My First 30 Day Challenge

How exciting! I've always wanted to do this as I was also intrigued with the concept after watching a few episodes of Morgan Spurlock's short lived series several years back. But I've always had a problem committing to anything!

I joined a gym and Weight Watchers 3 weeks ago - it was a spontaneous decision and I was "excited" about it, but secretly... I thought I would fail/quit and I was emotionally preparing myself to once again face the music. And then I'd have to give myself another pep talk just so I wouldn't feel bad about myself. But I took it one day at a time - the first 3 days were tough, but when I got to day 4 I started to really feel proud of myself. I was convinced I'd done this amazing thing - the gym!... 4 days...then 5 days... in a row! who does that? Oh, I know... Me!

Fast forward 3 weeks - I've been totally committed to changing the way I treat my body - I go to the gym 5 days a week, I stick to my food plan and I have already felt dramatic physical and emotional changes. Suddenly I feel that anything is possible and I want more! I'm ready for another challenge!

Daisyfae, my dearest and most supportive bloggy buddy, turned me on to this 30 day challenge and I'm so grateful!

I couldn't decide on the type of challenge - intellectual? creative? physical? spiritual?... I sat with it a couple of days, it was a tough call but since I'm finally learning new things about my body I'm going to expand on that discovery...

My plan is to learn how to Bellydance! It looks fun and sexy and really tones and strengthens the body.

I'm not a graceful girl so this could be laughable! On the other hand - I can only improve!

Thanks again for letting me play along!

Challenge II - Sleep

I really like daisyfae's idea of getting enough sleep for a while. I'll need to set my alarm to wake up at 6:00 to get the kids to school starting in about a week. It would be reasonable to be in bed by 10:30, right? And maybe asleep by 11:00? That's still only seven hours of sleep each night, but as a night owl, the idea of going to bed as early as 10:30 is a bit terrifying, so I'll take what I can get.

I can't imagine that this will be a very exciting activity to post about, but I think it will help me A LOT with my general happiness in life, so here I go!

Round 2 — What I'll (not) do

Well, my intention was "I'm going to do one new thing every day for the next 30 days."

Then I started thinking, while it might be an amazing task, I'm not sure how feasible it is, especially since I've already got a lot on my plate. So I'm going with Plan B (and I'll try to incorporate something new into my days, which will help out with said Plan B).

There's an exercise that I've done before from a book called Page by Page by Heather Sellers. In the book, she says if you do it ten days in a row, "your life will change." I've always* wanted to follow through with it. So here's what I'm gonna do for 30 days.

Page by Page, Exercise 13 (page 60)

• Number a page from 1-10
• Set a timer for 3 minutes
• Make a list of ten things you saw two days ago, starting from the morning and ending with the night. Keep your hand moving. If you get stuck, draw slow circles. You want to end up at exactly number ten at the end of three minutes. Don't write a novel at each item, just a few anchoring words to capture the image.
• Three minutes, one list.
• Look over your list. Let one item pick you, or if nothing leaps out, do number three. Number three is magic and it always works.
• Set the timer for ten minutes. 
• Write the item number and the words at the top of a fresh sheet.
• Some rules: You must keep your pencil moving. You must write slowly, all caps, skipping lines. Write in simple clear sentences. Don't try to be too fancy. Avoid adjectives and adverbs. Just write in nouns and verbs, very simply, very slowly. 
• For ten minutes. Write what you see. Write what you hear.

Apparently it's all about creating ritual. And forcing yourself to just write what you remember (and I reckon that after a few days I'll subconsciously be looking for new images/details to try to remember for two days later).   And, as busy as I know I'm going to be, if I can't find make 15 minutes a day to just sit down and do something for myself, then things be needing to change.

I'll type them up and share them, maybe not every day, but there will be thirty lists and thirty sets of observations.

What are you doing?

* Okay, you caught me. "Always" is a bit of an overstatement. I bought the book 4 or 5 years ago, and I've wanted to do it since then.

Wrap-up Round 1 a la Mitzi

The 30 Day Project came just at the right time. I was getting slovenly, and couldn't access the right inner zing to inspire me toward exercise. Un/fortunately, I am obliged to exercise for health reasons. The mental uplift is vital, and the maintenance of steady (decreased) weight is preventative of potential nastiness. Then a score of vanity reasons follow.

Getting out to the sea was an initial form of exercise, as I spent a good deal of brisk walking time exploring the local area. As I have only lived here eight odd months, the walks were exploratory and fun.

Despite the zensome joy of strolling by the sea and my initial stoicism, bad weather forced me indoors and back on the treadmill. The mental leap I made between about day 10 and now is exciting. It used to be gruelling to make it to 30 minutes. Now, it is distance rather than time thatI look forward to achieving. I also have proof that steady jogging of about 4 k's on a regular basis has shifted my shape around a bit. I became reacquainted with my waist which is once again the slightly narrower bit in the middle.

Now that the exercise hit from 30 Days round 1 has kickstarted my health and fitness needs, I may return to a mental challenge. One ten year goal I set earlier this year was to be able to do cryptic crosswords. The more I try, I find I've been able to make more sense of them. However, I don't want an unrealistic challenge. To complete an entire cryptic crossword is still impossible for me, but I can work out two or three clues. Therefore, one possibility for 30 Day Challenge Round 2 is to complete 3 cryptic crossword clues per day. As Monday 15th arrives slightly earlier for me than Northern Hemisphereans, I shall have to decide overnight!

My other desired challenges are: yogic stretching; a daily swim; contimued jogging; resume my learning of Gaelic; and a million other things.

Meanwhile, I will try to blog about a daily jog on my regular blog so that I maintain momentum. I also suggest that the highlight of my 30 Day Challenge round 1 was doing The Bay Run of 7 kilometres with relative ease. It showed how it only took about 15-20 ish days to resume a happy level of fitness and determination. Hooray for all of us, and Bob for getting the party started in cahoots with Daisyfae, and the rest of us tribal types. It's grand to form a fun yet frolicsome collective.

The hopeless case!

Yes, there is always one. And I'm afraid the "one" is me!
I said I'd give up wine for one month. Then promptly fell off the wagon when a friend had a celebration ! *
So I thought I'd start again, but with a more achievable goal of sorting my photos.
And I did stick with it (still a long way to go, but it's doable), but I completely forgot to post reports here!
See? Hopeless case.
But Daisy Fae is game for another round and wants to trim her flaps. Not sure my shoulder could manage many push-ups, but I'll throw my hat in with this:
30 minutes a day on my exercise bike.

This is a new "toy" to keep me active when the wet season closes in and I can't walk. I still intend to walk and swim as often as possible, but the bike is now my daily challenge.
If I miss posting here I'm pretty sure Daisy Fae will holler at me!

* when lab tests come back clear it's a celebration.

Wrap up - photo organization...

Well, I was not impressed with my performance during the first 30 day challenge. I made my usual mistake and overachieved for the first ten days, then petered out. I probably managed to do an AVERAGE of 30 minutes a day of photo organizing, but the majority was in those first 10 days.

I loved updating here, and it did encourage me to sit down and work on a few days when I otherwise would have skipped the project. I like the accountability of it.

The most important accomplishment that came out of this project for me was setting up an online backup system, so I can finally feel that my precious photos will be preserved even if the house burns down. I would be devastated to lose those triggers for memories of my kids' childhoods.

I do want to try again, so I'll be back for the next challenge. I have some ideas, but I think they will be less accomplishment driven and more peace driven. Maybe more guitar, maybe more sleep, maybe more baths. Or maybe I'll start running again. Or maybe an alternate day sort of thing. My kids start school in 1.5 weeks, so I'll theoretically have more free time then, but Cub Scouts also starts up again, which can easily suck my life away if I'm not careful. We'll see. I need to preserve some time for myself.

I really really enjoyed reading everyone else's posts. I checked back every day even though I didn't participate every day. Thank you for taking the time to share your experience with the 30 days... it has been really interesting! I hope that you'll all be back for Round II, and that you'll bring friends!

30 Days - Scores and Highlights

Perpetually distracted, huge stacks of books on my night stands, yawning my way through meetings after driving to work on snooze-control.

i still have a bit of this going on, after my run at 30 days to more focused neurons and more sleep. But i'm better. Definitely better.

Finished three books - not a huge number, compared to what most bibliophiles devour in 30 days, but that is three more books than i'd read in any other month this year! Still have stacks of books on my night stands, but i will continue to poke my way through them.

Sleep, glorious sleep! Forcing myself to bed by 11pm has made that 6am alarm far more tolerable. Definitely had some days where it just didn't happen - but mostly due to a few cases of "Fun Happens!" keeping me up far too late. i will continue to target a solid night of Zzzzz's because i simply feel better when i do.

It's been a lovely exercise in communal accountability - and i'll be back for Round 2. i've genuninely enjoyed tracking the progress of other contributors, and any chance to spend time with my old friend bob? Priceless. Thank you for launching this project!