Check In

If I choose to actually follow through will all of this my eventual goal is to establish a schedule for writing, right now it's sporadic and unfocused.

This week my skin has felt wrong.  Everything is off.  My skin is not my skin.  It's been replaced by an out of focus picture transferred on to cheap fabric and then wrapped around my bones.  I don't like it.  It's making me question every little tiny talking point that flitters through my brain.

So what do I do.  Do I succumb to the melancholy, as I have many times before?  Or do I fight it?  Is fighting the only other option left to me?  I want to believe that this is a chance for deep thoughts and potential change but I also know that I have a propensity to wallow.  Some wallowing can be a good thing, giving you a chance to confront why you feel poorly, but this is only useful if change comes of it.  Tonight I have some an event to go to but I also need to clean and I would like to watch the Season 2 finale of Lost Girl.  Once I've accomplished those things I want to finally work on that action plan I've been talking about and post it.

But for now:

I feel...
fat
tired
like I'm leaking
brittle
loved
unloved
like I'm walking down the wrong path potentially
sad
bloated
full of lies
lucky to have so many friends
overscheduled
bricked up
over saturated
like I want to run
like my face says things and I want to know what they are
hopeful
funky

I am going to be ok.

The beginnings of a plan

I have a tendency to make grand plans for myself.  Swear that I will make major changes that will make my life so wonderful and amazing.  Maybe it works for a little bit, I'll start a routine or buy some excellent groceries but it seems to fall down in the end.  With 15 items that I want to accomplish in the next 15 months it would be very easy for me to try to do all of it and end up doing some of it kind of/none of it really.

What I'm hoping will change things this time around is some more careful planning, rolling out changes rather than trying to accomplish everything at once.  Rough out a plan and start putting it together piece by piece.

I want to start with item #2: lose 100 pounds, a crazy ambitious thought.  Losing weight in a healthy fashion is two pronged, exercise and eating.  For the next two weeks I want to focus on the latter.  I'm going to work on menu planning so that it is easier for me to make good choices in the moment.

Step One: Create a menu planning board.  I have these wicked awesome boxes and a bunch of wine corks that I want to turn into message boards to hang in my kitchen.  One of them will be for a menu plan and the other will be for often used recipes.  So I'm going to put the boards together first.  This will also be my first art project, so double awesome.

Step Two: Using recipes I've collected and menu planning tips from the internet I want to create a one week menu plan and see if I can stick to it.  I want to make sure there is some wiggle room that I don't feel constrained.  This will also help me not waste groceries (something I'm guilty of far too often), which will help me save money (indirectly working on #10 - boom!).

Step Three: Refine plan after seeing how it goes.  It would also be great to find a way to make it flexible so I'm not eating the same thing every week.

Lets see how it goes.

Obstacles

I feel like every time I want to start something that life throws something in the way.  The current impediment in my actually starting on my list is a wicked upper respiratory infection that has taken up temporary residence in my sinuses.  Not only am I full of snot and loving to cough I am ridiculously weak and tired.  Yay for starting to work on any of my list but numbers one and two become particularly difficult.  I ended up in urgent care because of the grossness, my first time in a doctor's office in over a year, and had to be weighed.  I definitely need to work on #2.  I have cancelled all of my plans but one meeting tomorrow so my goal is to start working on all of these in some way.  This week I've watched an extreme number of movies and episodes of smuttish Canadian television.  As much as I never want it to end I also know that time doesn't stop, everyday I'm stuck on the couch is a day I'm not working on the list. 

Since I obviously didn't plot before the end of April the new plan is to have a rough idea how to accomplish each idea on the list.

Step 2

April 24th (actually written)

I've made the list, numbered it for clarity and swiftly realized that it's not enough.  The list is really just a bunch of things I should have done long ago and really want to do but have decided for some reason not to.  Those reasons would include fear, laziness, emotional baggage and some coping skills that are not actually that healthy.   My goal before the end of April is to start plotting how to realistically accomplish all of these before August 10, 2014.

Beginning

I turn 30 in a little over 15 months.  There are some things that I would like to do before then.  I've made a list.  I hope to accomplish everything.  This blog exists to facilitate that process.  We shall see what happens.

April 22nd (originally finalized)

1. Develop self care routine

2. Big physical goal: Lose 100 pounds
3. Create 1 piece of art a month (15 total)
4. Secret Important thing
5. Be able to do 100 push ups
6. Travel to Spain or Ireland or Scotland
7. Take an accounting class
8. Send in a secret to Postsecret
9. Get to know Forest Park
10. Improve Credit Score/Manage debt/Learn to budget
11. Decorate inside of fridge
12. Take a martial arts class
13. Learn to tap dance
14.  Build recipe database
15. Big writing goal: Finish 3 small pieces or 1 large piece