Habit Cultivation

Dear Parents Who Struggle With Self-Care

/ Bethany / 4 Comments

Dear Parents Who Struggle With Self-Care:

Are you feeling guilty about not taking better care of yourself (whatever that means to YOU)? Maybe you took great care of yourself (whatever that means to YOU) before you had kids, but now you feel pretty far off course?

I get it! The other day I caught myself thinking  “It is crazy how far off course I was from living a lifestyle conducive to self-care.” If you knew me when I was in my 20s, you would probably say the same thing. I was the most health-fanatical person of anyone I knew! Now, I’ve been working on habits that I would have considered pretty basic back then.  I would have thought that these habits were not nearly enough to maintain my health.

Continue reading →

A New Habit. Somewhat conflicted, but it’s going well

/ Bethany / 10 Comments

A couple weeks ago, I added a new habit to my list: finishing my food for the day by 8pm. My goal was to do this 25 times by the end of the year.

Why did I choose this goal? I’ve been noticing that if I eat too much, too late, I feel uncomfortable while going to sleep. My sleep is not great and I thought this habit might improve it. Why only 25 times? Because I have a past history with any “rule” that sounds like a diet rule, and I didn’t want to put too much pressure on myself. I just wanted to start experimenting with this habit to see how it felt. 25 times amounted to roughly 3 times per week.  I was uncertain  as to whether focusing on this habit is a good idea in the first place. What if it sends me back to a dieting mindset?

I noticed those feelings and tried to address them. You don’t have to do it every day. The goal is 3 times per week. That leaves plenty of room for listening to your body. If you are  hungry and need to eat, go for it. It won’t mean throwing in the towel. If you didn’t get home in time to finish eating by 8, the goal is flexible enough to accommodate that. If you are watching a movie and want a snack for pleasure, not hunger….well, there is room for that too.

This is not about restricting myself from eating food that my body is hungry for. It’s about encouraging me to finish all that food early enough in the day that my sleep won’t be compromised by a full belly. It’s about noticing where I am in this process/journey of developing an intuitive eating practice…and noticing that I have made great strides with it during the daytime, and not as much in the evening. Therefore, it’s about giving myself an external reminder (the clock) during the time of day when I feel least likely to remember to eat in tune with my hunger and satiety cues. And since the goal is not perfection (but rather, 25 times by the end of the year), there is room for me to check in with myself and decide that I DO want or need to eat after 8pm on any given night for any reason.

Even acknowledging all of this flexibility, I still notice some uneasiness with this idea. Not necessarily in a “red flag” sense…maybe just in a “notice the sensation” sense that yoga teachers talk about when holding a challenging pose.

Continue reading →

Letting “Good” Beat “Perfect,” Kitchen Edition

/ Bethany / 3 Comments

They say that “perfect is the enemy of good.” I am applying that wisdom when it comes to cooking healthy, budget-friendly meals for my family this week.

I’ve decided to add a couple more habits to my habit list. One of these habits is cooking a beans and rice dish 6 times by the end of the year (roughly once per week). (If you have a favorite beans and rice recipe, please drop me a link!)

Continue reading →

The Porch Gym Moves Indoors

/ Bethany / Leave a comment

It’s raining today…..so instead of taking a walk, I moved all my weightlifting equipment across the room and moved furniture around!

I had been lifting on my porch all summer…and now the weather is starting to get really unpleasant. I bought a heavy duty gym floor mat to protect my hardwood flooring. But last week when I set it up in my living room, I was really conscious of how I was not enjoying myself in that space at all. Surrounded by clutter and toddler dirt. Weightlifting is a hobby I love and I like to respect the space.

This past Tuesday I noticed the same thing: I did not want to lift in the living room. Something had to change.

Soooo….I rearranged all the furniture and made space for my equipment (it had previously lived near the door because that was convenient for lifting on the porch. Now I feel like I have a designated corner of the room for lifting, instead of feeling like I am in the middle of furniture and clutter. I am going to try lifting later and see if it feels any better. I think it will!

It won’t win any interior design awards, but I think it will help functionally. I have been struggling with motivation lately, so I need all the help I can get, and that includes liking my environment.

I’m feeling proud of how my self awareness is improving. Listening to your body can mean more than just listening for hunger, satiety, and sleepiness cues.

I’m also feeling grateful of all the discarding we’ve done – because it allowed me the space to move my porch gym into the living room for the winter. Not everyone has a ton of spare room in their home, and I’m glad I found a way to work with the space I have.

Goal Attained! and Getting Ready to Move the Porch Gym Indoors

/ Bethany / Leave a comment

Just a quick weekend update. I haven’t been in the mood to write and share much lately.

BUT….I reached one of my goals last week and I’m super proud of it! I set a goal to complete 150 strength workouts this year, and I reached that goal on 10/29/2015! I’m very proud, because it showed patience and persistence.  It reminds me of a quote I saw (sorry, I don’t know the source): “a river cuts through rock not because of its power, but because of its persistence.”

So, I’ll probably be at closer to 170 workouts by the end of the year. Right now, through trial and error, I’ve learned that 3 workouts per week seems to be the magic number for me. I can improve, but still recover well and still have energy for other activities, like work, motherhood, and all the trail walks we’ve been taking this fall. I experimented with 5 and 4 times per week, but I was often more tired than I needed to be. Lately, I’m realizing that minimalism can be just as enriching in fitness as it is in other areas of life.

To that end, here are some blog posts by other bloggers who seem to agree on this:

Another thing I did over the past couple weeks was order a good floor mat and flat bench so I can train indoors more in the winter.  I decided that instead of finding a winter alternative to the porch gym, I would simply move the porch gym into the living room for the winter. Rather than olympic weightlifting only, I will do a mix of powerlifting and weightlifting, just so I’m not dropping heavy stuff on my floor ALL the time.

I have mixed feelings about this decision. I chose it for practical reasons. Last winter I trained at a local gym with good childcare….but it was such an….OUTING to get there. I had to pack up my kid’s lunch, bundle him up, either clean off my car or walk in the cold, find parking downtown….when all was said and done, going to the gym with a 2 year old took ALL MORNING.  Now that kiddo plays by himself really well, I’m thinking that training at home will require less logistical “stuff” and kiddo can play or watch TV or whatever. And it will be fun to do more powerlifting again. Less technical, more oxen-like strength. Just heavy barbells. What’s not to like?

So why the mixed feelings? What if I never get used to the feeling of lifting a giant barbell in my living room? (um……) Or what if THIS is the winter I wish I could swim? (Doubtful – I access to a pool last winter and never pursued it because that would have entailed dragging even MORE stuff to the gym – swimsuit, towel, shower gear….). What if my kid gets bored? (This will theoretically free up more time in our day for non-gym outings). What if I don’t get enough walking in? (Nothing says I have to stop walking to run errands downtown just because I won’t be going to the gym there). So, basically, there is no strong downside. Only minor concerns. We’ll live with that!

Well, that’s it! I guess I did have things to write about after all. Seems like there is something to be said for “just getting started.”

Habit Cultivation for Financial Goals: My Personal Experience

/ Bethany / 3 Comments

Two years ago, in October 2013, I learned about Dave Ramsey and read the information on his website as well as his book, The Total Money Makeover. My husband and I were inspired and blasted through the first two baby steps: saving $1000 in an emergency fund, and paying off all non-mortgage debt using the debt snowball. Doing those things was a huge relief, and we started working on baby step 3: fully funding our emergency fund with 3-6 months expenses.

And our pace slowed down. We had a few times we’ve had to use the emergency fund to cover various costs, and each time, it seemed like our motivation and intensity diminished.

This year, one of the goals I set at the beginning of 2015 was to “save $12,000 in the emergency fund.” I wanted to finish it off and be done with it.

And then we needed to replace our car. Our emergency fund was down to around $1200. So very discouraging. There was no way that we would finish it by the end of the year.

Don’t get me wrong: we were still in a better place than we were when we started. We haven’t put anything on a credit card in two years! But we were stagnant; we weren’t moving forward.

And then I realized that focusing on the end number might be what was killing our motivation –  similar to how focusing on a “goal weight” while dieting can make every day choices and changes seem to not matter. So I thought, “what if, instead of chasing the end goal of a certain number, I focused on cultivating the habit of the ACTION of saving?” So, as I had done with my other goals, I got rid of the goal of the “end number,” and set a goal to make a deposit at least 15 times of at least $10 by the end of the year (this was in September). Surely I could do at least that, right? It wasn’t nearly where we needed to be, but it was more than zero. So, I started by depositing $10.

And you know what? Over the next 6 weeks, it got easier! I’ve been depositing $20 or $30 some weeks! Seeing the balance go up again is encouraging. (And we got a few hundred for the car we would have junked, so that helped too).

It was definitely an epiphany that I could apply the same habit cultivation methods to savings habits that I was using with training and sleeping and eating habits. I am excited to see if this helps us get over the low motivation hump with this goal.  We’ve tried other money management methods before with similar results: high motivation in the beginning, and lower motivation later. I’m thinking that perhaps they all failed for us thus far because they required a complete overhaul of our habits overnight. Maybe if we had taken the time to develop one habit at a time, we might have had more sustainable success. Hey, just like health habits! Whoa!

Got any saving tips? I’d love to hear about them!

Seasonal Challenges: Motivation and Sleep

/ Bethany / 2 Comments

It’s almost the end of October and fall is pretty solidly here. It’s my favorite season. I love everything about New England fall. The colors, the outfits, the leaves, the weather, the hot drinks, the squash and apples, the holidays.

I wrote a post this summer and talked about how establishing my walking habit in the summer took more effort to get going…until I realized how  my dislike of walking in bright sun on hot days was A Major Factor That Was Stopping Me. This time of year, I have NO trouble with walking often. Walking on trails in New England in the fall is pure heaven. I wish I could live in a place with perpetual fall.

As much as I love fall though, I’ve noticed that changing seasons can bring new challenges as far as sticking with my healthy habits. This is not necessarily a bad thing; it just requires some flexibility and openness to changing up my routine a bit.

First, since I lift on my porch most of the time, I’ve changed the time of day that I train. I’m lucky enough to have that option, since I am home with kiddo two days per week, and that’s when I lift (plus the weekend).  Now that the mornings are colder, I’ve started lifting in the afternoons more often after the temperature has warmed up. Kiddo usually plays outside while I do that.

However, afternoon workouts bring their own “challenges,” mostly of the motivational ilk. I’m noticing that motivation levels are NOT the same in the morning vs. the afternoon! I can definitely see why many people prefer to work out in the morning. After running around with a 3 year old for most of the day, I usually don’t feel like doing anything other than lying on the couch.

One of the things that gets me up off the couch anyway is the fact that I have a training schedule that my coach writes for me. I get a little antsy knowing that if I skip a day, it will throw the schedule off. So, it’s less a question of “am I going to lift today?” and more of a question of “how long until I get up off the couch and lift today?” That helps. If I didn’t have a program and was just doing whatever I felt like, maybe it would be easier to skip.

Once I am up off the couch and out on the porch gym, I find music helps. For morning workouts I preferred silence, but for the afternoons when motivation and energy are low, music helps me with both those things.

The other big challenge I am noticing with sticking with my habit goals this fall, is that fall TV shows are back on. Between that, and the fact that I’ve let myself get sucked into binge watching episodes of my favorite TV show that is no longer on, my Hulu Plus account is getting a lot of play. At night after kiddo is asleep.

My habit goal of going to sleep before 10pm is suffering hard, after I was doing great with it for months. My TV watching at night is interfering with my energy levels and my mood. I’m a lot more tired and impatient and it doesn’t feel good.

One question I have in my mind is “I don’t skip sleep to work out, because sleep is important to me and my health. So, why am I skipping sleep to watch TV?” I’m thinking about adding another habit goal to the list to help me with this….something like “watch one TV show or less most nights.” I’ll be back with more details about that once I figure it out.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading! If you have any tips for sticking to healthy habits when motivation is lower, or for getting to bed when you’d rather watch TV, I’d love to hear them!

 

Popping In and Saying “Hey!”

/ Bethany / Leave a comment

It’s been a couple weeks since I have posted. Just wanted to pop in and say “I’m still here!” I’ve been getting over a cold and had some low energy levels for a while, so posting has taken a back seat. (Okay, okay, I will be honest. Fall TV shows are playing a time-sucking role as well. There. Glad I got that off my chest.)

As far as how everything is going, habit-wise: great! I’m really pleased. While this blog may have taken a back seat for a few weeks, the habits I am working on have not. I keep thinking that there is not much to report, because once habits are solidified, it’s just routine stuff. Whoever said that “slow, consistent habit change is not sexy” was right.

I have a couple new habits in mind that I want to add to my list, and something is telling me to wait a bit and give the present habits more time. More on this later!

Hope everyone is doing well. I’ll be back with more deep thoughts soon ;D.

Tired Week Musings on Rest, Minimalism, and Contentment

/ Bethany / Leave a comment

It’s been a couple weeks since I’ve posted. I had some arm pain last week so I needed to minimize typing. And once it felt better, I just felt….tired. So posting fell low on the list of priorities.

As for the low energy, there were a few different factors at play. It was time for a deload week with the barbell, so it was natural that I needed some time to recuperate. I’ve also been fighting a cough for the past month. However, last weekend when I looked at my habit tracking spreadsheet, I noticed that I hadn’t been checking off the “in bed by 10pm column” as often. Well, that was a good reminder of why I chose that habit. For the past few days I’ve been making a conscious effort to go to bed instead of watching TV at night. And boy do I need it – even with the extra sleep, I still feel tired. I have some catching up to do, clearly.

Lately I’ve been enjoying the benefits of minimalism in my life. I’ve been working towards a decluttering goal this year and my husband and I have gotten rid of more than double the amount of things I aimed to get rid of…..and we are still going! I’m starting to appreciate the benefits at this point. Such as – I actually enjoy spending time at home now, whereas I used to feel overwhelmed and stressed out and needed to get out a lot. Which left things undone at home. Which left me more stressed out. Which meant my rest time wasn’t as restful as it could have been.

But today, I am grateful that I have been working towards a restful space, and I have achieved that (even though there is more I can do, I am happy with the progress we have made!). When I woke up this morning, I could feel that I needed a restful day. Thankfully, today is one of my days off from work. So I slowly got ready to go out on the porch and lift.  I read the weather on my phone, got dressed slowly, ate breakfast and took care of my kid’s shit (literally and figuratively). After breakfast (almost 2 hours later!) we headed out to the porch gym, which, today, was also a pet shop. Or a ticket counter. Or maybe both. I’m not sure.  Since it was a bit rainy and I was needing extra rest, I did not schedule any trail walking into my day.

Later, a friend I hadn’t spoken with in a long time sent me a message asking how I was doing. I caught myself about to answer “we are having a lazy day.” And I realized that sounded so negative, when in fact, I was doing a positive thing by honoring my need for rest. So instead, I said “we are having a restful day.” That felt great, and not at all self-deprecating. I think I will try substituting “restful” for “lazy” in my language, when applicable (which is probably almost always)”.

In addition to “tired,” I have also been experiencing a sense of contentment lately. I like this quote by Joshua Becker:

Minimalism is the intentional promotion of the things we most value and the removal of everything that distracts us from it.

Recently (definitely within the past year), I have found myself thinking self-pitying thoughts, especially about finances and lifestyle things that we can’t afford right now, such as a home with a bigger yard, and traveling to visit friends and family more. But my daily “name something for which I feel grateful” habit seems to be changing my mindset, and this morning I was feeling grateful for simplicity. Sure, I could work more, and I would have more money. I am a person who really needs a lot of downtime and time alone with my own thoughts though. And today, I am grateful that my lifestyle (and my husband!) is allowing me some of that time, several times per week. Especially since I have a child. I’m feeling happy with the way things are, right now.

Thanks for reading!

 

Uncharted Waters: Food Seems to Have Lost Its Power

/ Bethany / 1 Comment

When I started working on my habit goals nine months ago, I knew I wanted to be open to whatever outcomes may come, without trying to dictate and manipulate the results. After a lifetime of chasing outcome goals, I was sick of it and ready to give up control in that area.

Over the past nine months, I have noticed a lot of great outcomes, both physical and mental. I am now starting the tenth month, and one of the outcomes I have noticed recently is that the role food plays in my life is changing. This post will include some observations about my relationship with food in different points in my life, and now. Please keep in mind that in describing this, I am not holding any judgment towards myself or anyone else who happens to identify with these statements. Just describing my experiences at different points in my life.

As a child, I loved food, but it was also a source of guilt. I did not find my family meals relaxing. During meals, my parents sometimes argued, and there was often food policing of my brothers and my meals or portions. I grew to enjoy eating alone.

Continue reading →