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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   779 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for January 7, 2026

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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New Year's resolutions check-in (mainly just to keep myself honest, but feel free to post your progress as replies):

  • Posted my first blog post of the year on Monday, about what the recent Bondi Beach shooting implies about the efficacy of Australia's gun buyback programs in preventing mass shootings. One down, twenty-five to go.
  • Went to the gym twice last week and on Monday, going again at lunchtime today: can deadlift 1.68x my bodyweight, squat .77x and bench press .64x.
  • Have not consumed any alcohol, fast food, fizzy drinks or pornography since waking up on January 1st, although I did unfortunately snack between meals on Sunday and Monday.
  • Have completed the first of 11 modules in the SQL course.
  • Have practised guitar for roughly one hour every day since January 1st.

I wrote my resolutions in a Discord server. I'll post them here first, and then my progress:

  • this has already been ongoing for a while but I'd like to continue lifting and gaining muscle mass in 2026. overhead press for reps over 100 pounds would be awesome, and 10 chin ups in one set would also be great (current OHP is 85, current chin up record is 5)
  • I want to lose at least 25 pounds. earlier this month, the scale measured 200 pounds for the first time in my life (I am 6'1.5"), however lately it seems to trend around 196.8 pounds. I aim to get down to 170 pounds. I am on a diet between 1700 and 1800 calories each day and I am trying to get either weightlifting and a small amount of cardio or a big amount of cardio in every day (30 minutes or more, mostly zone 2 bpm stuff). will have to see how my weight is trending in a couple weeks, but I aim to lose about 2 pounds a week. the food scale and XL air fryer have been VERY useful in this regard.
  • I want to learn more japanese, putting in at least 4 hours per week on this between flash cards and actual practice, plus reading grammar explanations when I find new grammar. previously I'd been doing easy "comprehensible input" content, but if I clean up my anki cards, I hope to start reading actual native level news articles, mining every word I need to to be able to comprehend the article.
  • probably a bad thing that this is so low on the list but I want to get a new job.
  • also probably a bad thing that this is so low on the list but I should probably get a girlfriend if I ever want to get married. part of that means that I have to take some good photos somehow.

for some less big picture stuff

  • I want to finish The Brothers Karamazov
  • I want to start and finish Dark Souls III
  • I want to try at least one pick up game of badminton or tennis. I know of a couple indian guys at the gym who play badminton that I'm going to try worming into, putting on my best social autist face. there are also tennis courts all around town that I can hang out at and practice my swing while I wait. never played tennis before, HAVE played badminton before and liked it.
  • I only did one lifting session last week, but I've done one this week and aim for one more. Switching to dumbbell bench press has made me lose a lot of pounds on bench press, but it feels safer. I haven't really had an opportunity to test my pull-ups, but I am mostly happy with not having lost any strength from the weight loss yet.
  • The scale yesterday read 192 pounds. That could be an aberration, but it was trending downward before, seemingly. I need to measure consistently; I think I will always slip off my shoes and take my keys and wallet and phone out of my pocket before weighing. I've already had some hiccups with the dieting; I got a lot of food for Christmas, and I spent one cheat day finishing the worst of it (spicy Thai chili crisps are high calorie but low satiation). Aside from that, I also have difficulties when I'm with family and want to eat at a restaurant. One day, I didn't do too badly; I fasted all day and then had an order of fajitas. The day after, I donated blood and ate a bunch of stuff, to the point of satiation but not to the point of feeling full. That will probably have to be good enough for days when I am eating with family and can't track calories with my food scale. As for the cardio, it's going pretty well, actually. I find cardio easier to do than resistance training, and it's been nice spending more time in zones 2 and 3 instead of pushing myself through zones 4 and 5. I feel good after doing these workouts. However, I have failed at doing them every day. On weekends, it's difficult to motivate myself to leave the apartment/house when I'm home.
  • I've caught up on one Anki deck, but the other one is proving more difficult. I guess those kanji haven't sunk in enough yet. I am mostly failing to practice on native language articles every day, though I did learn the word for "drug cartel" last week thanks to Trump. 麻薬組織！
  • Nothing for the last two yet, predictably. I'm coming to realize that I have pretty cripplingly low self-esteem, which makes these two much more difficult. I'm not even sure if I want a girlfriend anymore. I had an embarrassing online relationship last year (she was a real woman, I promise) and I found that my anxiety was significantly increased about all kinds of aspects of her. I still have a huge amount of mixed feelings about relationships. I guess that that won't change until I interact with women romantically more, but the fact is that it's going to be painful and I wish I could just avoid everything.
  • No progress on Karamazov yet. I stopped shortly after the time skip after the arrest of Dmitri.
  • I can't start Dark Souls III until I beat Metro 2033; I'm on Chapter 5 out of 7, I think. I haven't been playing much because I typically spend too much time either studying Japanese or putting off studying Japanese. Or playing Caves of Qud mindlessly.
  • I've decided I should probably take up tennis, not badminton. I'd want to play with other white people, and there's a lot more tennis players in America. Just anything other than pickleball. I need to buy a racket and practice my swing, but it's cold out and rackets are expensive. Hmm, do I need to be a member of the tennis club to attend their social events? Getting some tennis friends would be nice.

I need to measure consistently; I think I will always slip off my shoes and take my keys and wallet and phone out of my pocket before weighing.

Strongly recommend doing it completely naked first thing in the morning when you wake up, before you eat or drink anything. That will give you the most accurate reading, uncontaminated by water weight.

Nothing for the last two yet, predictably. I'm coming to realize that I have pretty cripplingly low self-esteem, which makes these two much more difficult. I'm not even sure if I want a girlfriend anymore. I had an embarrassing online relationship last year (she was a real woman, I promise) and I found that my anxiety was significantly increased about all kinds of aspects of her. I still have a huge amount of mixed feelings about relationships. I guess that that won't change until I interact with women romantically more, but the fact is that it's going to be painful and I wish I could just avoid everything.

Strongly recommend reading this book. I found it very insightful and helpful.

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