By Jen Levin on Oct 11, 2019 08:00 am
If you are reading this the day I post it (or the few days after), I’m currently sitting at the SAG-AFTRA National Convention. This is my 3rd convention and I’m honestly so excited about it. I am so much more involved in union politics this time and I have a feeling that if I am lucky enough to win a delegate seat for future conventions that I will be even more involved by then.
For my first convention, I was equally overwhelmed and excited. I had no clue what I was in for, but I was prepared to be there and take it all in. I spent more time sitting and listening and trying to learn than anything else. I didn’t know what else to do, but being there and participating was all I was expected to do.
For my second convention, I wasn’t overwhelmed since I knew what was going to happen, but I still wasn’t doing much more than listening and participating in the votes. I didn’t submit any resolutions and I didn’t get up to speak. Most people don’t have resolutions or speak, so I didn’t feel too bad about that. I think a lot of being a delegate is being a representative for the group you are there to represent (for me, that means for actors in the Los Angeles local) and voting the way you believe is right. And that’s exactly what I did 2 years ago.
This year, I will still probably do a lot of observing and listening. I didn’t submit any resolutions, but I did help some friends with working on theirs. I feel much more informed about what is happening and what to expect. I have been more involved in the preparation for my slate for the convention, which has helped me a lot as well. As I work on things for everyone else, I learn more about them myself. I feel the most prepared I’ve ever been and I am even more excited than I was the past 2 conventions about what is going to happen.
I know that there is so much more that I can do to be more involved, but it’s ok that I haven’t done those just yet. I plan on being in SAG-AFTRA for a very long time so there is a lot of time for me to work on changing things to make sure they benefit all members. And I have been taking more steps to be involved with working on educating myself even more. I am trying to go to more events and meetings which I have found really helpful. And maybe being at those events and meetings will inspire me to create a resolution at a future convention.
I’m looking forward to recapping what happens at the convention next week on here. I won’t be able to share everything since some things are confidential, but I do want to share what I can because I feel like other members need to know what we did. And I’m so excited to see what I will learn this time and how inspired I will feel after convention is done.
The post Time For Convention (or I’m Ready To Get To Work) appeared first on Finding My Inner Bombshell.
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By Jen Levin on Oct 10, 2019 08:00 am
Yesterday, I hit a huge workout milestone. It’s something that I honestly didn’t know that I would get to, and I’m still a little surprised and in shock. Yesterday was my 1,000th Orangetheory class!
Because I track my workouts, I knew that this was coming up. I did only 3 workouts last week to make sure that my 1,000th class was in one of my regular classes (I’ll post more about my weird workout schedule in my recap on Monday). I wanted to have my milestone class be a class where I knew I’d have friends with me. While I’ve had other milestones with Orangetheory, this was one that seemed crazier to me for some reason.
I had been getting excited about this milestone for a while, and the staff at the studio knew what was coming up as well. But it still surprised me when I walked into the lobby and saw a giant sign congratulating me on doing 1,000 classes.
I’m not going to write about the workout much in this post since I’ll be doing that on Monday. But I want to share some of my thoughts after completing 1,000 classes.
I’ve said it before on here, but I had struggled in the past to find a workout that connected with me. There were other workouts that I tried that I just couldn’t do or coaches that treated me differently because of my size or medical conditions. I didn’t know it at the time, but I needed to find a place that treated me like everyone else but also helped me modify things when necessary. And when I walked in Orangetheory for the blogger preview, that’s exactly what I found. While I have been invited to check out other workout studios or classes, I’ve always compared it to Orangetheory and have always wanted to stick with it.
I started about 5 1/2 years ago and have consistently gone at least 3 times a week since I started. I started tracking how many workouts I did after a year or two so I could set goals for each year. But I also was able to track overall milestones. And I knew that getting to 1,000 classes was possible, but for some reason, I never thought too much about it until the beginning of this year when I started to add up how many I had done from every year.
I might not look different on the outside, but I know I am a different person than who I was when I started. I have gained so much confidence and awareness with my body. I feel more in control. I understand what I can push my body to do and what limitations I have. And I do think that I look a little different on the outside too because there is no question that I have gained muscle. Weight loss will hopefully come soon, but eating disorders are tough to beat and that’s a big issue for me with weight loss.
But I haven’t only made changes through the workouts directly. I have also made amazing friends from going to the same classes from week to week. I have brought friends and family to class with me and that’s been awesome too. I feel like it has helped me be a bit more outgoing being in class and the routine is a good thing for me (even though I did just complain a bit about being too much in a routine). I feel like I have more of a purpose each day and when I don’t get to work out it feels so odd to me.
I still don’t see myself as an athlete all the time because I know I don’t look like one. But after completing 1,000 classes, I think that I need to stop questioning that and believe that I truly am an athlete.
1,000 classes ago, I started a journey that I wasn’t aware was going to happen. So many things have happened for me because of taking that first class and I wouldn’t change it for anything. And next week, I start the journey of the next 1,000 classes and whatever that will bring my way.
Of course, I had to take a picture with some friends after my 1,000th class, and I wanted to compare it to the photo I took after my very first class. I feel like I look the same (which I’m trying not to focus on too much), but I also feel like you can see the difference in my eyes and smile. I have gained so much from these 1,000 classes and there’s no denying that.
The post A Major Workout Milestone (or Getting To 1000) appeared first on Finding My Inner Bombshell.
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By Jen Levin on Oct 09, 2019 08:00 am
Life has been crazy for me lately, but I’ve had a bit of a break over the past few days. I spent a lot of the time when things were calmer getting stuff done that I had been putting off. I also spent some time catching up on social media. While I do run some social media accounts, I haven’t really done a lot on social media for myself. And when I was catching up on seeing what other people have been up to, I saw a lot of posts from a few days ago talking about how there are only 90 days left in 2019.
I have said this a million times, but I have no clue where the time went. I was just thinking about how I should figure out if I was going to do something for my birthday, and my birthday was 2 months ago! I think I missed the chance to do that, but there’s always my half birthday. I know that time flew by because I have been very busy and my life is quite repetitive. From week to week, things do tend to stay the same for me. I have a similar schedule every day and even the things I do outside of work tend to be similar. And things have been crazy with trying to fit a lot of stuff in when I’m not working and things tend to chunk up together so I have a cycle of being extremely busy followed by a time where I don’t have much planned.
But I started to think more about what I have done this year and what I still want to do. I took another look at the various goals I set for this year and I’m glad that I have been making some progress on them. I don’t think I’ll be successful with all of the goals I set this year, but it would be a miracle if that happened. The goals I set are a mix of those that I know I can do and some that are more difficult. My priority is to get the ones accomplished that I know I can do plus a few of the harder ones. I think I’ll be able to do that this year, but I also want to make sure that I’m not being complacent and just doing the goals that I can do without much thought.
But I also can add some more goals for the last 90ish days of the year. I don’t exactly know what I want to get done, but I want there to be a change in my life. I have been living a life that doesn’t seem like a lot gets done or changes. And I need a change in my life. I am tired of living the same day over and over again. There are so many things that I want to change about my life that I’m not in control of, and I need to think beyond those. If I just focus on the changes that require someone else, I won’t make the changes that I can do on my own. And I think my focus has not been on the ones I’m in control of. I don’t quite know what those changes are just yet, but I know there are things I can do. And I’d love to work on them (or at least figure out what they are) during these last 90ish days of the year.
This is all still such an abstract idea for me because I have just been doing some thinking about it and not planning or doing any action steps. And I know I have been aware of this before and I haven’t been able or willing to make changes. I don’t know how many attempts it will take in order to finally make the change, but hopefully, it will happen one day. I don’t want to have 10 years go by and realize I’m still living the same life. I’m shocked when I realized how many years I’ve been working at this job because I don’t know how time went by without a lot of changes. I want to make sure that my life is as awesome as I want it to be, but it’s not there yet.
I don’t always love using the calendar to set goals and plans. I do set goals at the beginning of each year, but sometimes those goals are already things I’ve been working on. I don’t believe in waiting until the first of the month or a Monday to start a new plan. But for some reason, knowing there were only 90 days left in the year connected to me and got me to think about how I want to end out this year. I want to have some things to think about as accomplishments for 2019 and it’s not too late to start working on them.
The post Under 90 Days Left In The Year (or Doing A Bit Of Reflecting) appeared first on Finding My Inner Bombshell.
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By Jen Levin on Oct 08, 2019 08:00 am
My friend Anne hosts an awesome pumpkin decorating party before Halloween each year. I’ve only been able to make it once because of scheduling conflicts. I was afraid that this year I would have a conflict due to the convention, but I was so excited when I got the invitation and saw it was before the convention so I’d be able to make it! I’m not the craftiest person, but I like trying to see what I can create. Plus, Anne and her friends are extremely artistic and crafty so I always am inspired when I see what they create.
I haven’t decided if I would be decorating this year for Halloween, but I knew that if I was going to that I would want my pumpkin to go along with the ones I did at the last party. I didn’t have a design in mind, but I knew that Anne would have a lot of crafting supplies at the party and I was going to see what was there and what seemed right.
When I got to the party, as expected it was set up beautifully. Anne really is an amazing host and she had everything set up for all of us to decorate our pumpkins however we wanted. There was also some amazing food, but I forgot to take a photo of that.
When I got to the party, I was one of the first people there. I got to meet her other friends who were there (I didn’t know anyone except for Anne) and we also did some catching up. Anne and I hadn’t seen each other in person for a while, and even though we stay in touch through social media, it’s not the same. So having some time to fill each other in on what has been happening in our lives was nice.
And then I decided to take a look at the various craft supplies to see what I wanted to use. I knew I didn’t want anything covered in glitter or paint because that would make it messy to get back home. I wanted something fun, but I am also aware of my limitations with art. I was looking through a collection of drawer pulls in a bowl and saw this awesome keyhole one. And that kicked off the inspiration for my pumpkin.
My other pumpkins have a lot of black, so I was going to go with that for this one too. I had a slightly more elaborate plan when I started, but once I got to working on it things simplified. I used the hot glue to attach several pieces of ribbon going down the pumpkin and then used regular glue to attach some gems to the ribbon. And I managed to fit 2 of the gems into the keyhole and tape them in there so it almost looks like it’s glowing from inside. I know it wasn’t anything fancy or super creative, but I’m really happy with how it turned out!
I didn’t have a specific design inspiration outside of the keyhole piece, but I realized after I was done that it reminded me of the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland! It has similar colors to the ride, and I guess that’s perfect since the other pumpkins I made have Disney elements to them as well.
Even though the main point of the party was to decorate pumpkins, of course, it was also all about hanging out and meeting new people. All the people that Anne invited were amazing. It turns out I have a bunch of mutual friends with several of them, and it’s almost weird that our paths haven’t crossed yet. And not only were they awesome people, but we all also had something in common that became a huge part of our socializing: being into true crime stories.
I thought I was really into true crime. I listen to podcasts about it, have read books about it, and watch lots of tv shows about it. But it turns out, I knew nothing compared to everyone else at the party. They all are way more informed than I am about different true crime stories and watch lots of shows that I don’t. I got some great podcast recommendations from hearing what everyone else likes and was able to share one podcast that I listen to that the others in the group hadn’t heard of. But since everyone else was more into true crime than I am, I ended up sitting back and listening to the conversation a lot. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to or feel like I could participate. I was just more in awe realizing that I was in a group of people who are so similar to me and loving hearing what they had to say.
We joked about how it was a bit odd that we were all into true crime as much as we are. But it also seemed very fitting to discuss serial killers while doing a Halloween craft. And since we all were into it, I think that made it even less odd.
I would have loved to have stayed at the party longer than I did, but Anne has a cat and I’m severely allergic to cats. I was surprised I lasted as long as I did because I usually start to have a reaction after an hour. But her cat was hiding the entire time and she cleaned a lot before we all came over. So I think that combination helped to keep my allergies from kicking in as fast as they normally do. I was really enjoying hanging out with everyone and having so much fun discussing true crime and serial killers, so it was sad when I was starting to have some breathing issues and the rash and hives I get from my allergies were starting. I wanted to leave before things got too bad for me.
I’m so glad I was able to make it to the party this year. Hopefully, I’ll be able to make it next year as well because it really is a fun Halloween event to go to. And it gives me an opportunity to try to be crafty when I don’t usually do that.
The post Another Pumpkin Party (or A Day Discussing All Things Creepy) appeared first on Finding My Inner Bombshell.
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By Jen Levin on Oct 07, 2019 08:00 am
This past week, I only had 3 workouts. There was a time not that long ago that working out 3 times in a week seemed like a lot. Now, it feels weird to not have my 4th workout. But this was done for a good reason. This week, I’ll be hitting a milestone workout and because next week is also a 3 workout week (with a weird schedule), I had to skip a workout last week so my milestone class was in a class I usually take. But just because I had only 3 workouts doesn’t mean I didn’t work hard.
Monday’s class was a strength class. It was also my first workout after I hurt my back/hip, and I was a bit worried about how I would do. I already know a lot of modifications for my hip issues, so I figured I would do those and then just see how my back felt while doing other things and modify them from there.
Usually, strength classes have a lot of incline work, but this time it wasn’t too much. We had 2 cardio blocks and each block only had 1 hill. The rest of the work was regular base, push, and all out paces. I used my all out incline to be my hill work, which worked out well for me. I was able to do some work on increasing my pedaling speed, even with added resistance, since I wasn’t as worried about what I would do for my hill work.
For the floor work, we had an interesting format with doing multiple rounds of low reps for a few exercises. The first block had chest presses, deadlifts, pike situps, and then a 250-meter row. The second block had hip hinge low rows, shoulder presses, and side planks. The chest presses and hip hinge low rows were both done as 3 rounds of 5 reps with 10 seconds of rest between each round. It was hard to do some of the floor work because of my pain, but I was able to get it done. Sometimes I had to take a little extra break time, but I always got back to it to finish out the exercise.
Wednesday’s workout was a workout to get us ready for the Everest Challenge. I will actually be missing that workout because of my schedule this week. I’m not sure if I’m sad about missing it because I like to challenge myself or a bit happy because it’s not my favorite challenge. But either way, I’m glad I had the Everest prep day so I got to do a mini-Everest workout.
For cardio, we had a modified version of what the challenge is like. We started with 6 minutes of increasing the incline/resistance level every minute. Then we had a walking recovery before going back to the incline/resistance level we ended at and working out way down the levels to get back to flat incline. I did start my bike resistance level lower than my normal base is to make sure I could keep increasing it every minute. And it did feel really tough when I got to the top, but it wasn’t the highest level I’ve worked at. Considering that I was still dealing with pain, I was impressed with what I was able to do.
For the rower, all of the rowing was 200 meters. We were supposed to do different types of squats with a medicine ball after each row. We started with regular squats and had rounds of 5, 10, and 15 reps. Then they were supposed to be squats to overhead presses (with the same rounds of reps). I modified that one to just be overhead presses because the squats were starting to hurt. And the last exercise between the rows was supposed to be jump squats with the medicine ball, but I just skipped doing those and rowed more.
And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block had chest presses on the straps, high rows with weights, and plank work. And the second block had tricep extensions on the straps, low rows with weights, and side plank extensions. These exercises weren’t as hard on my back as the Monday exercises were, but they still were tough and I had to rest a lot more often than I’m used to.
Friday’s workout was also a strength day, but just like Monday, it didn’t have a lot of incline work for cardio. It was also the first day that I didn’t have to think too much about my back/hip hurting. I was still in pain, but the pain was finally closer to what I’m used to dealing with every day.
For cardio, we had 2 blocks that were similar. We had a long push pace, a base pace, another long push pace, a base pace, and an all out. In the first block, the long push paces were 2.5 and 2 minutes. And in the second block, the long push paces were 1.5 and 1 minute. And the second block had the all out at an incline, which was the only incline work that we had for all of the cardio work.
On the rower, it was supposed to be long rows plus jumping jacks. I can’t do jumping jacks when I feel great, let alone when I’m still in a little pain. So instead of doing them, I spent the entire block just rowing. I tried my best to only take breaks when it was supposed to be when I would have been doing jumping jacks, but I was tired. The first row was supposed to be 1000 meters, then 500 meters, and 250 meters. I wasn’t able to do 1000 meters without a break, but I had also worked hard during cardio which made me feel ok about taking those breaks.
And on the floor, we had 2 blocks as well. The first block had sumo squats while holding a weight, shoulder presses with weights, hip bridges, and bird dog planks. And the second block had deadlifts, bicep curls, and plank pull-throughs. The only real modification I made was with the bicep curls. I’ve learned that my form isn’t as strong when I’m doing both arms at the same time. So even if they aren’t single arm bicep curls, I do those instead since I know I can lift heavier and do the exercise with the best form. For all the work except the shoulder presses, I tried to go heavy with my weights. I wasn’t doing the heaviest weights I’ve ever done, but I was close.
It really was weird to not go to workout on Saturday. I’m so used to my routine and I had to think about not putting on my workout clothes as I got ready to log in for work. And I did miss not having my workout, but I know it’s for a good reason. This week will be a huge milestone and I’m so excited about it!
The post The First Of 2 Short Workout Weeks (or It’s Funny That This Feels Weird To Me) appeared first on Finding My Inner Bombshell.
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