I've been a grumpy bugger for a few months now. Kind of impossible to live with. This year has been a big year for so many of my friends. Babies. Jobs. Moves. For me it's been kind of stagnant. Not a lot of progress. A load of grumbling. Some wallowing. Then more grumbling.
Like I said, I've been a grumpy bugger for a few months now.
The thing about being grumpy is that it's very easy to stay grumpy. It's much, much harder to actually get out of a funk.
In a year that feels big for everyone except me, the most important thing I can do is to stop seeing my life in terms of other people's goal posts. It's hard enough to make progress against my own goals, let alone comparing them to others. Sounds sensible, right?
I mean, it is sensible. The problem is getting your head around that sense.
Lately, I've been listening to a lot of pod casts while I work. Usually I'll put on some music and just groove along to that, but for some reason even music puts me into a grump. Anyway, I stumbled across this Ted Talk (not a pod cast) and was transfixed. Give it a watch. I'll be waiting.
Try something new for 30 Days. It's not really a revolutionary concept. I love that he used what I like to call my mom's slogan too. My mom went back to college to finish her degree when I was about 14. She always used to tell me, "8 weeks will pass whether or not I go to school. At least if I'm in school I'm 8 weeks closer to graduating". My mom did graduate college the year before I graduated high school.
So, here's the thing, 30 days will pass whether or not I do anything different. I could spend those 30 days in a grump. I could feel terrible about the progress I feel other people are making while I'm slumped where I stand . . . OR . . . I could make something happen.
Everyone has a secret dream. Something they wished they could do. I'm going to spend 12 months ticking off my dreams in 30 day blocks. With the help of one of my best friends, and mostly impartial judge, Angel, I'll be keeping track of all of my 30 day challenges here on the blog as well as on my Tumblr and Twitter. I'll check in at the beginning of the month to announce what I'm working on and at the end of the month to let you know how it worked out.
There will of course be rules/guidelines:
1) A month begins on the 8th and ends of the 8th of the following month. (Example: Month One is from the 8th May- 8th June) Why begin mid-month? Why wait for a the start of a new month when I might be feeling less then enthusiastic about the whole thing! This is all about destroying the grump.
2) The goal must be quantifiable.
3) The goal must be daily.
I suppose beyond that, there are no rules.
For my first month I'm going to tackle something I've been meaning to do for ages. I'm going to attempt to get my incredibly out of shape self into some sort of exercise routine. How? Every day for a month I'm going to walk/run/crawl 1 mile on the treadmill. 30 miles. It's not a lot to anyone who is in shape. It's a bit pathetic. But, for someone super out of shape, it's a start. It's something that if I can succeed at this month and I'll be proud to have done it. I'm also hoping this will be the start of some sort of exercise programme for me.
Here I go. Wish me luck.
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