Commit To A Healthy Life

      It’s a new year. What will you do with it? Resolutions come and go. The way you choose to live shouldn’t. Don’t throw in the towel, grab one and break a sweat. Lets do it together! Those words were on the cover of an invitation from Lifetime Fitness inviting us to their facility. I thought it was a great choice of words urging people to commit to a better life!

     I already wrote about what I planned to do with my year, and how I felt about resolutions. The catch for me in the words above, is that the way I choose to live shouldn’t come and go. I have always been a yoyo dieter. My joke is I haven’t even been able to yo, however for 15 years! The numbers have been gradually creeping up and up.

     Take it from me, losing weight isn’t hard. What’s hard, is getting your mind in the right place to stay disciplined. Exercise is a huge part losing weight and being healthy. I’d do well for awhile and then fall off the mark.

     I absolutely hate the TV show The Biggest Loser! I cannot believe someone doesn’t die and I can’t imagine the injuries that must happen when people that large are driven to exercise like that. In my opinion, it sets the bar way to high for the overweight people watching it. To me, it sends a message that they are going to have to practically kill themselves to lose weight. Excessive exercise is not likely to happen for most of us, because by the time you allow that many pounds to add up most of us are limping and ill. I heard a good analogy once that compared a wagon carrying a light load to a wagon carrying a heavy load. Naturally the heavy wagon’s wheels are going to give out first! Interesting, but didn’t spur me on to any success. I hope it works for you.

    You don’t have to kill yourself practically to lose weight just concentrate on getting healthier and I really think it will just happen. Maybe I’m delusional, I’m not sure. Its about feeling better, doing some things like horse back riding I haven’t done for years and just being who I am and living my days instead of acting like they are unending and just wasting my time here.

     I am eleven days into my campaign to sparkle. I have lost five pounds in eleven days, far from the biggest losers success if your measuring by pounds but I don’t care. I have my walking up to 20 min. and I started at ten. I haven’t been sore or stiff, and my back is holding up well. I have never been thin and don’t plan to be, it is not about looks for me.

    I’m writing blogs because I love to write, and I want to help someone else. I’m not going to write all year on weight. Life is way bigger than that! I have lots of ideas, but this one is in my face at the moment. Or should I say in my back?

So tomorrow, God willing, I will grab a towel, break a sweat and enjoy my day. I’m staying strong in my commitment to live better.  

Ps…Scotty is doing ok. He has surgery today to put the port in his chest for chemo.

Looks A Lot Like Jenga

     Have you ever played Jenga? I haven’t actually played it because…. ok this may sound strange, but I don’t like games where there’s potential for aggravating noise. Kathy and Mom used to play Yahtzee and I never joined in. Listening to five dice hit the table three times for each play was not my idea of fun, let alone some people shake it five minutes before dumping them out! Today, I decided working on myself and finding the real me after all these years is a lot like a game of Jenga.

     My initial fired up feeling over adding some sparkle to my life, ebbed a little today. I’ve not had a Coke in three days and I’ve exercised every day. So, besides admitting that I need a higher power to keep me from my Coke addiction, the exercise part confirmed that I’m the laziest person on the planet! When it comes to physical exercise, I’m a wuss!

     I have back problems, but I’ve complained about that so much I can’t stand to listen to myself even, so I’m going to skip whining about that. My heels however, I am going to whine about! I have not had tennis shoes on them in a couple years. I’m the croc queen and before you start gasping some of them are really cute! They have attractive flats that no one even knows are crocs, and for my back problems they are the bomb! But my heels have gotten to be so tender I can’t wear real shoes.

    Yesterday, I walked around the neighborhood. Today though, I got Sydney to help me pull my treadmill out of the corner and after only a couple gouges in the wall, we got it laid down and positioned. I purposely waited until Sydney went to Zumba before I started my exercise “routine” (eleven minutes, hush now) so she couldn’t say anything about how long I stayed on there. If it was up to her, she’d train me like Jillian Michaels on the biggest loser! Refer to paragraph one…I’m a wuss remember? Nobody’s screaming in my face to push harder! This is a sparkle campaign not torture!

    After grunting and struggling and that was just getting my shoes on, I was thinking, these don’t feel to bad! I got on the treadmill and hunted around for where the key goes in. That’s telling how long since I’ve used it and there was a time I never missed a day walking 4 miles on it. I’d go home from a holiday and walk. After I got the key in, I dusted off the dashboard and thought to myself this thing is as dusty as I feel right now!
     So I started on my walk thinking….“ my shoes don’t feel to bad, YET!” So, I walked eleven minutes which is nothing I know but I do not want to hurt my back so I decided I’m going to add a minute a day for the first couple weeks. I’m going over to Marcy’s tomorrow to help with the kids, and I want to walk thru the door without a cane when she meets me with her neck brace.

    On the bright side, which is the only side that matters, I ate healthy all day, got my pantry cleaned out, signed up for three more drug classes {not for myself, for my education ha), and a jewelry class. Brendon called me to have dinner with him Friday. That invitation made my day, I really love to hang out with the kids.

    Back to Jenga, you build your way to the top a little at a time. Sometimes your only move looks shaky and the top seems a long way away. Other people might think you’re making a wrong move, but it works for you and the tower still stands! Even in the worse case scenario, it makes an annoying racket and tumbles down. If that happens players just start over and build it back up! The game goes on, the game can always go on.