Living Intentionally

3 years ago we had an auto accident that I'm still not sure how we walked away from. After that, the way I viewed life was very different. I had a bit of a passion for living. I also learned to live more in the now. Over the last 3 years that has slipped away a little. I've fallen into old habits and I don't like it and want to change it. 

I have goals and dreams for my life. There are things I still want to do. But I find myself saying, eh, too tired. Or I'll do it tomorrow. Or I'll do it next week. Or some such nonsense. Part of that is because I've fallen back into old habits. I spend literally hours on this computer doing nothing. I scroll Facebook until I have seen everything on there. I play a stupid computer game, which is fun but does not need to be played for hours on end. Shit, the first thing I do in the morning or when I get home from work is turn on this computer. That just sets me up to spend far too much time on it. So things need to change. 

My goals really are rather simple: 

• Craft and get creative more
• train Maverick
• spend time with the Hubby
• relax and enjoy life
• travel some

that's it. But none of those things are compatible with hours on the computer. 

In the new house, things will be set up differently and sitting on this for hours will be less appealing. But I would like to start weaning myself away now. I still have some packing to do for the move, I think I will move that up on my priority list. I want to start working with Maverick on some basic stuff and I want to make that a habit every day, so I'll start doing that. I think it's time to wean myself from this electronic monster. 

Time for a reset

both mental and physical. For the entire summer, I have used excuses and the 'until this is over' attitude. That needs to change. I need to get back on the exercise track. I've done it before. I can do it again. I just need to get started. I'm trying to figure out when would be the best time to work out.  I just went and looked up gyms near the new house. There is an OrangeTheory close by and I think I will sign up for that. They have classes at 5 am and in the evenings. I think I can make this work. It's a little expensive, but I think I'll try it for September and see how it goes. I'm also going to kick up the walking as soon as the weather starts to cool. I need to move more. No excuses. Time to get off my ass.

Last week I kind of threw the shifts to the wind and decided to just eat. Things have been going well and I'm actually feeling pretty damn good. I think if you eat a certain way for a long period of time your body gets used to it and adjusts. After 2 years it may be time to switch it up. Plus, honestly, I'm tired of worrying about what shift it is and what I can and cannot eat. I need a break, at least for a while.

I am over it.....

It's like I turned 60 and all kinds of weird shit starting happening. Well, I'm done with it.

I've been getting these weird stomach pain. It feels like my entire bowel system is inflamed and it's even sore to the touch like I press on my abdomen and get pain. It's horrible. It flared up a couple of weeks ago and I posted about it. Well, that was not the first time. It was probably the 3rd or 4th time. Then Sunday or Monday night it woke me again. Around 3 am I woke and felt the pain starting. I was laying on my right side and remembered some silly Facebook meme about sleeping on your side and your stomach opens when you do...I really don't remember it well, but I thought, hmmmm.....let me switch sides. So I rolled over to my left side and the pain passed. My stomach was a little funky all day but I was able to function. So, in my stupidity, I thought boom, figured it out. Then on Thursday, I woke with excruciating pain in my right knee. Like I could hardly walk pain. I wore my step counter that day and I got less than 2,000 steps all day. It was that bad. But I discovered that the pool helped. I could move it and walk and do some simple PT on it in the pool. It gradually got better. By yesterday, Saturday, I was pain-free again.  Which leads me to yesterday. We went over to a friend's and hung out at the pool all day. I didn't eat anything in the morning. By 1ish I was starving so had a slice of peanut butter bread. Went to the friend's house and had 2 beers, hamburger patty, chicken, coleslaw, hummus, pretzels, veggies, and that's about it. Well, about 2 hours ago I woke up with the pain starting in my stomach again. Only this time I was already lying on my left side. So I took my pillows, stacked them up, and then laid on my back with my upper body elevated. That worked. But still, the tummy is feeling a little funky.

This has to stop. I cannot live like this. Once school starts, I can't be waking up at 2 am and be half awake all night then go teach all day. No. NO. NO.  So I things have to change. Starting right here, right now. First off is walking. I'm going back to getting my 10,000 steps a day in - NO MATTER WHAT!!!  I start class again tomorrow and I have that wired. I walk from the park and ride to school. I walk at lunch and then I walk back to the car after school. That easily gives me 10,000. The week between my class and school starting is going to be slightly harder. I will need to get up early to go walking before everyone else gets up.  Then I'm going to need to focus on moving during the day. I just have to. I also need to add some kind of workout in. I think I'm going to get Beach Body on Demand and do some workouts in the living room when I get home. I need to move more. Then the food. Let's talk about the food. I'm going to keep a food journal for a little bit to see if I can isolate what is making this happen. I thought it was bread, but I had an episode when I didn't have any bread. I'm wondering if it's alcohol.  So I'm going to get back on the eating track and also keep a food journal for a while to see if I can nail it down. This has to stop and it has to stop today.

Getting serious

After last weekend's post, nothing changed. Monday was the same, no exercise and lots of crap eating. Tuesday I woke at 3 am in pain. My stomach hurt - really, really bad. I could hardly move. I was in agony. I didn't go to class because I couldn't walk let alone ride my bike. I woke at 3 am with the pain and it took all day to pass. It wasn't until 11:30am that I could get off the couch and move without dying.  As the afternoon progressed I got better slowly. I did go out to dinner that night because Chris was here and he was leaving the next day. So we met Janna and Mike at Native's for dinner. I did not drink and I ate pretty conservatively.  The next day I went to class with the intention of trying to get my stomach back in order. Luckily the snacks that day were healthy. I ended up eating a lot of sugar snap peas and not much else. For lunch, I went to Qboda which is basically Chipotle. Felt pretty good but still not completely normal. On Thursday I woke up and kind of felt like crap again. I decided that I needed to shake things up. I needed to get back on track in a big way. I decided to fast. It was day 2 of 3 shift so I decided fasting would be a good idea. I drove to where I park and then walked instead of riding my bike. It's not far, about 10 minutes. Wonderful. I was determined not to eat anything but the girl who brought the snacks brought donut holes and mini cupcakes. Ugh!!! I could only resist for so long, then I caved big time. But I was determined that the day would not be lost completely. At lunch, I headed out on a walk and walked around campus for about 30 minutes. Then I stopped at Starbucks and got a cold brew and a protein lunch. The rest of the day was good. We had decided to go out for dinner for our anniversary, 30 years - wow!!!  So we went to Mingo's. I had jambalaya and frozen drink with mango and rum and it was awesome. But I woke up on Friday feeling really, really crappy. My stomach felt huge like it would get in my way when I sat down huge. I had little energy and really didn't want to do much of anything. I don't like feeling like that. I want to feel good. I want to have energy. I want to feel like I did last year. So I said, fuck it!!!! Time for things to change. First thing was I meditated. I have let that fall by the wayside and I am feeling the effects of that. So meditation it was. Then I went for a walk. My thoughts were that I would walk until I felt better. I did 2 laps around the neighborhood and by the end of the 2nd lap felt my old self returning. I had a spring in my step and I found myself smiling for no apparent reason. Yes!!!  Then we ran a bunch of errands. Came home and finished up my homework for my class. Did a little packing. Then it was off to jumping class with Maverick. I ended that day with over 18,000 steps and felt amazing. I was tired, but it was a good tired. Yesterday came and I started it with meditation. Then it was off on my walk for 30 minutes. Then it was packing, packing, packing. Then RunBuddy. And finally off to a friend's for pool, relaxation, and dinner. I was so good. Once I start to feel better, I'm not even tempted by junk food. She had made lasagna for dinner but I didn't eat it because of the pasta. Same with the homemade garlic bread.  I did not eat anything outside of shift yesterday, though there was plenty around, and I did not drink. Again, by the end of the day, I was tired but it was a good tired. I noticed that my stomach did not feel so huge yesterday. I felt like I could actually suck it in, not much, but I could. Today I woke up and the first thing was meditation. Then I was off on my walk. As I was walking I noticed how I felt. I felt good. My stomach is not sticking out past my boobs like it was on Wednesday. I still have some slight residual pain from the episode on Tuesday, but that is slowly passing. My back hurt halfway through the walk but considering that I haven't been walking and my stomach has been so huge, it's no wonder. Time to work on mobility at night. I needed to stop and write this because it feels good to feel good again. This is how I want to feel. I honestly don't care about what the scale says. I don't. I just want to feel good in my own skin. I want to be able to sit down and not think how my stomach is sticking out. But by the same token, I don't care what size my waist is. I'm in this to feel good and that's what I'm after. I'm done chasing a size or a number or any other weird social measurement. I just want to feel good.

No exercise in sight

I do not know the last time I worked out. Actually, I think I do. I did some running here and there a couple of times. But the last time I worked out seriously was in January at Laveen Crossfit. And the fact of the matter is I feel like crap. I need to change things. I have a ton of excuses for why I'm not exercising; taking classes, hot outside, too hungry, too tired, too focused, whatever, it's all bullshit.

So what to do about it?  At the moment I am taking a class from 8 - 4:30, Mon-Thurs. Well, last week I rode the bus so I had to be up by 4:30 to walk the dogs, shower, and get out of the house by 6:30 to catch a bus. Then I wouldn't get home until 6 pm. This week I will have the car so I probably won't have to leave until closer to 7 and I should be home by 5:30ish.

You know what, regardless of the freaking time constraints, I need to exercise. I need to do something. Last week I rode my bike from the bus and I'm going to ride my bike again this week but that is not enough. I need to work out. I can't make excuses anymore. It's time to just suck it up and start doing it again. Time to remove the emotion from it and just get it done. Time to use my mindfulness to get it done.

Summer lethargy

I've fallen into the summer slump and I need to get out of it. I have a summer pattern that goes back to old ways of thinking. Let me see if I can ferret out where this all started because I didn't use to be like this. So my views now are constantly that I need to rest and relax. If I have downtime I will do absolutely nothing. There were times in my life when I was very, very busy. I was going to college, I worked, after that I worked a full-time job 5 days a week, then I taught 5 days a week and summer time. Somewhere in there, I got the mindset that I was super busy and needed to rest whenever I could. Now that in and of itself is okay except that that belief hung on long after I was no longer so busy. Fast forward to today. I'm sitting at a desk that is an absolute mess, I have 2 classes that need to be finished up as quickly as possible, I have things I 'want' to do, and yet I've sat for the last week on my ass not doing a thing. I've played a stupid game and scrolled thru Facebook far, far too many times. All because I have this idea stuck in my head that I need to rest and relax. I don't need to rest and relax. I need to recharge my batteries and I can do that by doing things that I enjoy. I like walking in the mornings. I like working with Mavy. I like doing my craft projects. I like taking photos. I like being active mentally and physically. So I need to change my thinking. I need to set up my day so that I can actually do things and not sit on my butt. So, starting today (as soon as I'm done here) no turning on the computer in the morning. Unless I'm going to work on my classes, otherwise it stays off. Walk as soon as possible in the morning. I need to get moving before the heat so I will get up early and walk with Mavy. Work on things that bring me joy. Reading. Crafting. Photography. Whatever. Make time for my classes to get those done. Clean up after me. Seriously, this desk is a complete disaster. And no more thinking that I have to rest. I've done enough resting. I'm tired of resting. Time to do things.

Summer has begun

May 16th was the last day of school. I have been on serious break since then. Serious. The first weekend I didn't do much of anything. Watched some TV and that was about it. This week has been slightly better, but not a whole lot. I've started a couple of things but not followed through, just haven't been motivated to push myself. I've been walking a bit. Not as much as I'd hoped to, but some. I have not worked out much at all. But I was also allowing myself time to kind of decompress from the school year. But things have to change. Not only did I get a scholarship to take a class this summer, actually 2 classes, but I also have things that really, really, really need my attention. So, rest is over, it's time to kick it into gear.

I'm going to set a kind of schedule for myself. Walking in the mornings before it gets hot, then working out in the afternoons before dinner time. Nothing I do is so strenuous that I can't do it in my bathing suit, especially since my bathing suit is a sports bra top. So walking and workouts will happen every single day. Meditation will also happen. I've been slacking on that, need to get it back into the rotation. Need to set a schedule so these things happen on the regular. Something like this:

• get up/coffee/meditate
• walk
• shower
• walk dogs
• breakfast
• work, work, work
• lunch/pool/read
• work, work, work
• workout
• work Mavy
• dinner/pool/relax
• bed

Something along those lines. There will be days where we need to run errands and I will fit that in either in the morning or afternoon. There will also be days where I will consume alcohol and that pretty much eliminates productivity for the rest of the day. I'm okay with that, but no more than 2 times per week but preferably only once. That's pretty reasonable. If I get up at 4:30 I have lots and lots of time to do everything. 

So there is my summer plan. I need to have a schedule and a focus or else absolutely nothing will get done. So this is good.