Starting the 75-day soft challenge and why I’m doing it.

Many of you will have seen both the 75-day hard and now the 75-day soft challenge, they are all over social media. I did for 1 minute consider the hard challenge however only being moderately active now, I did not want to set myself up to fail. I already tried intermittent fasting this month and that went very badly, it never fails to amaze me, how I can self-sabotage, 2 weeks after starting I weighed more than when I had started. Not prepared to waste any more of my life, I binned this off and started to look for something new, this is when I came across the 75-day soft challenge.

What are the rules:

The 75-day soft challenge is not just a diet but more about overall well-being, these are the rules that I will be sticking to

· Pick a diet or some diet rules. For me, I will be a combination of the Joe Wicks diet and the blood sugar diet. I also want to commit to no fizzy drinks at home and not highly processed snacks.

· Minimum of 45 minutes of vigorous exercise every day, apart from Sunday which will be 45 minutes of active recovery.

· Read at least 10 pages of any nonfiction book every day.

· Drink 3 litres of water every day.

· Take a progress photo every day.

Why I think this may work for me:

The short version is I like rules, I’ve trained for a half marathon before and see this as something similar. I always struggled with my relationship with alcohol as I could not moderate when I finally became sober, I realised for me that abstinence was easy than moderation.

I’m at a point in my life now where I’m very worried about my weight and how it might affect me later in life if I don’t do something about it now! I also like the fact that this challenge is not just about diet or exercise, frequently in the past when I’ve tried something new, I find myself embracing it, but subconsciously stopping something else positive in my life. I consider this challenge to be both well-rounded and over a period that is both manageable and long enough to track progress.

When do I start?

As I write this, I’ve been doing the challenge for the last 10 days longer by the time you read this. So far, I’ve found the challenge amazing, and I’ve not missed a goal in the 10 days. The hardest part for me has been drinking the 3 litres of water, but that is just because I have a weak bladder. Both the exercise and new food I’ve been trying have been great. I will write another post when I get to the end of the 75 days, however, I’m already thinking about how many of these habits I could make permanent parts of my life.

If you fancy joining me with this challenge or something similar come join me in our members area, to help stay accountable to each other in our sobriety and any other well-being challenges. I hope to see some of you there.

Together we have got this!

Ben – It's That Sober Guy

Disclaimer – I’m not a trained addiction or mental health professional, information is based on my own life experiences and shared in good faith to help others.

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