Hello again and welcome back! If you missed last week’s post, and you aren’t quite sure what I am talking about here, you can go check it out! Last week we talked about race, or in layman’s terms, genetics. Something that can have a small effect on your body, but nothing you can’t overcome. Today, we are going to build the most fun part of character creation, your class.
Now, I am not talking Marie Antoinette style class here, by class I mean a choice you make that directly affects your strengths, weaknesses, skills, and abilities. You know some of these. The fighter, the wizard, the cleric, the rogue, etc. These are more generic choices, the large templates that allow for personal nuance. Part 3 will describe the personalization of these classes.
When you start a game, you need to figure out what class you want to be, much in the same way in our weight loss journey. You have to figure out (sooner or later) what you want to do. Do you want to be a bodybuilder, how about an ultra-marathon runner, or maybe an expert in parkour? When I played D&D, I often played the exact opposite of what I was. So I would often play the fighter. Strong and manly, able to take a beating, and muscular, I would start at level 1, go and kill some kobolds or goblins or sewer rats until I leveled up. Then kill slightly tougher things until I became tougher and became stronger. You get the picture. In fact, you can see where I might be going with this. Oh, you readers are just so smart and amazing.
So when I started exercising, I recognized exactly what I was doing, I was picking my character class. After I lost all this extra weight, what did I want to do? It didn’t make sense to simply do whatever to lose that weight if it meant I wasn’t getting closer to my ultimate goal. Why would a fighter spend time learning wizard spells if he could never cast magic? It’s not an efficient use of time. You gotta think long term. Just because you are level 1 doesn’t mean you shouldn’t start thinking about what you want when you reach level 20 (the “highest level” for D&D, before you reach epic levels and you can go around killing gods for fun).
I wanted to be like that fighter I always created. I wanted to be strong. So I started lifting things up and putting them down. I couldn’t lift very much to begin with, but I lifted what I could. And the next week, I lifted a little bit more weight. And a little more. Now, I’m no professional powerlifter who can lift small cars (unless you count matchbox cars), but I’m able to lift more than the untrained person.
I started at my journey, picked my class, and started from level 1. I have been leveling up slowly. Gaining experience, getting some sick new gear, defeating mini-bosses, my small goals (getting my deadlift to 3 plates (315 lbs), benching more than my body weight, squatting 275. Next mini-boss for me is overhead pressing 1 plate, or 135 lbs).
What is your class? What is it you want to achieve in this journey?
David Jasmin is a formerly obese 25 year old male. After failing to lose weight several times, David and his wife buckled down and lost a combined total of 185 pounds. David is a Software Engineer in the Boston area, enjoys comic books, video games, Magic: The Gathering, reading and all sorts of sedentary activities. He recently added lifting weights and running to his list of activities he likes. He still not so secretly loves food. You can follow his life on instagram 
You must be logged in to view comments.