This is it! The big KICK-OFF!

This is my big week! The time has finally come, after a month or so of reading up and planning, to KICK-OFF my journey into healthy living and weight loss. You can read more about my goals for this journey on the About page.

I'm so excited to get started that I can hardly wait (and I'll probably end up starting a few things a bit early, anyways!). Starting Wednesday, January 30th (because I weigh in on Wednesdays via Weight Watchers at work), I will be logging all the food I eat into WW tools, exercising for 20 minutes, and meditating for 3 minutes every day for 4 weeks. Each week, I'll also go to 1 gym class, meditate for 10+ minutes three times, write 1 blog post, take 1 photograph of myself, plan meals and shopping lists, create an exercise plan, and work for 1 hour towards designing a motivational or positive affirmation poster.

So after 4 weeks, I'll have logged food for 28 days, exercised for 21.3 hours, meditated for 3.4 hours, written 4 blog posts, taken 4 photographs of myself, planned delicious healthy meals 4 times, created 4 exercise plans, and designed 1 motivational poster! Oh, plus, I'll be rewarding myself with a mani/pedi, new gelish nail polishes for DIY mani/pedis, fun new pillows for my office futon, and a hair cut and color by the end of the month.

Then, I'll plan for the month of March, tweaking my goals and rewards, creating another monthly meal plan, adding to my exercise regime, and writing a month recap blog post, and more. Over time, my workouts will increase in length and intensity, I will develop an arsenal of WW-approved recipes, I will complete 12 motivational posters, and get better and better about planning and implementing for my new healthy life. I'll be writing on here much more often than I have in the past year or so, too.

I have been thinking a lot about how to involve my friends and family. I know I can't do this alone and I need a good support system! Of course, Dave is going to get on board and help make meals that are WW friendly, but he's not too interested in going to the gym or exercising. He'd take walks and hike with me, but it's FREEZING outside right now so that won't happen until spring or summer. So, since I don't live near many of my friends and it won't be easy to get together and work out often, I would like to open up a conversation with some of you near and far about how we can connect to support and motivate each other.

First, there's one simple way you can participate with me: give me your own advice and tips, send  encouraging well wishes, or forward me great healthy recipe ideas or workouts, etc. Feel free to share them publicly or privately, on Facebook, Pinterest, email, comment on this blog (MAKE SURE YOU SIGN YOUR NAME to your post!), or any other method you choose. By doing this, you can help me stay on track, inspire and motivate me to continue achieving my goals. I would be so glad to do the same for you, too! Just let me know what I can do!

Secondly, give me a workout challenge. I have the Wii Fit and have already started some of the games and exercises on it. I'm also in the process of purchasing Just Dance for Wii. I'm thinking about finding some yoga and other workout videos.games, too. Plus, I belong to the YMCA, where there is plenty of treadmills, ellipticals, strength training equipment, bikes, and classes (ZUMBA!). I love to go on walks and hikes (when it's warmer), especially with friends. So, now that you know what I have (and what I don't have?) at my disposal, challenge me to a workout of your choosing. It can be as simple as "come over and workout with me at my gym" or "complete 4 ZUMBA classes". I just ask that you just give me an achievable/appropriate deadline for said challenge and your name. Once I receive the challenge, I'll make plans to achieve it, and when I do, I'll give you a gift of some kind. If I know you personally, I'll make sure it's something you'll love, too!

Finally, as I work towards achieving my goals this year, I plan on hosting a few brunches, lunches, or dinners focused around healthy living. I hope to see you at one, a few, or all of them!

New Ideas: Having Them

I'm into having ideas. I love the randomness of how they appear. You have a work problem. You think about it for awhile during the work day. You go home, think of other stuff...watch TV, read the interwebs, make dinner. Shower, blow dry your hair, brush your teeth. While you're doing one of those auto-pilot tasks, the kind you can do while thinking of other stuff, you zone out. And then, all the sudden, you have an idea to help solve that problem you had earlier. I think it's fascinating how our brain works subconsciously to figure things out!

I recently recalled an article I read on creating ideas. (Well, in truth, I've gone through my emails today and found the article there; see step 3.) It talks about making lists of ideas everyday. To get into the habit. Just for fun. Nothing too... productive, necessarily. The point of getting into the practice, I think, is to help keep the mind agile and prepared to come up with new ideas.

I think I want to start this practice. So...I should probably make a list of idea lists I should make soon, huh?