The Next 24

It was a beautiful morning for a walk around the neighborhood today.  As I walked, I was flooded with memories of my childhood growing up here.  It's funny how  the "family name" stays the same in my mind, despite how many owners have come and gone since I lived here as a child.  Once the "______ " family's house, always their house I guess, at least in reference.

Anyway, taking a walk, along with providing the opportunity to reminisce, also gave me the chance to think, uninterrupted by anything.  My thoughts wandered to a lot of places but ended with reason I went for a walk to begin with...self care. This is an area in which I have struggled all of my adult life and has been making more regular appearances in my thought pattern than ever before.  I don't know if it is turning forty, wanting to feel better, wanting to look better, being generally scared of dying without really fulfilling my purpose here on earth or combination of all of the above.

Today, I was thinking about why this is so hard for me...and what mental blocks I have in place that are most of the time preventing me from reaching my full potential.  I came to the realization that I am putting too much pressure on myself, and in turn becoming overwhelmed and not following through with anything. I have higher expectations of myself than are realistic at least for me.  I know myself and the fact is that though I work well under pressure when someone else is expecting something of or from me, when it comes to my own expectations of myself, I need to, well, calm down.   I am not going to  quit sugar, exercise daily, drink my required water, eat healthy,  strength train etc. etc. etc.... at least not all at once.  Some people can do this...I am not one of them.

How do I function best?  When I take one thing on at a time, give it my full attention, master it, and take on something else.  For the past few years, I have been trying to live in the now...not spending too much time in the future or the past; concentrating on what I can do with the 24 hours in front of me.  For some reason I have not really applied this to self care.  I am always thinking I need to do one million things at once and this is just not true.  If I take one step at a time, slowly picking things up along the way, I will be in a much better frame of mind to succeed, instead of constantly feeling like a failure when I do or don't do something that gets in the way of me being healthy.

So...that is what I am going to do...take on this task one day at a time...documenting my successes and failures along  the way.

Today's steps: I took a mile and half walk around my neighborhood.  I chose walnuts for a snack.  I drank a protein shake for breakfast.  I wrote this blog entry.  Hey...being open and honest about my thoughts in a public forum definitely counts in my book.