Intentionally not posting any “before / after” photos, but I’m sorta stoked on how far I’ve come since I started running in 2016.
Back up. Before my first office job, in 1998, I was pretty trim. I worked at grocery stores in the 90s, and when I wasn’t working I was riding BMX or mountain bikes, or playing basketball, or street hockey.
Then, well… let’s just say that at one point my lunch order was three chalupas from Taco Bell (that’s over 1000 calories). Moved to NYC in 2004 and dropped some weight because I was at least walking around more, running to catch the train, or running between building on campus (I was an A/V tech). Heck, even after leaving NYC on my bike and doing “The Bike Nerd” thing, from about 2010-2012 I was in okay shape, but I still ate like shit.
And you can’t outrun a bad diet.
Then from like 2013-2016 I was just a slug. Lots of processed food, not a lot of activity, and broke as fuck from not being able to find work. I was in a miserable place.
But I started running in 2016, and knocked off about 25lbs in a year or so.
Then did “No Junk June” in 2019 with my roomie, and worked with a nutrionest (Grayson Murphy), and lost another solid 15-20 lbs.
Now, in 2020, I’m about 20 lbs away from my pre-first office job weight.
Most important is I’m eating a lot better. Running and all that is one thing, but to finally be working with a consistent plant-based diet, and still snacking on here and there, that’s the biggest thing. Changing the mindset of food. And straight up not buying cookies at the grocery store because I’ll eat the whole damn box in two days.
So much of this is just showing up every day. I run not because it’s “how I’m going to lose weight,” but because it’s something I can control. It gets me away from the computer, into nature, breaking a sweat. I think whatever you can do, to keep things fun, will probably work for you, too. Long hikes, basketball, dancing, roller skating, whatever… you just have to make sure you’re having fun.