How I used tech to sustain fitness, went from 72kgs to 64kgs and almost flat tummy – Part 1

Getting fit or losing weight is easy, remaining in that zone is not easy. I did this weight loss circus many times in last 10 years and every single time I lapsed. It was like a sine wave. Gain weight, get fit, gain weight, get fit, gain weight, get fit. Last year, I thought of taking a different path to get fit. This time, it was not just about getting fit. It was about getting fit and staying fit for the rest of my life.

Before we start on tech side of staying fit, let me talk to you about one key factor here. If tech is the front side of a coin, ‘habit’ is the other side of the coin. This will be a two part article. in this part I will talk about habits and how I used specific tech to form habits.

Making a habit vs finishing weight loss program

They say that one can form a habit if he/she does the same thing daily for 21 days. It has to do with neurons blah blah blah. Trust me, this is not true. Millions pick on weight loss and get fit program, do it for 2-3 months, complete the program and stop working out. If a habit is formed in 21 days, how come we lose the urge to do this day in day out? To make things worse, majority of us lapse. We eat more and in a month or two, our tummy bulge is more than what is used to be before weight loss. This is because we are going back to the ‘habit’ of eating junk or go back to the ‘habit’ of being lazy. This is a habit that we got used to by following it for years. Two years of staying home took a toll on many. Many formed this habit of being lazy. A weight loss program is not about gaining a habit, it is more about getting rid of old habits and sustaining new habit. So, how do we do this? Hire a habit coach who can push you and motivate you. Again, do not this for a month or two.

Habit coach vs gym coach

I am saying this from the point of view of an average person who is not ‘habituated’ to working out and staying fit. Few years ago, I took instructions from gym coach twice. It worked as long as I am hitting the gym. The problem with this approach is that the moment there is a long break due to various reasons, it gets hard to hit the gym again. The other aspect is food. Not every gym coach/instructor can make you follow a proper planned diet. Their instructions are more inline with ‘have more protein today, less carbs today. Have more carbs today, no rice’. This is not ideal. What you need is someone who can help you change your diet habit and sustain that for the rest of your life. So, whom did I hire and how did I form habit?

My habit coach is from Cult Fit

This is not promotional content for Cult. I picked Cult on my own after trying various fitness apps, gyms and I am paying from my own pocket. Cult never approached me for promotional content. Why would they? I am not an influencer, I blog when I have free time and I am a techie.

Early last year, when I got routine liver/heart/kidney function test done, results showed that I had high liver fat and cholesterol too was high. I was about to go for ‘another round’ of fitness but then a friend of mine told me about how he is taking instructions from habit coach in Cult Fit. I thought of giving it a try. Few months before this happened, I read ‘Atomic Habits’ book and somehow I felt that this time, I want to concentrate on making fitness a habit, not a goal. I quickly installed Cult Fit application. There was a long questionnaire that I had to fill and it generated an overall score/chart. I was then assigned to a habit coach.

First call and a new direction

We had almost an hour long call where I explained my current eating habits, sleep habits and how work is (stress related). By then, I was already on cycling (mainly on weekends). So, I asked the workouts to be designed with this in mind. My habit coach put me on a diet plan and assigned beginner work outs. Another goal that my habit coach my habit coache assigned me is to be active through out the day. This is by making sure that I move around every hour. If I have to do 8000 steps a day, it should not be 7500 steps in one shot and 500 steps for rest of the day. One major difference between earlier goals and now is the diet plan. No more junk food, no more processed food, no more food with preservatives. Does this mean I cannot eat cake or ice cream or chocolate? Nah. Oh, I did give up one favourite food. Maggi. It was time for me to say goodbye. I only had two bowls of Maggi in last 1.5 years. Even if you put a piping hot Maggi in front of me, I wont. Instead, I turn my attention to making healthier Spaghetti or rice noodles (less noodle, lots of veggies).

The new diet

The new diet is what they call the ‘Cult Plate’. I eat rice, I eat roti but instead of gobbling up loads of rice, I eat maximum of one cup of red rice and I fill my plate with curries, vegetables. This way, my hunger is subsided and I get all essential nutrients/vitamins with every meal.

I eat ice cream. I eat chocolate. I eat cake. About two weeks ago, I had DBC. Then how is this a diet? I eat one in a while and when I eat, I eat in very limited quantity. How much of DBC did I have? We ordered one DBC and four of us shared it. I did put in extra workout. When I have these, I workout more. I walk more. Why do I eat occassional sweet food? I do not want to give up on all, get ‘enough is enough’ feeling one day and lapse. I formed a habit. No junk food, daily work out. When I crave for such food, I eat in limited quantity, work out more the next few days.

The workouts pattern

The pattern here was simple. On weekend, I do cycling for at least 1.5 hours. This is mainly cardio workout. On weekdays, I started with overall workouts (beginner level). Once it became too easy, my coach switched me to intermediate workouts and then to advanced. When I informed my coach that it now feels a bit boring, I am put on trainer-led VoD (video on demand) workouts. The first one was ‘Belly burn with Shwe’. As my tummy has significantly reduced, I am put on toning up my muscle. The new workouts require using weights. I was put on ‘Tone up with Kunal’ and now I am on ‘Tone up with Vasudha’. Why am I having different workouts? This is where I love Cult Fit. There are so many programs, so many options and if I get bored of one, I pick another. All of this, I am doing from home.

Saying this again. This is not a promotional content for Cult. I picked Cult on my own after trying various fitness apps, gyms and I am paying from my own pocket. Cult never approached me for promotional content. Why would they? I am not an influencer, I blog when I have free time and I am a techie.

The tech side of the story

You have to wait for the part 2 of the story to know how tech helped. Reason why I did this is because I do not want you to believe that putting on a watch and running will make one to sustain the habit. Still, for habit tracking, I used Cult.Fit application and during the early days, I was using Habitica. Habitica is a free habit and productivity app that treats your real life like a game. Habitica can help you achieve your goals to become healthy and happy. To track my weight gain, I was using eufy smart scale that syncs my data to application on my phone. The image that you see at the top contains stats from eufy.

But you have to wait for Part 2 to know the actual tech side of this transformation journey and how much of a difference (mentally) a habit brings to goal of being fit.