REGULAR READERS OF THIS BLOG MAY HAVE NOTICED A FLAW IN my healthy habits via my entries in the almost full year I’ve been posting. I’m great at setting goals for myself, for being ambitious. I’m not so great at completing them.
Even as an adolescent, I’d start three different art projects, only to finish none. I have a whole crate full of half-finished cross stitch samplers, water color paintings, friendship bracelets, you name it — My Basket of Art Shame. When I picked up knitting a few years ago, the only thing that allowed me to present a whole scarf rather than part scarf/ part ball of yarn was the promise I made to K that he’d have a warm, handmade wool scarf to wear by Christmas.
As I looked back on my first year of blogging, I was embarrassed to find a number of things I declared I would be doing for X amount of time until I reached Y results, only for all traces of that goal to have seemingly vanished just a couple posts later. Here I list the brunt of them, explain why I failed in keeping my oath to completing the tasks, and I modify the goal for my fresh start in 2010 in an attempt to start my New Year’s resolution of finishing what I begin. I present to you, my Admitting Weakness List of 2009:
- Quitting Diet Coke – Ah, my first failed promise in cyberspace. At one point I even had a counter featured on the right column proudly displaying the length in time I had gone without a sip of this sweet nectar of the gods chemical concoction with known noxious results to the body. I failed at this because as much as I know how bad diet sodas are for me, they’re something with a flavor I enjoy, they’re cheap and readily available, and it being calorie-free and all, it’s hard for me to say no. My modified goal: I will let myself have one once in a while, when I feel no other beverage – water, tea, sparkling water – will satisfy me. But, when I want a diet coke, I will try as many other alternatives as available instead of jumping straight for it first.
- Making a Work Out Schedule – This summer, inspired by Caitlin’s oh-so-organized Excel spreadsheet with planned monthly workouts featured on her blog, I resolved to do the same. And to be fair to myself, the spreadsheet was created!! I just never followed it. Don’t get me wrong; I still was active every day, and I’m proud to say this past summer was one my smartest summers to date, with balanced eating and even a random sprint triathlon thrown in there. But I did it all without a plan. To be honest, I just never gave the Excel spreadsheet a full chance, writing it off a few days later as too much of a hassle. I realize how important it is to have even a flexible schedule to make sure I’m varying my work outs enough, and in the end I know it will be fun for me to track my progress. I think planning a month in advance was too ambitious for me though – I don’t think that far ahead. My modified goal: I will try planning workouts for a week or two weeks in advance, still via Excel in Caitlin fashion, and try that for a month. If I then find it to be a hassle, I’ll nix it and find another way.
- 100 Push Ups Challenge - And the sit ups…and the squats. Ugh. I was doing well. Great intentions yet again. No excuses. Just pure laziness. My modified goal: Incorporate strength training into my work outs. Also, don’t take on three challenges at once, Alice. You know you’re terrible at following a set training schedule. (See Admitting Weakness Point #2 above.)
- 21 Days of Yoga – This was also going well. And then K and I took a half cross country road trip from the Cape to central Texas. And most of our floors are carpeted at home in TX so I couldn’t find a good place to do at-home yoga, and in-studio yoga was intimidating simply because I was unfamiliar with Austin studios. My modified goal: I’d like to try this one again but I need to plan it at a time when it will be convenient to do this, not when I’m packing up and moving in the middle of the commitment. I’ll look ahead at my schedule and let you know when Try 2 of 21 Days will be.
This list isn’t fully comprehensive but I did highlight the most significant of the broken promises. I’m not doing this to be a Debbie either (that is, a Debbie Downer), but more so I can learn from my past, evaluate my strengths and weaknesses, and tweak things so some of my weaknesses become catalysts for more strengths.
(For example, I realize one of the reasons why I love races so much is because I not only have to financially commit to something, but I also have a built-in deadline as to when I will have to be ready, lest I injure myself or plainly feel bad during or after the race. Even if my motivation putters during training, I have to get back on track because race day comes whether I’m ready or not!)
I acknowledge I’m human and that a lot of positive things were accomplished in the last year too. To list a few, I started this blog, I did my first two sprint tris, I graduated Magna Cum Laude from my undergrad with a double degree, I moved to NYC, I started my year of service running an after-school program in one of the poorest Congressional districts in the USA, I ran in Central Park for the first time, and I signed up for what will be my first half marathon.
Speaking of the half, I finally edited the content on my fundraising website. In brief, I’m running the 13.1 New York half marathon as part of Team World Vision to help the efforts of building clean water wells to change lives in Africa. Please take a looksie and if the cause speaks to you, the organization and I would greatly appreciate any donations!
Do you have any reoccurring bad habits that you’re going to resolve to fix this year?
Thanks for reading. And Happy New Year!!! More great things are to come for all of us this year, I have a sneaking suspicion.











