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Shreyans Ravrani Shifts From Illness to Wellness!

Shreyans Ravrani

At the age of 38, Shreyans Ravrani led a lifestyle which wasn’t very different from the working professionals of his age group. As a Gujarati, his diet involved regular consumption of oily food and sweets, something he never realized can be detrimental to his health. He didn’t maintain portion control nor eat a balanced meal. Physical activity was almost nil and to add to it, his stress and sleep were negatively impacted due to work pressure and traveling.

He had joined GOQii in 2017 as he found the personal coaching feature appealing but did not stick to his plans or take being healthy seriously. In June 2019, Shreyans Ravrani was diagnosed with high cholesterol and fatty liver disease. He was faced with 2 options – either live with the prospect of lifelong medication or adopt a healthier lifestyle. He chose the latter and his life changed since then.

Making Positive Changes

Shreyans Ravrani realized he had to reduce his weight. He weighed 77kg with a BMI of 29. In order to get healthy, he renewed his subscription with GOQii in July 2019 and got more serious about utilizing personal coaching. He already was consulting a dietitian and he started to validate all her suggestions and inputs with his GOQii coach.

These were the changes he incorporated:

  • Took sugar and fried food off his diet
  • His breakfast included oats or idli.
  • For lunch, he reduced his chapatti intake to 3 and included lots of salad and buttermilk
  • For dinner, he mostly had soup or a light khichdi.
  • He stopped snacking on processed foods and shifted to fruits, roasted chana or makhana along with green tea.
  • He began walking for 2km every day but that wasn’t enough to burn fat. So he began running in August. Initially he felt breathless after 350m. By November, he could run 5km a day. From a strenuous activity, his running time now became his “Me-Time”.

As a Jain, he was used to fasting which helped him control his hunger pangs even as he reduced his meal portion. He says, fasting gives you mental strength and distracts you from the thought of food, which he was able to do successfully.

Levelling Up The Game!

By November 2019, Shreyans Ravrani participated in and completed his first 10k run within 65 minutes. In December 2019, he did it again but completed it in 60 minutes. He was happy that he managed to beat his previous time so quickly.

Between July – November 2019, he had reduced 14kg. Seeing this, his coach had to ask him to cut down on his running and add some strength training routine to his workout. He ensures that he completes his quota of running by spot jogging at home even during lockdown!

He regularly participates in health challenges organized by GOQii with the GOQii App from time to time including the current 30 Day Quarantine Burn Challenge.

What Does Shreyans Ravrani Have to Say About His GOQii Coach?

Shreyans is extremely thankful to his GOQii Coach for her contribution towards his transformation. He thinks the best part is that he can ask questions as and when they arise in his mind and get them answered by an expert quickly. She is also a constant motivator, following up with his habits, progress as well as guiding him in the right direction. He feels it helps when you have someone monitoring your habits and giving you timely feedback.

What Changes Does He See in Himself?

Apart from weight loss and his vitals returning to normal, he says the complete change of mindset towards health and fitness is worth it! His entire family is now more aware and diet conscious. Every member makes sure to burn off extra calories as and when they indulge.

Do you want to make a lifestyle change as well? Download the GOQii App and subscribe now.

For more inspiring user journeys, read here: https://goqii.com/blog/category/user-stories/

#BeTheForce!

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Sangeeta Jajodia goes from a Simple Housewife to a Super Woman!

Sangeeta Jajodia

They say being a housewife is a full time job, and quite rightly so. As one among many, 52 year old Sangeeta Jajodia from Mumbai, led a very busy life. Her routine revolved around tending to the needs and demands of her grown up children, cooking, cleaning and regular household chores. During her free time, she watched TV or browsed through her mobile – this is how she summed up her life before GOQii.

Apart from her daily chores and normal walks which were required, she never indulged in any physical activity. She had no restrictions on food, she would sleep late and wake up early to prepare food for her kids. All of this led to acidity, cholesterol, fatty liver and weight gain. She says that she had never been underweight nor obese.

In 2017, after a family wedding when browsing through the pics, she realized that she had gradually put on a lot of weight. She decided that she needs to lose weight. Not knowing where to start, she decided walking was the one thing she could do. Seeing her interest, her son gifted her a GOQii and with it, a key to a new life which began taking shape from January 2018.

Life after GOQii

Initially, Sangeeta Jajodia was very reluctant to follow her GOQii Coach’s instructions – even simple things such as adding a salad and fruits to her diet – something she hadn’t done before. Slowly, she began adding salads to her dinner and her lunch as well. Now, she includes them daily.

Apart from adding salads to her diet, some of the changes included:

  • Adding fruits in between her main meals to avoid the long gap she used to have before.
  • She had to exercise portion control while eating her meals.
  • Drinking 2 cups of green tea and cinnamon water before going to bed
  • Eat dinner by 8 PM
  • Regularize eating and sleep timings
  • Apple detox twice a week which includes adding a few pieces of apple and cinnamon powder to a jug full of water, leaving it overnight and consuming that water throughout the day. On these days, she avoids grains and dairy products
  • 1 hour walk every day and does basic home workouts shared by her GOQii Coach
  • She takes her 10k step target seriously and walks even if she’s on vacation.

Sangeeta Jajodia Makes the Shift!

After implementing all of the small lifestyle modifications suggested by her GOQii Coach, Sangeeta Jajodia witnessed a lot of positive changes in her life. To begin with, her weight had reduced from 82kg to 73kg within a year of joining GOQii. Furthermore, her acidity was gone completely. Her cholesterol and fatty liver levels are in the normal range. Apart from this, she has participated in 4 5k runs and 1 8k run last year.

What Does Sangeeta Think About Her GOQii Coach?

Sangeeta completely trusts her GOQii Coach and follows her instructions and guidance diligently. Her coach follows up with her every day and reprimands her if she doesn’t follow a habit or cheats on her diet. What Sangeeta likes the most is that if she is in a difficult situation, her GOQii Coach modifies her habits – for instance, when Sangeeta’s mother-in-law was sick and she was stressed, her GOQii Coach asked her to start with breathing exercises and meditation which really helped her out during that time. Constant suggestions and a customized solution like this is what appeals to Sangeeta the most!

Like Sangeeta Jajodia, do you want to make a positive lifestyle change as well? Download the GOQii App and subscribe to our service now!

For more inspiring user journeys, read here: https://goqii.com/blog/category/user-stories/

#BeTheForce

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Always Look At The Big Picture – Mukul Bhartiya User Journey

Mukul Bhartiya

We often treat health as a one off objective but what happens once we achieve our goal? Do we fall back to our previous habits? While keeping health goals, it is important to always look at the big picture. While losing weight is a good target, being healthy should always be a lifelong goal! This is something our player Mukul Bhartiya understood during his journey with GOQii. Let’s look at his journey in his own words. 

Finding GOQii 

I started my journey with GOQii around two and half years back and my purchase decision was a result of meeting Vishal Gondal in 2012 at IIT, Mumbai where he was one of the speakers. I was looking for a fitness band and while researching, I came across GOQii. I immediately jumped in without having a clear idea of what I will do with it. Unfortunately, after just a month or so of purchase, I became very busy with work, having very little time to spend on my health. There was a disconnect with the coach and the 3rd coach assigned to me was a tough task master with his own ideas of fitness and health. So I decided to quit the journey.   

I am a Black Belt in Shito Ryu Karate Do, but left practicing it around five years back due to personal issues. I kept myself active for a couple of years but after that, I became lazy, spending lots of time on social media, following twitter trends, validating my view point through anonymous writer’s rants.  This time, around four months back when I looked at one of my pictures, it gave me a clear idea that I needed immediate help. I was weighing 84kg. Around 10 years back when I signed up for a weight loss program, though I lost 11kg, it was at the cost of my health. This time I needed certified people guiding me, so I went for GOQii! 

Mukul Bhartiya Begins His Journey Again 

My coach Ms. Falguni Bhojak is a patient and understanding coach and mentor. She asked me about my routine and my health objectives. She encouraged me to speak more about my health objectives, challenges and limitations and it resulted in a personalized health template for me. I years back. I wanted to lose weight fast, but she drilled down a few things in my mind, like “not everyday will be the same, I need to  focus on the bigger picture and not allow failures to bother me”. We set a target of 1.5-2kg weight loss per month and made it a one year project. She also said that though weight loss is my immediate target, good health should be my lifelong target.  

Ms. Bhojak’s first and foremost interest was to pull me out of laziness and make me active. She told me, “Mukul, can you start with half an hour of low intensity activity?” and guided me with the same. Now, what was “half an hour activity” around three and half months back, is “more than three hours activity” ranging from moderate to high intensity. In three and half months, I have lost 12.5kg. I am walking around 14-15km per day, spending around 30 minutes on martial arts, 20 minutes on yoga and eating healthy. Even on a bad day, I walk more than ten kilometers.    

What Were Some Key Learnings? 

  • Start always matters, even if it is small: I started with around 15 minutes of lazy activity and now I keep thinking how can I incorporate exercise in every activity. 
  • There should be a bigger picture than the big picture: My coach’s question made me think what will I do after losing 20 kg? I have created a bigger picture for that and it has made my big picture look like a journey than just an end result. 
  • Break the big picture into smaller pixels: Big picture may look daunting and many people back away, so break it down into smaller targets. Achievement of targets work as a reward mechanism for efforts we are putting in. 
  • Stay consistent: Not everyday will be your best day. If you have a bad day, work hard the next day and make it better than your best day. 
  • Everything needs time: You can’t make things happen by the snap of your fingers. Every result is the outcome of many actions you take on a daily basis to make it good.
  • Have someone who can critically analyze your actions but will be considerate and a helping mentor. Ms. Bhojak encourages me to ask questions, list out my challenges, immediately points out my deviations and keeps exercise routines which interest me. 

There are options in the GOQii Arena where players can share their achievements, their story and their now-then photos and people share their achievements daily. Then there are “active month” challenges where participants can see their points, badges and ranks. There are some feature stories of achievers as well. There are many like me who either learnt or re-learnt something during their journey with GOQii. If everyone shares their stories, their journey, challenges, pain, achievements and guides each other from their experiences, moderated by experts, it can create a Facebook of “Health and Healthy Community”. 

What Does Coach Falguni Have To Say About Mukul Bhartiya? 

Mukul joined with a goal of losing 20kg of weight. He was doing meditation but workout or physical activity was missing due to the lockdown. We started with 30 minutes of workout. Moving ahead, as he was a trained Martial arts karate player and enjoyed doing it, we started with Martial arts as his exercise along with 20k steps. 

He was following healthy eating and early dinner, but portion control was needed. So, we started working on it. He was quite determined and with his consistent efforts and hard work, we were able to see a loss of around 14.7kgs in 4 months. 

The best quality of Mukul is that he is a very active GOQii Player who keeps updating his routine on the app and also discusses his challenges and progress with me on a regular basis – which is very essential in achieving any goal. 

Does the journey of Mukul Bhartiya inspire you to begin yours? Head over to the GOQii App or our website to begin your journey today! For more inspiring stories, check out Healthy Reads. 

#BeTheForce 

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Faith, Patience and Persistence – Kumarswamy Remala User Journey

Kumarswamy Remala

What motivates you to push past your limits and achieve your goals? What drives you to stay active mile after mile? Is it determination? Is it a poster you read that charged you up? There may be many reasons such as building confidence, wanting to be there for your family and friends, the desire to live longer and healthier – but as we all know, motivation runs out as quickly as it comes. Determination without the right guidance is meaningless. But with the right guidance, faith in your coach, patience and persistence, anything is achievable. Don’t believe us? Ask our player Kumarswamy Remala. 

Life Before GOQii 

Kumarswamy Remala is a 33 year old working professional from Bangalore. Since childhood, he has been a complete foodie. However, to balance it out, he used to be very active. Cricket and badminton were his favorite in college. He even kept himself active intermittently after joining a workplace. In December 2015, he suffered a back injury which put a halt to all his physical activities for a while. 

To add to this, he worked in rotational shifts which moved from morning shifts to late night shifts. This worsened his eating habits as pizzas, junk food and alcohol became a staple. His sweet tooth along with a penchant for trying different recipes added to his weight gain. He went from 80kg to slowly accumulating another 20-24kg over a period of time.  

Motivation to Change and Joining GOQii

His health began taking a turn for the worse. He knew he had to change but the real motivation came through when his child was born in 2017. Kumarswamy Remala realized that he could not hold his child for a long time due to his back pain or even play with him due to his weight issues. This made him feel quite unhappy about himself and he finally decided to do something about it. He did not want to miss giving a 100% to his child. It was in 2019, approximately 6 months ago that one of his colleagues introduced him to GOQii. 

Kumarswamy Remala Turns His Lifestyle Around! 

After coming onboard GOQii, he began to strictly adhere to the habits set by his coach. His changes included: 

  • Reducing rice intake. Although difficult, he managed to switch to less rice and began eating more salads for both meals. His plate now is 60% veggies! 
  • Reduce the intake of sweets and consume natural sugars like dates, dark chocolate, etc. 
  • Begin consuming plant protein powder supplements post-workout and chia seeds water to control the in-between hunger pangs. 
  • Finish dinner before 9 during his night shift and just eat a fruit or muesli with milk if he feels hungry at night. 
  • Drink ACV water in the morning to boost metabolism.
  • Get active for at least 5 days a week by working out in a gym.  

Making the Shift! 

Currently, Kumarswamy Remala weights 84kg. That’s a reduction of 16kg in a span of 6 months with GOQii. He says he feels really good about himself for having achieved his goal. He is able to concentrate on work better than before. In fact, he has begun pursuing his passion for badminton again as and when time permits and also enjoys spending time with his family like he couldn’t before! 

He is thankful to his GOQii Coach for the inputs shared on portion control, suggestions and tips on how to eat healthy during his night shift and for sharing healthy recipes which appease the chef in him. He interacts with his coach regularly and logs his activities without fail every day. He purchases a lot of products from the GOQii Health Store, in fact, he purchases half his groceries from here. He has subscribed to GOQii Play coaches like Tufail Qureshi, Ronak Gajjar and Bhumika Uniyal for a mix of fitness and yoga. 

In closing, he says that it is easy to manage your health when you have somebody guiding you at every step. He says this job is done extremely well by GOQii and all you need to do is have faith in your Coach, patience for results and be persistent in your efforts to achieve your goals! 

We hope this story inspires you to get off that couch, Level Up and Get Active! Do leave your thoughts in the comments below. 

#BeTheForce 

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