Motivational Wednesday

Because my last post was so gross and full of complaints, I feel complied to equal out my complaining with being positive. Hopefully I can motivate some friends and family in the process of explaining how I motivate myself. First and foremost I like to start off by saying I truly believe that you are in charge of your own happiness. You can wake up in the morning and have slept poorly, missed your cup of coffee, and decide the day is going to be crap. Or you can decide to treat yourself to an extra special lunch and keep a smile on your face. Each day is how you make it and if you decide to be a spoil sport about life, well your day is bound to suck. I'm not saying this is an easy task. Clearly when you are in a bad mood it's not easy just "getting over it". And when someone tells you to "get over it" it usually ends up making you more crabby. The challenge is to try. It's like a habit, the more you try the more positive you become on a daily basis. So next time you are having a bad day I challenge you to take a step back and focus on your attitude. Can you change it for the better? The next thing I like to try to do is say a prayer. I like to take a moment and humble myself and chat with God about what's going on. Ask for His help in my attitude change, and most importantly, thank Him for my blessings. Because as always, things could be worse. Usually my little frustrations are something others wish could be their own frustrations instead of what they are dealing with. Example; I was sitting in the doctor's office with B to figure out why he had been throwing up on and off for two weeks straight. I hate having to take him to the doctors, and I hated that he was sick. It hadn't been the best day and I was a bit sour about it. Then walked in someone I graduated high school with. Mind you, I graduated in 2007, not even 10 years ago. In that short amount of time this young person had been married, had children, had step children, and lost their significant other very suddenly to a disease that came so quick. They had no warning, the person got sick and died in a very short amount of time. This person is my age and now they are trying to raise multiple children and mourn the loss of their love? What a way to put your life into perspective. Here I am with my precious B who is not deathly ill, and I am texting my husband about waiting so long in the waiting room. What a life I have! It's a beautiful one and I NEVER want to take it for granted! Humble yourself and pray. Sometimes that simple act can change your day. As much as I can have bad days and bad moods; working out and eating healthier have changed my life. I am trying to force myself into this lifestyle change. I am working on making exercise a routine and stop the buying of junk food. It's not easy at all, but what little I have already incorporated into my life makes me feel significantly better on a daily basis. I feel better about myself and my self esteem. Even if I only do about 10 minutes of floor work in a day, that's better than doing nothing. And that's the attitude I try to keep. Something is better than nothing at all. Even if it is only taking a small walk outside, at least you got off of your couch! One step at a time, baby steps DO count and they SHOULD make you feel better about yourself! Missing a day of working out is not the end of the world, just add another 5 minutes the next day. And like I said, at least you're doing something! What have you done for yourself today? Always take a few minutes of the day for yourself. Sometimes this is near impossible, especially as a parent. Sometimes you have to sacrifice sleep in order to have these few minutes. That's okay. Sometimes my few minutes is me hiding in the bathroom after K comes home and simply getting on my phone to play a game for a few minutes. With the bathroom fan on, I cannot hear the commotion going on outside of the door and I can find my center. These are just some of the things that I do to help myself out of my funks. Sometimes it takes more, sometimes I need to hide away in the basement after dinner and watch television or read a trashy book. And sometimes I just need to take a step back and force myself to "get over it". This morning I forced myself to get things done, I slowly hacked away at my to do list and the more I did the more motivation I had to KEEP at it. Soon, my to do list was complete and I feel amazing about myself. All because I kicked myself in the butt and forced the work out. I hope this helps some of you to get motivated and feel better about yourself. You are in charge of your own happiness! You can do it!

Getting My Life Together

At the end of 2013, I decided I really need to get my body healthier and happier. Tina and I always joked that those people who ran every day "had their life together", and if we could ever get to that point we would too.

So we made the decision to start running January 2014. And if we couldn't run, then we would work out in some other way. And our end goal would be running in a 5K color run in September. 

I mostly decided to do this with one goal in mind. And this goal is going to cause me to get yelled at by my mother who will most likely read this. To fit in the skinny jeans I got for Christmas. First off, I can actually button the jeans which is great! However, the muffin top created by said jeans is ultimately hideous. So that was kind of the straw that broke the camels back.

I decided to not weigh myself as I do this because my ultimate goal is a "lifestyle change" not a weight. I want B to grow up eating healthy and being active and I want to be a good example of that. And I want to be healthy and happy with myself too! 

Already I've seen great results. At first I would run out of breath before my body got physically tired of running. Now, my legs start to get weak before I run out of breath! Do you know what a great feeling that is? I can run up my stairs without sounding like a wheezing machine now. I haven't necessarily lost that muffin top yet, I know I need to make more drastic changes in my diet, but I'm a fat girl and it's not that easy. I'm still getting fit and stronger and that's already steps towards my goals.

Winter is proving to also stand in the way. Every week since 2014 began someone in our house has been sick. And the cold air makes my chest burn terrible! I think when spring hits I'll be outside a lot more and can even make a family event out of it. K and B can play in the park while I run the trail, and Allie LOVES running with me. She's a great running dog and good at keeping pace. 

Anyway, I've slowly began to cut junk food out and buy healthier choices in food. Slowly but surely I am getting my life together and I feel great about it! Running is a lot of fun, especially with angry rock music; I run out a lot of aggression that way and it helps my mental stability a lot more. 

And that's my resolution for 2014 and I've done a pretty decent job sticking to it!