2014: The Year of New Adventures

2014 is already becoming a year of adventures! In the past two weeks, I've done quite a bit of decluttering, and still have more to do. I am going back to school, and will be starting class this week. And then this weekend while I've been sick, I have been reading a series of books about losing weight on my Kindle fire. I will share at the bottom of this post a link to this bundle, but I wanted to share a little bit about what I'm taking on as a result.

Weight loss has always been a daunting thing for me. Intimidating, frustrating, overwhelming, and depressing. I look at how much I'd like to lose, and I lose heart because the number is so big. Suddenly a bunch of old lies start playing in my head. "You'll never accomplish that. You've not been able to so far, so what makes you think you'll get it right this time? And if you do, what's to keep it off?" UGH!!!

Well, this book series is the most balanced real-person material I've ever read. While I'm not done reading the bundle yet, I have been working on some of the suggestions she's made in the material up to now. She talks about setting an ultimate goal (done), and then how to break it down into smaller yearly, quarterly, monthly, weekly, and even daily goals.

Here's where the light went on. If I can attempt smaller goals along the way (like 5lbs/mo), I will be less likely to get frustrated and give up. Five pounds in a month? That's all? I can do that! So, now I have quarterly goals for the year, monthly goals for the first quarter, weekly goals for January, and daily goals for this week. Noting that I will be regularly evaluating these goals and making changes as necessary, I am proud to say I have goals set!

You may be wondering what those goals are. Well, I will share some of them with you. First of all, if I can lose 5lb each month, that means that by the end of 2014 I will have lost 60lbs. That's amazing! It puts me much closer to my ultimate goal, and gives me many milestones in between to celebrate. I have a goal of 100mi walked in 2014, breaking that up by quarter and allowing myself some ramping up time, I have set a goal of 7mi over the next three weeks, then more for the rest of the quarter.

In the ramping up of walking, I've set a minute/times per week goal of 15/3 for January, bumping that up to 30/3 or 30/4 for February and March. We'll see by the end of January how I'm feeling and if duration or frequency moves first. However, I took Duke for a walk for 20min today, and we logged 0.8mi, slower than me by myself, but better than I expected.

I've also set as daily goals remembering to take my vitamins, drinking plenty of water, and eating at least three servings of veggies. I took my vitamins early today because I was awake in the middle of the night, and have had two veggies already, but I'm behind on water intake. I'll remedy that soon.

Now comes the real kicker for a goal. I plan to lose 2lbs this week. This is hard for me to say, because my experience tells me that I won't make it, or that if I see it, it will just be a fluctuation as happens regularly anyway. I am choosing to no longer believe the negativity and lies. I want to be healthier, and this is one of the ways I am going to do that.

So, with all the other stuff going on in my life right now (big stuff like going back to school), I find myself wondering why I want to take this on at the same time. Well, it's time to face a whole bunch of lies head-on. Lies about failure, rejection, self-worth, and so forth. It's big stuff, and I can't do it alone. I need God's grace to sustain me, and I need you, my friends, to stick with me and at times to pull me out of the stinky space of the old thoughts. I usually like to take one thing at a time, but right now I feel like coming out swinging.

Oh, and the author recommended writing out your motivation for taking on this particular task. I have, scribbled on a piece of paper (it'll look better soon) a bunch. Among them: Honor God, confidence, more active, better self-talk, health, attraction, more energy, job interviews, satisfaction, accomplishment, and ease of motion.

So there you have it. I need your prayers, your accountability, and your encouragement.

Here's the link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0083238G0/ref=oh_d__o00_details_o00__i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1