head is pounding. I feel pain at the base of my head where it meets my neck and I feel it in my temples. The pain in my neck felt like someone was hitting my with their fist over and over again, each time it throbbed with pain was a strike. The worst part was my temples, imagine someone taking their thumbs and pushing as hard as they can on each temple. Luckily when I was throwing up it was early in the morning and all I had in my stomach was water (side note if i had a choice of one thing to throw up it would be water the best of the worst) and for some reason the rush of blood to my head made the pain go away temporarily. That stopped a few minutes after I started dry heaving and the pain was even worse.

At this point the two alive that I had taken already went down the toilet, but i didn’t want to attempt to put anything else in my stomach. So I took an ice pad out of the freezer and rested my head on it so that the ice was touching the base of my head where it meets my neck. Really all you can do in this situation is to ice your head while laying down in a quite dark room until the pain goes away. Sleep is the best, yea you may wake up and its only a little bit better but you didn't have to sit in that pain for the three hours it took for the pain to drop. Thats what happened to me i woke up at like 7 am  with the margarine and fell asleep around 8 am, and woke up at 11 my head still pounding. this time my vision wasn't blurry and it wasn't anywhere near as bad as it was. I was able to take some alive and keep it down, it is now 3 pm and I no longer feel any headache of any sort. 

That whole thing was insane, to even think about gives me a slight chill. The scariest thing was after words, when I tested my blood sugar. My father thought that it would be a good idea because the blurry vision is a diabetic symptom. It was scary because I am a heavy set Mexican with a family history of diabetes. I have all of the pre coursers for it, I didn't want to have this and for that reason alone I almost didn't take the test. I took the test and my blood sugar reading came out to be 129, which is pre diabetic, talk about scary. 

Its up to me now to fix that, I have already started on this road of having a normal good sugar reading, The only thing is for some reason I haven't really thrown myself into the weight loss way of life. I don't really eat the right stuff or at the right times I don't drink enough water during the day and i don't work out as much as I should. I have no clue why this is. its seems as though  I have alway been that type of person. I will throw my self into a project or an idea, but I never really jump in and slowly move further and further away from what I started. I started to do this with my weight loss, I haven't ran in a week!! Not a single mile I told my friends it was because I wanted to spend time with my family instead of running. Which is a BULL SHIT excuse I could go run for the 30-40 minutes that it takes me and still have the rest of the day to be with my family. 

No more!! Will I fall victim to my own self sabotages i can not listen to my head when it comes to this. Part of the reason why I wanted to tape and talk about my weight loss on the internet was so that I could be held accountable for what I am trying to do. I was afraid that my desire to be healthy was not enough and come to find out its not. It takes action, I have to keep my head up an acknowledge the good that I have done, and keep it moving forward. 

I do know that I excel in a structured based system, but this is life and it doesn't have structure that I excel in. Life is more fluid like the ocean, as a whole constantly changing with the coming tide. Even though life may always be changing that doesn't mean we cant build our own structure in it, to better ourselves. This is exactly what I am going to do, I am going to build my own system taking the knowledge that I have and adapting it to fit my likes the best. This is going to go past when, where, who, and how im going to work out, its going to be about how i want to live the next couple of years of my life. So the next couple of post are going to be all about adding structure to my life.