12. So let the people talk, it's a Monday morning walk...

Okay, so technically it's Tuesday, but it feels like Monday for me what with the kids not being around yesterday, and me starting my new goals today. So far, so good though - as per Megan's suggestion, I've started a blog just for it here. It's boring, I warn you - literally just a list of stuff for me to keep in mind and have for future reference.

It went well though! I love how me writing down what I eat, makes me not eat as horribly. Which is exactly what it's supposed to do, but yeah just thinking about "ew, I don't want to record that I ate that later" makes me think more about what I'm putting in my body. I successfully didn't grab anything on the way home from work and mid-drive, I realised I actually wasn't that tired... with Mom's plotting for us to exercise together and my new goals in mind, I literally paused at a stop sign, took into account that I was actually already wearing my tennis shoes and if I took off my suit jacket I would in fact be in a comfortable tank top and khakis.... I made a left turn to the gym. I even had an empty bottle in my car to fill when I got there. So I spent twenty minutes on the elliptical - sure - not a half hour. But just the fact that I went makes me happy and I realised I shouldn't push it since I think I forgot to stretch much and it's been a month since I last worked out hard. BUT I WENT. And now I'm fucking starving, but mom called and she should be home soon with pizza nom nom nom.

I almost had my afternoon productivity foiled by a lack of laundry detergent - have only enough for the load I put in! Noooooes. Maybe Mom has more hiding somewhere... and since my dad has put in the new TV mount I couldn't find the receiver for the speakers to plug in my iPod and rock out while doing things like I usually like to do at the time since no one's home.

On the upside, the laundry is being done, I haven't failed my goals on day one, and while there's Kara tonight - I don't have to feel bad. I exercised, did laundry, recorded my food, blogged, and it's cold enough out that I can wear the gorgeous scarf my brother got me in France. Ta da!

11. New goals...

So, I got into a bit of an argument with the parentals tonight. I don't know why I get so upset when discussing anything even remotely sensitive with my father, but I do. It might have been the way he started the conversation very negatively - it felt like he was trying to intimidate me out of considering moving out to an apartment. Now that I've calmed down, I know he just wants me to budget it all out before I keep wistfully dreaming of another place to live in the spring. It makes sense, I'm just so sensitive when it comes to my dad being critical of anything - even if he is right.

Ranted to Ryan a little bit about it, and in doing so kind of decided the only way to solve this is to figure it out, and figure it out well. He suggested I track my spending, which is pretty much an awesome idea. I think I can do that. And then when I started thinking about that, I thought about all these other things I should be doing. Yes, I've been using WoW as my social outlet, but maybe I should really think about it as such, and not be on from the time I get home from work to the time I go to bed. Every time I rehash that I actually do that, I cringe.

My dad and I got into another... not so much fight, but "discussion" before I came up to bed. He's frustrated, and frankly, so am I. I can't let my dad dictate what I do though, whether it's listening to him or going out of my way not to. If he's right, he's right, damn him for being so and for bringing it up the way he does, but that doesn't make him wrong.

He told me - now is THE time to work on myself. I'm working, and can live at home so I don't have to work so much that its all I do. I won't be going back to school until at least next fall... when else am I going to be able to have such freedom to really work on myself? Of course, this is all stuff I thought of last spring as well, but this time around, some things are different: a) I have a job that keeps me getting up in the morning and feeling productive every day, b) My college friends are all out having their own lives and doing their individual things, so there's no wallowing in self-pity about all the friend-gatherings I'm missing out on and c) I *do* have some long term goals in mind now that are realistic, and palpable, and give me a direction for my life to eventually follow rather than looking ahead and just seeing a huge cloud of black and scary UNCERTAINTY in the distance. And I thought about more - can I really do it this time? Can I try and start something and stick to it?

You know, I thought this NaNoBloPo would be fun, and yeah, a bit theraputic... but I'm on week 2 and honestly, really sticking to it has given me even more drive to do so, which means I stick to it more... and I feel like I could do that with something else too. Like recording my spending. Working out an hour every day. Recording my eating habits. 3 things. Kate made a whole list of NaNo's she's doing, one to smell pretty every day, one to grade some papers every day... you know, that's probably a lot better for her than just blogging.

I think, why I keep avoiding doing that other stuff is because it's not stuff I can say I'll do for fun for a month and then whatever, they're steps to change my life. And while those changes would be good, the idea of failing at them terrifies me. So I don't try. Which is the exact fucking reason I dropped out of school. If I don't try, I can always say "well, once I work out every day, I'll be fine" or "once I sit down and figure out my money, it'll be easy". But then I never do so that I can always pretend that it'll be fine when (another Kate-ism) Future!Meg gets all that stuff done. It's paralyzing, and it's hard to shake. Really hard. I've been trying for the last few years. I don't know, maybe I need some extra help to do it. Maybe I just haven't been trying in the right way. Or you know? Maybe I just simply haven't tried hard enough.

Fact of the matter is though - I did it in January. And I'm doing it now with this blog. I can do it with other things. And you know, maybe if I think of it like a monthly challenge at first just to start, keeping it up won't nearly seem that hard. I already feel like that about the blog. Now that I've started, I enjoy it. People are actually reading it (hello stalkers!) and I like looking back and seeing every day have a post. It makes me feel awesome. Which I thought it might which is why I went ahead to do it. So. Time to add a couple more challenges, starting slowly, because as Green Mountain did teach me - you will burn out if you try and change your entire life around at once.

1.) Blog every day.
2.) Go to the gym, take a walk, or lift weights, a half hour every weekday.
3.) Eat lunch at home 5/7 times a week.
4.) Track spending every day.
5.) Track food every day.

We'll start with that. And we'll see where it goes. And wow, this blog wasn't supposed to get so personal, so fast.