I don’t have anything against New Year’s resolutions, but I don’t usually make them for the same reason I don’t celebrate “Love Your Body Day.” Every day should be “Love Your Body Day” and every day is a new year. Every day is the fulcrum of your life story. However, I do need to rededicate myself to this whole health and fitness game and since my timing coincides with the start of a new year, I guess we can call this a New Year’s resolution. It worked out rather well three years ago, didn’t it?
As I mentioned yesterday, I’m slipping out of my groove and I know that I need to do something about it now or regain 50 pounds. The former sounds much more appealing than the latter. I have a lot of sympathy for people who regain weight, but I do not want to be one of them. So, here’s my plan of attack:
PastaQueen’s Not-So-Secret Plan of Attack
1) Write down my goals. I need to know where I’m going or else how will I know when I’ve gotten there?
2) Identify my problems. I did this in the last post.
3) Create strategies to overcome my problems. The word “strategy” makes me sound like I’m planning a military campaign, but boot camp makes you fit, right?
So, I already identified my problems. Let me lay out my goals and my strategies. Goals need to be SMART: specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely. A goal like “Eat better” is nice and all, but too vague to be of any use. How are you going to know if you are eating better? A better goal would be “Eat three fruits and vegetables a day.” This is something specific that you can do and is easy to see if you are accomplishing. I recently posted some non-weight goals for 2008 on the wall above my computer so I’m reminded every day of what I want to achieve. It’s all rather cheesy, but it tends to work so I’m just going to have to get over my lactose intolerance on this one.
My Health, Fitness and Body Goals for 2008
1) Run the Indianapolis Mini-Marathon. I thought about setting a time goal for myself, but honestly I’d just like to finish this thing without injuring myself along the way.
2) Run a 5K at a 9:30 a mile pace. My fastest and only 5K time was at a 10:31 minute a mile pace. After I train for the half-marathon, I think I can get that fast.
3) Try at least one exercise class/sport I haven’t tried before. Variety is the spice of life.
4) Fit into size 10 jeans. When I was at my largest, I thought a size 10 would be a great size to end up at. Right now I’m wearing size 12 jeans.
5) Do not weigh-in over 186 pounds. I had to lose 186 pounds to weigh 186 pounds, half my weight. I want to stay on this side of half of me.
6) Lose the last 20 pounds. I keep flopping back and forth on this one. I did set 160 pounds as my goal weight and there are many reasons I’d like to get there. However, I don’t care that much about the scale anymore. I don’t want to gain any weight back, but I can name at least 5 other things that are more important in my life than losing 20 pounds. I know I write a weight-loss blog, but ultimately losing all this weight has allowed me to live my life, a life where I don’t care that much about weight loss. I care about my health and fitness and maintaining what I have lost, but losing any more weight…eh. The best reason I can think of to lose 20 pounds is because I’m going to be promoting a weight-loss memoir in 4 months, but that’s a pretty crappy reason to lose weight. It’s based entirely on other people’s expectations of me and that’s no way to live. I also think if I put a lot of pressure on myself to lose 20 pounds in 4 months, the stress would backfire on me and I’d end up binging. While I would not be unhappy to wake up tomorrow weighing 20 pounds less, it’s in my best interest not to get obsessed with that number and instead to focus on maintenance, health and fitness.
Okay, I’ve got some goals. What are my strategies?
PastaQueen’s Super Cool Strategies
1) Join a gym. The National Body Challenge from Discovery Health is offering an 8-week FREE pass to Bally Total Fitness. You have to sign up by January 11, 2008 to get the pass and it can only be used until March 2, 2008. No doubt Bally will also try to get you to sign up for a full membership and a personal trainer and shake you down for smoothie money once you’re in there, but I’m willing to give it a try. I’ve never joined a gym before, so I’d like to try out these spinning classes I’ve heard everyone talk about. Bally is only about 10 minutes away from my house and I think a change of scenery might help me get revved up about exercising. The thought of my treadmill in the bedroom isn’t really doing it for me right now. I would like to apologize in advance to all regular gym goers for being one of those annoying newbie January members who will be hogging your elliptical machine next week.
2) Index cards of inspiration. Oh man, the index cards make feel completely loony, but I’m going to try them anyway. My only real problem with eating right now is binging in the evenings. I’ve written reasons I want to lose weight on several index cards which I’ve set on my kitchen counter. The next time I want to go on a binge in the evening, I’m going to make myself read these stupid index cards and hopefully they will convince me to put down the fudge pop. I have no idea if they’ll work. I do know that part of the reason I’m eating too much in the evenings is because at that moment I care more about eating than I do about weight maintenance. The cards might help me rebalance my priorities at that moment. Part of losing weight is admitting that you don’t do it through strength of will alone. You have to acknowledge your weaknesses and make plans to circumvent them. And if they don’t work, at least my cat likes to play with them.
3) Do what worked before. Basically, I’m going to make myself start working out in the mornings again. I’m going to focus on eating more fruits, vegetables and lean meats and less carbs. And I’ll keep on blogging about what’s happening. I know how to lose weight, I just need to actually do it.
Those are my goals and strategies for now. I’ll monitor my weight and see how things go. At the end of January I’ll do another evaluation and make any adjustments or set new goals and strategies if necessary. Sound like a plan?