My goal WAS to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023. It has been one week since I completed this challenge. I have done at least 50 pushups a day past the 31-day challenge. On day 36 (yesterday) I did 100 pushups! Then I took a hot bath and had to ice up my arm.
Comparing Day 1 to Day 31
Today I compare what my 1st day of pushups looked like up against my 31st day.
Here are the main points I make in this video:
(I am sorry they are not composed as learning objectives! HAHA!)
In the video, I fail to mention that this 50 pushups a day challenge not only made me commit to holding myself accountable but I was also motivated me to build other skills.
For example, I wanted a logo for my blog but have not been very active in developing it. The energy generated from this project motivated me to sketch out my logo, scan it in, and then design a PNG file in Adobe Illustrator with a transparent background. I actually recorded my screen while designing my logo and plan to release that video next week. Once I got the ball rolling on the pushups, other projects didn’t seem as daunting as they did before. The first step is the most difficult.
Not Too Late to Give to the Children!
I did more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I am happy to say that I did 50 (or more) pushups every day for August 2023. It was not as easy as I thought it would be to VLOG about 50 pushups for 31 days straight.
This all takes way more time than it looks like. There were times when my family missed me and I had to step away from this to tend to them. I learned a lot from this challenge and I am proud to say that I completed it. It forced me to learn how to generate “PNG” files with a transparent background and even apply those custom artifacts over video footage. I am at a different place than I was 31 days ago, (mostly I am just better at doing pushups. HA! 555+) but this has forced me to grow in more ways than one and for that, I am very grateful. Consistency is not easy but once it becomes a habit it is not difficult either. I will miss this daily grind, but at the same time, I am so glad it is over!
My goal WAS to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023. My stretch goal STILL IS to do 50 quality pushups in a single set. Today I did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to do an actual set of 50 by the end of 2023.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets as preparation and a reset for the second set of 25 pushups. This video is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale very often.
I have done more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I am feeling better today than I did yesterday. It got down to 65 degrees here in Saint Louis, MO so I decided to do the pushups outside. I am trying to trim the videos down shorter now so there is less dead time and less talking time.
My goal is to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023. My stretch goal is to do 50 quality pushups in a single set. Today I did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to do an actual set of 50 by the end of August.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets, which is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale.
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I am not feeling very well today. In this video, I declare, “That is the thing about consistency, you still show up even when you are not feeling well. I am going to give my 100% even though I don’t have 100% to give. I am going to give my full 83%.) My kids both got Hand Foot and Mought Virus over the weekend, and as our Nurse Practitioner warned, there is now a strain that adults get. Maybe it is the offspring of the Omnichrom Carona 19 virus. I am not pro-vax or anti-vax.
It seems to me like just getting the virus is a vaccination in its own way. Probably more risky than a vaccination but it’s cheaper! and I love a good value! Still, I’d rather just get a vaccine if I can afford it and it doesn’t make me sick. So, now that I have polarized my reader base, let’s move forward to the video where I try to do pushups even though I am not very fit and I am sick!
My goal is to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023. My stretch goal is to do 50 quality pushups in a single set. Today I did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to do an actual set of 50 by the end of August.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets, which is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale.
Please Donate to The Children
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
It was especially nice outside so I decided to do my daily 50 pushups on the deck behind our house. It was windy and I got a lot of pops and clicks on my microphone. I had the foam wind guard on my mic so I am wondering if it was the wind that caused that. I have never had that issue before.
My goal is to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023. My stretch goal is to do 50 quality pushups in a single set. Today I did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to do an actual set of 50 by the end of August.
I did a 5-minute breathwork session between the two sets, which is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on to the exhale.
In this video, I brought my small digital kitchen timer to help time the breathwork. I have been using my laptops for timers but that is cumbersome and a few times I have left the computer in random spots in the house and then not known where it was. I recall my time at Wat Chom Thong, in Thailand’s Chiang Mai province where I did a 10-day Vippisana Meditation retreat. We used timers like these at that meditation center. More information about that center here: https://northernvipassana.org/en/
After the breathwork, I place my hands together and raise them to my forehead, and as I do that the church across the pasture rang its bell for 2 PM. I was not anticipating that but for some reason it tickled me. I went on a tangent about how small moments of coincidence or magic like that should be allowed to make us happy. All things are connected in ways we can not understand. I go on to claim that the world is a single organism and we are like the microbes living in that organism. I then made a statement that there are more bacteria in the human body than human cells, but I edited that part out because I looked it up and technically it is not true. If you take into account the red blood cells, the human body is 50% bacteria and 50% human cells. If you think about that, that’s still incredible. The mass of the bacteria is smaller than human cells, so the mass is not 50/50 but the number of human cells to bacteria is estimated to be about half half.
Today again was a very rough day of doing 50 push-ups a day for Saint Jude. I make a good point in this video that you know if I was just healthier and if I had been doing this since I was young, this would be easy. I then get on my soapbox and preach how it’s never too late to start.
I’m going to be honest my cheat day has turned sort of into a cheat weekend. Saturday night, I had a couple beers, and a glass of wine and didn’t eat very well (Pizza, ice cream, Peach cocktails, etc.).
Normally, this really wouldn’t affect push-ups the next day, but since I am old, and I have been eating, very healthily and not drinking alcohol, I can really tell the difference when I do add these things back into my routine. You will notice that in the second set, my kids come down to help in my first set. You can hear them screaming upstairs in the bathtub, but please don’t worry my wife was watching them.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets, which is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale. In this video, I didn’t do the full 5-minute breathwork because I was very pressed for time.
I am doing 50 pushups a day for August 2023. I am now including all my breathwork in these daily video updates and owning the fact that this is a form of meditation. I am sharing my experience with the practice and the benefits I receive from it.
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I am doing 50 pushups a day for August 2023. My goal is to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023.
I completed an iteration of my new logo so I added that to this video.
This is my first time using a PNG file with a transparent background of a logo I designed over video. So, all pretty exciting for me on this side of things… I am feeling incredibly good about it. I also found some very good open-source music from the Psych Rock group Kruingbin for the breathwork session today.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets, which is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale.
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I made the mistake of looking at YouTube on my phone right before recording this. The YouTube Channel for Improvement Dave was reporting zero traffic on my phone. So, I recorded my video with the sub-context of “nobody watches any of my videos. This is futile. I have to be consistent anyway.” Now that I have had a moment, I logged in on my laptop I see that people are watching the videos and..
SHAT! I got a few likes. Not the reason I am doing any of this, this is mostly practice for me. This is about me being consistent. I am posting for the sake of consistintly posting. However, the main point of this is to hold myself accountable for doing the work. If I was not posting these videos I would have stopped doint the 50 pushups a day, and that is the point. Still, I was hoping that someone had at least watched a single video! Funny how our minds react so quickly on such a visceral level to people paying any attention to our work. I know that I am insignificant in the universe especially when you add the 4th dimension of time… but it still burned like hell.
Burned like hellfire.
Knocked Me Off My Game
What is especially interesting to me is on this day when I felt creating was futile my production was absolute garbage. I failed to record the preparation. I also failed to record Set 1. and Set 2 was cut in half. Was this a user error or were these alarms that popped up on my iPhone? Or was it both? I do not know. I do know that I should stop using my phone, which I also use in my life, to generate this content.
What is all this, Anyway?
I am doing 50 pushups a day for August 2023. My goal is to do 50 pushups every day for August 2023. My stretch goal is to do 50 quality pushups in a single set. Today I did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to do an actual set of 50 by the end of August.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets, which my iPhone filed to capture. In this breathework session, I did the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale.
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I am doing 50 pushups a day for August 2023. My goal is to do 50 pushups in a single set. Today I did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to do an actual set of 50 by the end of August.
In this video, I share that we had a recent death in the family. This caused some truncated schedules, so I got straight to work. I do not waste the opportunity to remind us that we should all be grateful for the lives and loved ones that we have. Give your loved ones an extra hug or phone call, tell them you love them all the time, and don’t forget to be thankful for what you have.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets, which is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I do the basic 4-count in, 4-count hold, and 4-count exhale. Then when that feels comfortable I up it to 8-counts for all three. Normally I would do a 4 or 8-count hold after the exhale but having just done pushups and preparing to do more pushups I do not tend to hold on the exhale. You will notice that in this video the breathwork is cut short. An alarm actually goes off on my phone turning off the video recording. I would say this is both bad and good because the alarm is to remind me to take my son to school, which is a top priority. However, on this specific day, he asked to attend the funeral we had for a family member, so the alarm was not critical. It still reminded me I have things to do today so start PUSHING UP DAVE!
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
his is David Kolmer for Improvement Dave Hello you’re watching Improvement Dave This is David Kolmer with Improvement Dave this is day 23 from my understanding I do have my new microphone working so you might notice a difference in sound quality if you’re watching these back to back I have a feeling maybe people aren’t watching them back to back but just so you know I got a new mic so that’s cool I’m gonna go ahead and do 25 push-ups for the first set if I can do a little bit more that’s great if not well I’ll still get up to 50 in one day and all of us will get to heaven on time set one
thank you [Music]
okay
n=Not terrible right had a few pauses not too bad pretty good form As I said I have a lot to do today I had a lot going on today so fresh breakfast and added carbs back into my diet I was only eating ketogenic just fat and vegetables and fruits so I added carbohydrates back in because of these push-ups and I just ate like two pretty good sized waffles about 30 minutes ago and ideally I would have waited an hour or two but you know my privilege has been diminished today because I have a funeral to go to so rid of passing in the family
so it’s kind of a sad day
Okay so the breath work was diminished because I had another alarm go off it’s time to take my son to school so I need to knock these 25 push-ups out as fast as I can and then get things moving
whatever [Music]
oh that was the end of the set too it was 50 push-ups total thanks so much for tuning in this is Improvement Dave and today I’m just reflecting on the fragility for agility of life and being thankful that we still have life cherishing the moments that we do have together and just making sure that we’re making the most of it and being thankful for what we have awesome thank you so much. see you down the line [Music]
thank you
Okay I just finished set one I’m gonna set a timer for five minutes and do some simple breath work here just to calm myself down and put some oxygen back into my system I said Almost electrolytes we should drink some water I mean it’s a sign right
This is just water
systems telling me telling me that I’m thirsty
Freudian slips speaking very well today
Music
Music by RoyaltyFreeMusic Nver Avetyan from Pixabay Technology Dubstep
Music by John_Kensy_Music from Pixabay Mindfulness Relaxation & Meditation Music
Music by To Hot to Play, Lobo Loco, Free Music Archive (CC)
I am doing 50 pushups a day for August 2023. My goal is to do 50 pushups in a single set. So far I have made it to what I call the faux 50, where technically I do 50 pushups without resting but my form is sub-par. Today I backpedaled and did two higher-quality sets of 25 pushups, for only 50 quality pushups in total! I think this is the best approach overall to be able to do a real set of 50 by the end of August.
I did a 5-minute breath work session between the two sets and that is available to view after the two sets of pushups. In this video, I mention that during the breath work, I had an image come to me that I am in this house, and I hear the house creaking because I am being silent. I am in the house, the house is settling. That is a metaphor for myself being in my body and settling. It is not the deepest realization and there is no direct link between the house and me and then me and my soul. However, the image was strong in my mind that finding time for silence allows you to settle and find a state of calm. All you need to do is sit and breathe and let the thoughts flow. In the video I mention how I did breath work in “Voice for Stage” and then forget why I brought it up. It is because in that class we ran laps around the theater seats before we did breath work. This is the same as the pushups.
I’m Doing more than 1,550 Pushups for St. Jude – Please donate to my fundraiser!
I’ve been doing some breath work in between sets to try and reset my muscles feed them some oxygen and also tell my system everything is okay now perceive body as a cage or as something that limits me but more as an enabler this is my vessel that’s carrying me carrying my soul carrying whatever I am whatever you can believe us to be we’re definitely more than flesh and Bone we’re definitely more than mud don’t know what but there’s something going on I have electricity flowing from brain to my fingers something’s going on right but it was really nice to hear the creaking of the house listening to house settle as a metaphor right I’m in the house the house is settling in me is myself trapped in my body but if my body is settled then there’s less of this feeling that I’m trapped in my body right foreign hello this is David Comer for improvement Dave day 22 of my 50 push-up day challenge for St Jude Research Hospital really thought I had my new microphone figured out and I’m building slowly building a Blog with a video about this this journey I could be posting that Asi go but I’ve decided to just accumulate all the video together and you can look at all my Misadventures and all my learn your learn years all my learning from failure on that post I think I’m this close I have a very nice camera that plugs right into my tripod there but I’m not there yet so I’m in this big booming room you’re hearing this wonderful echo through the microphone on my camera which is it’s where I’m at today so I’m being consistently not the best but at least I’m being consistent at least I’m owning it okay set one right yes it is really difficult because I just carried a 40 gallon water heater up a flight of stairs on a dolly my dad did help so thank you Dad he did admit that mostly he was steadying it and I was the one pulling it up the stairs which was fair it’s my it was my rental property uh it was my water heater and it was my responsibility so thanks Dad I really appreciate your help their big shout out to my dad Thanks so much Couldn’t have done it without you but literally physically and intellectually probably would have just paid said one thousand dollars to put in that 500 water heater so I spent a whole day of time but I saved a lot of money on honestly an asset that’s generating income every month so it’s a win all right enough about me let’s talk about some push-ups set one we’re gunnery and do at least 25 here and we’re looking at quality not quantity right I know I got up to 80 at one point but those were not those were not push-up foreign[Music]you two three four five two seven[Music]hey[Music]everything[Music]thank you are these push-ups I think they are yes they are16.17.18.[Music]turn your mind[Music]if I don’t take these little breaks I’m not going to make it back up you know[Music]25[Music]7I’m touching the ground a lot there Iwas kept hitting my belly and I think I just have to but it would be more like real push-ups I hadn’t done that if I hadn’t done that thank you it does feel really good you know I am going to keep this up I think my buddy Scott Costa said his name right that time ask he you’re going to keep it up yeah You’re Gona Keep doing video I don’t know that’s a good question so should I keep doing video probably this is the only way I really hold myself accountable is I have to post every day I want to do this for the rest of my life that’s scary I have to be in like one long take these separate takes where I I’m not I’m not more on that later[Music]all right this is David Coleman with Improvement Dave working on set two I just finished five minutes of breathwork in between the sets that you can catch after this recording of this next guess I did 27 so I don’t have to do a full 25 here but we’ll see what I Amable to muster with these muscles that I’ve developed over the last 21 days it could be bigger but they could be smaller I’ve been eating a lot of protein and I’ve been doing my best and that’s what’s important during the breath Mark I had a lot of thoughts about metaphors around breathwork and meditation and I just remember back to my time at Millikin University Mean you don’t know I studied theater Did a lot of breath work a lot of yoga maybe even some meditation I’m not sure if that was part of it or not it kind of depends on what you define as meditation either way I was reminded of the breathwork that I did early in the morning at certain class called voice for stage just these concepts of breathing and it really is a powerful asset to my life and I even had a point that I was going to bring up something that I learned from that class but that’s totally looted Meum I think it was just nice to get back into this practice a little bit and on that a bit and have a way of communicating to my body to myself that everything’s all right I don’t need to be in a constant state of stress and anxiety the way that the I guess the marketing and the advertising industry of the United States maybe even the media want me to be in right because if you’re scared if you’re worried your body breaks down you need to buy stuff you need to buy medicine you need to buy little cushions and heaters to make yourself more comfortable but if you’re already comfortable in your body and you’re at peace with yourself and your environment you don’t need all that stuff in fact this wall behind me used to be full of stuff right a week ago two weeks ago or even before that when I was traveling through Thailand this entire wall was filled with junk my wife and I have not touched for what since 20192023 now it was like four years Haven’t touched any of that junk and I did keep some of the books I kept some of the CDs because that’s memorabilia some printed photos but the rest of it we pretty much got rid of minus the camping supplies because camping’s awesome so sorry for that little rant I just wanted to reconnect with why I’m doing this this concept of being consistent has really triggered something in me 50push-ups a day it seems like a lot to some people to other people doesn’t seem like much at all it’s really interesting when I talk to people what they say they’re like oh that’s not that much Ido 200 or wow 50 push-ups a day I don’t know if I could do five I don’t know if I could do one but for me 30 push-ups a day is a lot I’ve been working out a lot this year and still 50 push-ups has Beena lot especially 50 consistently 50quality push-up that has not been easy so thanks for listening I really appreciate you lending your ear on this side of the camera it feels good to just kind of offload some of these thoughts and I think vlogging is a little bit more of my style than blogging right I’m a bit more of a talker than a type[Laughter]I need some of that well what is it audio to text okay push-ups let’s talk about some push-ups set two Improvement Dave here Improvement Dave that’s how I say it every time now right mess it up everything I consistently say Improvement Dave David Kolmer for Improvement Dave I kind of like that all right. I was at 27 let’s see if I can at least another 25 one two three-oh [Music] six seven hey [Music] fourteen [Music]15 16.17.okay [Music] do you want me it’s harder when you don’t touch the ground but I want to make sure I go all the way down so let’s catch 22. some comments here help me outlet’s switch the best for you could probably just go read on WebMD Do helpline or something21.22.2324 I already hit 50.ohoh man that was 52 and that was difficult as I said halfway through my stomach keeps touching the ground I guess that’s okay I don’t know tell me uh send me message call me out hold me accountable her name is Improvement Dave actually my name is David Kolmer for improvement Dave have a great day I believe it’s Tuesday over here whatever day it is for you have a good one[Music]okay this is actually what I did between two sets of push-ups looks like I made it up to 27 today in the first set and Then followed up with I don’t know yet in the second set because it hasn’t happened yet so we’re kind of traveling through time here a little bit with Improvement Dave my name is David Coleman hey how’s it going yeah everything’s great everything’s good it’s all good I’ve been doing some breath work in between sets to try and reset my muscles feed them some oxygen and also tell my system everything is okay also a count of four in holds before and for four I’m already a minute into this so let’s get started on the breath Park[Music]it’s already there I held in for eight which felt pretty good I might just keep doing that foreign okay doing a hold for eight in an exhale for 12 and an in for six is working really good for me right now foreign that was five minutes on the built-in Microsoft alarm clock a little bit nicer than the online Google alarm that I heard the other day I didn’t actually record that session that’s funny it happened but you didn’t witness it only did while I was doing that breath work I thought maybe this is the best part of these push-ups is this well let’s just call it breath work meditation that I’m doing in between sets I feel like I’m gaining a lot more clarity overall if that’s possible and I think it is it’s quite possible in addition to that I’m thinking of maybe processing this video without any audio so we can hear the sounds of the house kind of creaking and settling that really spoke to me in this session for some reason as I’m sitting here Maslow breath is telling my body to relax my calmness my emptiness my silence my connection with my breath is helping me relax telling my mind relax really want to turn that video off or that that alarm but I’m not going to Donita’s not going to do that I want to really bad but it was really nice to hear the creaking of the house listening to the house settle was a metaphor right I’m in the house the house is settling in me is myself trapped in my body but if my body is settled then there’s less of this feeling that I’m trapped in my mind right because my body can walkout that door over there that you can’t see just outside of your field of vision of the door can go out that door so in the same way if you believe in anything esoteric maybe ask for projection or the concept that the soul isn’t necessarily Tethered to the body I can potentially leave my body and not perceive my body as a cage or as something that limits me but more as an enabler this is my vessel that’s carrying me carrying my soul carrying whatever I am whatever you can believe us to be definitely more than flesh and bone with nothing more than mud I don’t know what but there’s something going on I have electricity flowing from my brain to my fingers something’s going on right thanks so much for tuning in this is David Kolmer for improvement Dave it’s been a pleasure on this side of the campground and you have a great day[Music]good[Music]foreign[Music]
Music by RoyaltyFreeMusic Nver Avetyan from Pixabay Technology Dubstep
Music by John_Kensy_Music from Pixabay Mindfulness Relaxation & Meditation Music
Music by To Hot to Play, Lobo Loco, Free Music Archive (CC)
Improvement Dave 