Day 51 Question 51:

Have you set goals for yourself?  What are some of your goals?

I know I have gone on rants in past blog entries about focusing on the now and being in the moment.  I believe that majority of time I do follow this (sometimes I let my mind get the best of me and I will think about 5 bazillion things I need to get done) but this does not mean I do not set goals for myself.  I set goals for myself to challenge myself and to push myself just that much farther.  I am the type of person that will almost always reach a goal if I go into it with full force.  I reflect a lot on my life and how far I have come and in a strange way it feels like at the age of 33 my life is really beginning.  I am getting a true grasp on happiness and my search for knowledge keeps increasing every day.  I am conquering my fears and saying to hell with letting them control me anymore.  Year 33 seems to be the year of self improvement in as many ways as possible.  I believe I have improved myself a good deal for the last few years but I am now officially taking the bull by the horns.  I am taking my life back.  I am in control of my choices, my physical self and my emotions (as wacky as they may be some days).

So the answer to my question would be absolutely, 100% yes.  I have a lot of goals in mind.  I do not want to put end dates on all of them.  Sometimes the pressure makes me crack.  I set goals and work through them in small pieces.  I find that when you set a goal and you go into it with full force trying to reach it too quickly that you usually just end up falling on your face.  I like to set a general timeline of when I would like to reach my goals and the closer I am to achieving the goal I will get more specific with dates.

I have found in the past that I was able to set goals, be excited about them for a minute then I would just move on to something else.  I realized that I did this because I was never giving myself a reward for achieving what I originally set out to do.  I do not mean a financial reward or a materialistic reward (although sometimes I do like to treat myself).  I will look at a situation and set a goal based on the situation at hand.  I will put myself out there in order to force myself to not fail (and if I do-because failure is inevitable from time to time-I will brush myself off and move forward as opposed to linger on it).  For example, one such goal that I have is to lose the remaining 30-35lbs I have been speaking of for far too many months now.  Since late 2008, I have lost about 60lbs (give or take).  I did this through mainly adding more exercise/movement into my routines.  I did start eating better but I was far from perfect.  I am lucky enough to have 2 jobs that keep me moving pretty regularly.  It hit me yesterday (well it has been sitting on my mind for a bit now) that losing the rest of the weight should not be difficult and the reason it has not happened is because I have not put the true effort in.  I have not told myself enough times that I can and will do it.  I had been making excuses and I started to get slack.  Being a slacker is not me and I know this.

So, let me start here…I am going to share some information that in the past would make me completely cringe.  Even just talking about my weight would make me want to crawl out of my skin.  I avoided the topic completely.  I would NEVER get on the scale.  I feared going to the doctor unknowing of what they would tell me.  I loathed my body.  Now don’t get me wrong I am not in love with my body now but I am at a lot more peace with it now and I know what I am capable of.  I also know that my body is not at all who I am.  So anyhow, that was off base. I am a 33 year old female that stands 5’8 (yes I am fairly tall for a girl).  In late 2008 I weighed in at 248 lbs. (seeing this number on the scale made me want to crawl into a hole somewhere and just die).  As of March 7, 2012 I weigh 188lbs.  Sometimes that number freaks me out too but then I remember that I am 5’8 and I also look in the mirror and no longer feel completely hideous.  I wear jeans in a size 16 (loose 16-I actually should be a size 14).  Oh boy this is not easy for me to even write about but I am determined to go outside of my comfort zone and face this.  I have lost weight in the past and gained it all back and then some.  In the past I never followed a healthy diet or exercise plan.  The first time I dropped a significant amount of weight (75 lbs in 3 months) I was lucky that I did not do great harm to my body.  I was home from college for summer break and with great determination I decided I WAS going to lose weight.  I worked out every single day.  I would walk anywhere between 5-10 miles in the morning then head to the gym for about 2 hours.  At night I would rollerblade about 6 or 7 miles.  To top this off I was eating such a strict diet that I was only allowing myself about 10 grams of fat per day and about 1,000 calories.  I was so uneducated and so unaware how damaging my actions could be.  I went back to college in the fall and fell back into the routines of drinking beer and eating junk food and before I knew it the weight was back on.

I believe it took me a long time to mature in life and finally see the error of my ways.  I am ok with that though because life flows the way it is meant to.  So one of my big goals is to get the remainder of my weight off by the end of the summer (maybe by August-I want to do it healthy and progressive to make it a lifestyle and keep the weight off).  I have decided to put this in my blog to ask for encouragement and to ask my readers to continuously ask me how it is going and if I am sticking to it. By putting it out there like this I am less likely to fail or sit stagnant because I will be able to prove to myself and to others that I can do it.  I know life is not a contest and about winning but doing this drives me and gives me the motivation I need.

I laugh a lot on the inside because a few people in my life have referred to me as a hippie.  We are no longer in the 60’s and I am not sure exactly what a hippie is but I will take it with no offense at all.  I do not do things to show off or seek attention.  I do things because they seem right for my life and they make sense to me.  I want to live a long time to experience as much as I possibly can and it finally came falling down on me like a pile of bricks that I really need to start taking care of myself…not just physically but also emotionally and mentally.  So when people here that I meditate and that I am planning on doing a 30 day Vegetarian challenge (yes this is another goal and the start date is Monday March 12^th) and I love watching independent films they tend to put me in a class of what they consider weirdos or peace-loving, tree-hugging hippies.  If that is the case then so be it.  What matters to me the most is my happiness and the happiness of others.  I believe in life people need to find their niche and when they find it they should explore it in every way possible.  I am finding my niche and the exploration has made me feel more comfortable than I have in years.  Why would I not embrace this if this is what feels natural to me.  Call it what you want, that is what life is truly about.  I may not do all things up to society’s standards but I set goals that I believe will better myself which I also believe in turn could help better society as a whole.  If I exude happiness and positivity then that could lead to a sense of infectious happiness.  Tell me what harm there is in that?

I will not go on a long rant about my other goals but instead just list them so they are finally put out there (to give me something to reference back to).

Goals:

1)      Lose the remainder of my weight (30-35lbs) and fit into a size 8-10 jeans (give or take depending on the brand and cut)

2)      30 Day Vegetarian Challenge starting March 12, 2012.  If all goes well I may continue and who knows it might be a lifestyle change

3)      Work on my book continually and start looking through the process of what it takes to become published.  Have a book published within the next 5 years

4)      Travel abroad (and hopefully meet a couple of my new blog following friends in other parts of the world).

5)      Make more trips to visit family-The visits between my sister, brother-in-law and nephews have been way to few and far between

6)      Make amends with those that I need to make amends with.  Apologize if needed even if they are unwilling to accept it.

7)      Decrease my Internet/Facebook/Texting time significantly.  This one may sound silly but like many others I have become addicted and I know how unhealthy it is.  It is going to be a HUGE challenge but I (think) I am ready for it.

I have many goals in life both big and small.  I do not want to list them all because that will only make me lose focus.  These goals are the main ones that have taken center stage in my life at this very moment.  I am happy and I know by meeting these goals…or even taking the journey to meeting these goals my happiness will increase by insane amounts every day.

So tell me my fabulous readers, what are some of your goals?