Eight years ago on this day, I listened to the theme of Top Gun as I packed up my Plzeň dorm room. That morning, I was handed myTEFL certification as I finished my graduate degree and wound down water fasting for the month. What a great time to be alive!

A time of accomplishment!

Fast forward today and it's the winding down of The 13th Expedition, one in which I hope is a scale model of the rest of 2020.

On Thursday, I'm going to have my 6-week weigh-in. I doubt it'll be the 40+ lb losses of Expeditions past—I just don't feel it. I feel lighter, I just don't feel THAT MUCH lighter. I do feel normal and not deprived like even the best of intentioned 1150 kcal/diet levies. Unlike my diet of 2018, 2019, and early 2020, I'm actually content beyond the satisfaction of intermittent fasting with an escape of sleep.

I am satisfied, yet I am devout in keeping that 30 total carb boundary; however, I haven't been dogmatic when I go beyond my 140 protein and 190 fat gram targets. Of course, whatever my weigh-in is on Thursday, after checking fat percentage, I'll be dialing my protein requirement down, and whatever percentage it drops, I may just replace it with more fat to keep the overall % of carbs around 5. And while I don't monitor calories, if I want to eat less, I will.

That's the basic diet strategy for the rest of the year as I carve away my midsection and have fun doing it! < cue Richard Simmons prancing about >

The great thing about this approach is that it seems to be something that I can run indefinitely for it does not rely on an ironfist grasp to maintain. That sort of approach eventually rusts and failure invariably occurs time and again—it's not like we can drop weight and capture our physique into frozen state that we can revert to like a backup. A diet cannot think in terms of the initial ride down, but also consider the rise of the ride back up as well.