WELLNESS in 2019

WINDOW to WELLNESS 2019…..

Fitness is my passion.  I love working my body to it’s extreme, it’s limit, over the line, pushing, failing, trying again, being out in the world, on the race course with others, realizing that I wasn’t the only one pushing and working all those months!

But….

I’ve learned… (am still continuing to learn) (which is the point)…. About fitting this fitness thing into overall WELLNESS.

What is wellness, anyway?  Sure, it includes fitness and exercise, but it includes so much more.  It includes taking care of our WHOLE SELF.  It includes our nutrition, sleep, our self- care.  It includes down time, social time and a variety of nourishing relationships, time spent on hobbies and passions.  It includes spiritual health, taking care of oneself financially, etc. 

And our wellness is never perfect. We are always basically dividing the pie of our overall circle of life/wheel of wellness into all of these components and we need to regularly come back and see if the amount of the circle that we are spending, energy and time-wise, on the components of our wellness are in line with our values, desires, and what we are comfortable.  There will be times when our exercise component of wellness may not be at its optimal.  There will be times when this is our conscious choice- an awareness that we have gone too far in training, when for our overall wellness, we need to back off.

That was this past four months for me. Instead of making training/ reaching/ pushing my 40% (or more) of my wheel of wellness, I honestly needed to cut it back to the essential.  To maybe 10%... 10% in the form of walking two puppies and nourishing my need of movement with yoga.

I have taken this past month to… ummmm… indulge in my nutrition component of wellness.  Not necessarily eating bad meals, but indulging in TREATS.  And, this is no surprise: it was and usually is my plan starting from November on!!!  I enjoy eating treats, you will find me with bagels during this time!  My weight creeps up, I don’t feel great, but DARN IT GETS ME MOTIVATED come January 1!

And now is the time when I look at my wheel of wellness and am excited to blend back into my physical healthy habits- making nutrition and exercise more of a priority.  Other things will slip.  They will have to.  We pick our priorities, we choose our time commitments. 

What does your wellness look like?  How are you dividing your WHOLE SELF?  What are your priorities, needs, and wants, and are you conscious in your actions in daily life that take your time?  What is missing?  What is snuffing out other things? 

I firmly believe in New Year’s “resolutions/goals” I do not care what you call them.  It is not because we are trying to become PERFECT!  That is many times the argument: that we are not accepting ourselves fully if we are trying to make these changes.  I think that is absurd- we should always be evaluating, aware, living consciously!

I don’t think these goals always need to be done at this time of year- any month/season is a fine time to reevaluate.  I do love the new year though!!

MY PHYSICAL GOALS for 2019

*Begin training again with PURPOSE (which to me makes it fun, inspiring and frankly exhilarating!)

*Eat overall well.  I will still have wine.  I will still have occasional treats.  But they will not be nightly!! Or after every lunch!  (good grief, it is so easy to get into a habit when you eat lunch and then think you need to have like a cookie or something to hit that “spot” that feels like it hasn’t been fulfilled!)

*Sleep/ keep track of my sleep.  I know I will not get “enough”… but it will be a priority.  I will track it and notice patterns and work hard to do my best.  I will allow myself naps when I need to since I wake up so early.  And when I wake up from a nap, I won’t act all pissed off at myself for napping.

*I will do core, yoga and a handstand every day. I will pray that my back allows me to move throughout the year.

*I will keep up a general level of EXCITEMENT FOR LIFE.  Each morning, I will (still have coffee) but I will also have lemon water before 10AM, I will remind myself of at least one AWESOME THING that I “GET TO DO” today!!  I will make sure that some of that is work because I am lucky to do something I love for work!  I will make sure that also at least 5-10 minutes of that will be devoted to “self care”… even if that is while doing something else like walking the dogs (which is also kind of self care for my heart!) Most of all, I will be intentional and intentionally aware of the state of my heart.

*I will remind myself to release what needs to be released.  I am here to LIVE OUT LOUD, and “not one drop of my self-worth depends on anyone’s acceptance of me.”~quincy jones.  With this, I will soften my defenses and remind myself to not spend a single WATT of my energy(!) on negative interactions with others. 

                                                                             

*ME GOALS!  I will:  (see that I am not writing “I will try to”… I WILL!!!!!)

             -play  music as often as possible

             -spend as much time laughing as possible (honestly… laughing just makes me so happy—lately      I’ve been watching the intro to Stephen Colbert for some funny outlet once/day while I’m on treadmill or bike!)

           - once/week: make protein balls, make crockpot meal, have fish

- consolidate to get rid of a small desk that takes up stupid space in kitchen

- Get a wall cut if possible in my bedroom so I can easily get my arm to part of my closet that I honestly just don’t really FIT getting to  my clothes.  So annoying and I am constantly feeling like I’m “too large” to even get into my own closet. Ugh.

- Repaing/stencil front porch this spring and instead of white porch with grey stencil/ switch it to grey porch with white accents.

- Finish seashell projects with  my shells from Sannibel a few years ago.

- Plan summer better.  Instead of waiting to see where planned downtime fits in, block off a week or plan something so our vacation isn’t just a one night beach trip again.

- Financially:  make an appointment before May with financial advisor.

- January:  30 days of getting rid of at least one thing per day!

- Continue reading/ visit library more though!

WORK WISE:

I am going to write more.  I’m going to blog more, I’m going to stick with writing a once/week “Training talk” newsletter, reach out for opportunities to write about fitness, training, yoga, wellness.

I am excited to get my videos off the ground.  I will continue this monthly, adding videos.

I am looking to NOT ADD any classes to my schedule, but KEEP and really NOURISH the ones I have!

Personal training:  I have room to add a few appointments each week- probably only 4 more per week.  I have loved beginning doing more partner training this past year- what a nourishing part of the week it is for people to combine friend time with a crazy awesome workout!

Triathlon and Run Coaching:  I haven’t been coaching as much this past year. I miss doing more of this and hope to do some outreach to remind people of all levels that I can help them, that training with a plan is so fulfilling- each DAY you get to achieve goals!  I am not strong at marketing myself and putting word out about my training, so I need to do that.  I will.

DOG TRAINING, podcasts, GARDEN GOALS, CROCHETING PLANS, spiritual plans AND MORE… I do not need to bore you further…

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!