Cats, good books, AI, and religious walking in the city of Sofia
This is my first documented pull-up with my feet not touching the ground even slightly. When I set an annual goal of one pull-up, it felt like a stretch goal. Doing it in 2027 was quite fine for me. I haven’t been to the gym since 2019, more than 6 years ago. I haven’t done any upper body training other than carrying kids since then. I’ve also gained weight.
But while I wonder if I should update the goal or blame the steps, here’s a video.
I set myself a goal to do one pull-up by the end of the year. I made some progress yesterday. My one rep is not a clean pull-up. The grip is neutral, and my legs are touching the ground from the moment I started pulling. I didn’t jump, but it’s not entirely clear from the video if I really pulled all of my body weight completely unassisted by my legs.
In any case, I’m not too far off. So far, the number of injuries exceeds the number of pull-ups. Honestly, I didn’t believe I’d get that far, let alone so soon. I was hoping I could achieve something within a year or two. Achieving a somewhat recognizable repetition in less than two months of practice is a big surprise to me. I’ll think about adjusting the goal once I do a clean rep.
Feeling like Rocky Balboa from Rocky 5 today.
Sharing your goals on a public blog adds extra pressure to actually complete them. Thankfully, most of my friends and family don’t know I blog, so the embarrassment is not too big. I set some goals last year, and now is the moment to look back and see how well I did.
- ✅ I’ll try to climb Vihren (2 failed attempts in 2024) – success
- ✅ I’ll try to keep an average of 10k/day for 2025 as well but increase the difficulty by doing more hiking and less city – success for the steps and mostly for the hiking as well
- 🚩 I’ll try to add 1h/week of gym time, starting with body weight exercises like push-ups and plank. – failure
Honestly, the Vihren goal was too optimistic and we stopped doing hiking after it. I don’t know what happened with the gym idea. I did a grand total of under 1 hour of exercise. I don’t have an explanation, it was never part of my todo, had zero interest in spending time on it, and just dreaded the idea that I’m going to do that. But, reality is, that I need to find a way to do it.
So, for 2026, let’s try again:
Wish me luck.
I slipped on my 10K-steps goal for November, despite having two additional weekend days in the month. I found it quite difficult to maintain the average and eventually didn’t make it. The weather, knee pain, lots of work, zero hiking, a couple of emergencies, and several low-energy days all contributed. At least WordCamp Sofia was good.
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