Week 14: Shape Up

Here we go again. Here’s what’s been in my mind recently.

Something I keep doing

Being diligent in my exercise. Although I’m starting lately to overdo it, especially with weight exercise. The heavier you go, mindfully, and the more you improve, and the more you have to be mindful about rest it seems. I’m getting depleted more than I would like to. Rest matters the same as exercise.

Another way around this is doing lighter weight exercises in the off days. Not completely abandoning the exercise. Doing an active rest like long walks, easy pace, should do it for me.

Last week average:

5 hours strength training + 1 workout Zone 2 = 6 days in the gym.

Something I succeeded in doing

VO2 max sessions that’s not an agony to do. According to Peter Attia, a person should do a 4x4x4. Meaning:

4 min full effort, 4 min zone 2 effort. Repeat that 4 times (32 min total.)

Normally this is done on a rowing machine.

I just didn’t want to in the last couple of weeks like this. It’s boring. Am making them fun. What I’m doing is 50 min blast without rest (non scientific, just fun.) I’m doing the following:

5 min: elliptical. You can do treadmill with an incline. For me, it’s easier on my knees on an elliptical.40 min: Combination ofWeighted sledge for 40 meters total. Forward and Backward. the backward side is for knees from the KneesOverToesGuy.20KG Kettlebell on each arm for 40 meters total.Repeat.10 min: elliptical.

Am young. I should be able to handle it and have some fun from time to time. I want to feel life and alive. And I sure am when I am doing these sessions.

I’m not different.

A short post I wrote here this week.

Something I keep buying

Blueberries. I simply say to myself that Lamis, my wife, like them. And then I eat them all by myself. I think I also tell myself they are good antioxidants and then they’re good for strength and the gym work I do. I find a reason to keep buying and eating them. No worries.

Something I keep using

My Moleskine notebook. It’s a bit pricy but it does the job. The quality of paper is superb and that matters if you draw or design on paper. I always choose the one with dotted papers.

I use for design, reading and all my writing and thinking.

Best of what I watched

I love Aldaheeh. I’m proud we have an Egyptian in the Arab world that has this impact on youth simply explaining science in simple terms, humor in 15 min. He’s amazing. I’ve watched this video on the Arabic Language as the Language of “daad.” Which we seem to get all wrong. It’s not the language of “daad” after all. Recommended for any Arab.

A big side note: I should rethink this it seems. He’s more of a presenter, than purely scientific. His video on Keto diet is purely misleading and unscientific. If you’re a regular guy like me but you’re interested in exercise and diet, you’ll see this episode and say that he got lots of things wrong between Keto diet and Intermittent fasting.

Best buy

If you’re a runner or want a really good top for gym, I’ve bought this by Nike a while back, and it’s a really good top. It’s not as white as it appears to be. It’s actually grey.

Something I’m learning

I’ve just finished the first walkthrough in the Moral Foundations of Politics course on Coursera. A really good intro on the subject. If you know any good course on politics on philosophy, please do send me an email. Directly here: mohammadshakergtr@gmail.com

80/20 of my time for the week I went on..

My work day is dominated by meetings. I’m trying to keep at least 1 day where it’s completely free of meetings. I think if we, at Noon, are to do something dramatically different, we should follow dramatically different approach to work VS other companies. And I think it starts with how we plan and execute. We’ve made lots of changes in the last 1 year to plan properly and execute and iterate faster. But we still have long way to go.

We’re starting to adopt to some uncommon practices in our industry by 37Signals/Basecamp. These guys got it right early, and still do. I read all their books 7-8 years ago and it effected all my management style, me starting a company, hiring and firing, and internal processes. I’m in-progress of widely implementing some of them at Noon. Give their ShapeUp book a read for Product Engineering work. Or any of their other books.

They are very easy quick reads. But they are gems in a mired of insanity of engineering practices in the tech industry. I love these guys.