Where I Am With My 2021 Goals

As a goal focused person, I love setting new challenges for myself at the beginning of the new year, often known as New Years’ Resolutions. While I sometimes call my goals/challenges New Years’ Resolutions, I do not limit myself from setting new goals or challenges to the end or beginning of the new year. This is where I am with my 2021 goals.

For 2021 I wanted to be more intentional and focus on setting goals I knew would challenge me the most. My three main goals were: Pay off my debt (not including our mortgage, my student loans, or car loan), no unnecessary spending, and no eating sugar.

You may have noticed I used the term “were” in the last sentence. There is reason for this. These three goals have morphed. Let’s break it down.

1) Pay off my debt. As I mentioned, this does not include my student loans, my car loan, or our mortgage. This is simply my portion of what we had to pay for our new HVAC system we had installed in December (hello two new refrigerated air units, two new furnaces, and new hot water tank). Talk about #adulting (insert disgusted face here).

Not only did I clear out my savings for our HVAC system, but I also had to borrow to make up the rest of what I owed (we split everything 50/50 since we do not mix and mingle finances). Setting up my payment plan to pay off what I borrowed helped me figure out a payoff timeline. Consequently, this payoff timeline helped me know when this balance will be paid in full (looking at you October 2021!) and allows me to allocate these payments (after October) toward my student loan and car loan, in addition to what I pay each month.

The most exciting part, I have figured out the estimated date I will have my car loan (December 2022) and student loan paid off (December 2026)!

Now, the only way to make this a reality is to stick to my budget and not allow for unnecessary spending, which was my second goal for 2021.

2) No unnecessary spending. This is my version of a “no spend year”. Meaning I only buy things I need, such as shampoo, conditioner, facial moisturizer/cleanser, food, and gas. But it also includes gifts for friends and family for birthdays and Christmas.

You may be questioning how in the heck is that a no spend year? Here’s the deal. I am not buying any clothing, purses, jewelry, or what I consider fun stuff for myself. I am cutting down on the facial products I use and keeping it to what I really love and use all the time, which helps my complicated skin. I am not scheduling any facials or massages (unless I have a gift card). I am not buying any Starbucks for myself unless I have a gift card (gasp, I know!). No new tech gadgets and yes, my earbuds still have wires attached. And no buying books, only reading the books I have and checking out from the library.

My focus is to be intentional with my spending and knowing exactly where my money is going. Oftentimes the above items would eat into my budget or I would have to shift things around to accommodate for the unexpected expense. Not this year, my friend. No unnecessary spending means really honing in on and sticking to my strict budget.

On a similar note, I am focusing on minimizing the amount of stuff I own by selling and donating stuff I do not wear or use much anymore. The money I make from the items I sell will go towards paying down that pesky debt!

3) No eating sugar. This was an audacious goal. I knew it would be hard and I was on track for a solid month. But I broke down. I “failed”. I took a face first dive right into dessert.

What I came to realize is I cannot limit myself too much in life because life is to be enjoyed, not restricted so much you end up hating life and yourself. Life is too short to limit yourself unnecessarily, especially if you are not training for something specific, which I am not (I just workout because I love to workout). Guess what? I also love to eat.

I really struggle with self-control when it comes to eating sweets. I will eat and eat and eat till I make myself sick. What I have changed my goal to is M-O-D-E-R-A-T-I-O-N. We do not need to discuss the events that took place this past weekend and the 4 boxes of Girl Scout cookies that presumably disappeared into thin air. But moving forward I will be focusing on moderation and I will plan out my desserts. I am going to limit myself to dessert one to two times a month and will be something *special*. When I say “something *special*” I mean will be placing an order for a specialized dessert, I will be making a dessert, or I will plan for something very specific. However, it needs to remain within my budget.

While my goals for this year may have changed ever so slightly, I think they are exactly what I am needing and they will still be a challenge. I am trying to give myself space to figure out what works for me and what does not. I am also working on being gentle with myself, not beat myself up because I broke down and ate a crap ton of cookies. Forgiveness is critical in life. Not just for those around you, but for yourself as well. No need to beat yourself up. Just pick yourself up, brush off the dirt, and try again.

So… this is where I am with my 2021 goals. What are yours and how have they changed?

The Compound Effect

So, what exactly is the compound effect? Yes, it is a book written by Darren Hardy, but it is also the law of cause and effect. It is the act of doing a small, little thing over and over and over, being consistent and faithful in your pursuit to continually do this small task. In a nutshell the compound effect is a lot of little decisions or actions that add up to a whopping pile of success, or lack thereof.

In today’s society it is all about instant gratification. We want to see immediate results. We do not want to wait, we want it in a split second. We want to win the lottery or get discovered and become an overnight success. We want to lose that 15 pounds in 3 days or become a professional athlete in just a few weeks. But as we all are aware, that’s not how it works. That just doesn’t happen (ok I know some of you are arguing that yes, people do win the lottery, but that is very few and far between).

What does work is showing up every single day, every single week, and being consistent. Day after day, week after week, that work you put in adds up. What does it add up to? It adds up to results, success, and achievement.

No one is going to applaud you for going to the gym every day. No one is going to applaud you for eating healthy and not eating sugar every day. No one is going to applaud you for writing one blog post every week. But what you will find after a year is that you are more fit. You will find after several months you no longer crave sweets and you can see your abs poking through. You will find at the end of the year you have a robust blog with tons of content and more followers.

The point is, no matter what you do, it will create the compound effect.

Let’s look at it from a different angle. Let’s say you watch or listen to the news in the morning when you are getting ready for work. Everyone knows the news channels are report on stories that are typically negative and depressing – plane crashes, children abducted, wars happening around the world, things that are not normal or happen on a regular basis to the majority of the world’s population. You listen to or read the news, then you slowly process what you heard or read. It seems insignificant, but it all adds up. Stop and think about it. Every morning you are getting a constant, small drip of negativity. You are filling your brain with all these negative thoughts, because that is what the news outlets report on. You are feeding your brain with sensationalized interpretations of what you are looking at, watching, listening to, whether it be on TV, the radio, Instagram, or Twitter.

How would your life be different if you listened, instead, to educational podcasts or videos about the industry you work in or something that interests you? How would your brain feel or be different? Your body of knowledge would be so much more vast and on a deeper level because you would be filling your brain a little bit every single day with content relative to you, your career, and your happiness.

In another instance, let’s say you have a cookie every afternoon. You think to yourself, it’s just one tiny, little cookie, it can’t do any harm. You won’t notice a difference on the scale tomorrow or a week from now or even 2 months from now. But after a year, two years, three years, you will notice a difference. You will notice a difference in how much you weigh, how you feel, and how your clothes fit. Imagine the compound effect of skipping the cookie every single day and the significant difference it will make after a year.

Our daily, insignificant choices seem mundane and minute. We don’t enjoy these choices in the moment. Actually, they can be quite difficult in the moment! But all those choices add up to the significant.

So why do we make our insignificant choices insignificant? Because we are hungry for immediate reward. Each choice we make is significant because it is exactly what will ultimately lead to our success or our failure. Anything you do every day is significant – brushing your teeth, showering, working out, learning, cleaning your home, walking your dog, reading to your children. Your daily decisions are what pile up your successes.

Every single little decision you make every single day of your life adds up to an effect, and compounds. What can we do about this? Evaluate all the decisions you make throughout your day. Look at your life differently, look at your day differently. Evaluate all the choices you make throughout the day, throughout the week, throughout the month, and see how it effects your outcomes after a year.

Everything leads to something, whether it is something you are doing or aren’t doing. It’s true with your health, your weight, your relationships, and your goals.  If you want to create a certain life for yourself, it’s just about making one small decision every single day, times it by time, and you will get the compound effect, resulting in the goal you set for yourself.

The most difficult part of this is going to be making yourself do the little things each and every day and having patience for the long game. But if you learn to love the process, it becomes more rewarding than the end game.

Instant gratification is soooo much easier, but it’s also robbing us of the big goals we want to achieve in our lives. Our brains are hardwired for instant gratification, but we have to know that when we delay our gratification, we can enjoy the compound effect. If you want to become more, if you want different results, you have to wash, rinse, repeat, wash, rinse, repeat, day in and day out, making the small decisions in order to reap the benefits of the big results.

People constantly talk about how boring routines are, how terrible it is to be “stuck” in doing the same thing each week or each month. But when you look at successful people, like Labron James, Tom Brady, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Katrin Davidsdottir, the common denominator is that they each did the same thing over and over, practiced, worked hard, same thing day in and day out, first on the court, last on the field, in the office on the weekends, to get where they are today. People chalk it up to “luck” or “talent” they are born with. But saying those things are robbing these individuals of the hard work they have dedicated their lives to. They have sacrificed so much to keep a routine in order to become the best in their respective fields. Yet people like to dismiss it to something they were just born with. I’m sure these individuals can attest, once you get the flywheel going, it gets easier to keep the momentum going.

The choices we choose to make will compound to become our lives. So, ask yourself, do you want your life to become an accumulation of all the images you look at on Instagram? Or do you want your life to become an accumulation of all the books you read? Do you want your life to become an accumulation of all the TV shows you watch, or an accumulation of the activities you partake in with your family?

The way we change our lives is by changing our days, changing every choice we make on a daily basis. Once you get the flywheel going, the momentum builds up, one day after another, the results start to take off, the momentum increases. Once you start creating results for yourself then the results will start to create other results – that’s the beauty of the compound effect (aka consistency, routine). There are no instant successes, success is built on a pile of day to day choices and ultimately sacrifices.

What it boils down to is that the big wins are made up of a bunch of little decisions, every single darn day. So, what decisions are you going to make?

Looking To 2019

As we get closer to the end of the year, we hear a lot of people state, “let’s hope next year is better than this one”. How miserable and discouraging… Was there nothing about this year that made you happy or laugh or be overwhelmed with joy and thankfulness? Every year can’t be that bad…

Although there have been some very trying months this year, overall, I must say it has been an incredible year. I did not make time to blog as much as I wanted to, but there were many other things that really made 2018 special for me. Here are just the highlights:

• We brought home the cutest, most scared little bean (rescue pup), and gave her a forever home. Marvin now has a sister! Lulu went from hiding behind the couch for the first 3 months to now always wanting me to pick her up, cuddle with her, and rub her belly. She is even letting Matt pet her every few tries!
• Saw good friends get married
• Bought a new car that is not (what my mom calls) a “cheap college car”
• Turned 30!!!! And had an incredible time in Taos at Hotel Luna Mystica with my Boo and spent a day at Ojo Caliente for a shared birthday girls’ day and dinner
• We moved into a new house
• We had a weekend getaway to our favorite town, Pagosa Springs; we went on a 10-year anniversary trip to Vegas for the law firm I currently work for; I traveled to Chicago for a work conference; and we are going on vacation to Jamaica with friends
• Saw Journey & Def Leopard and Jack Johnson in concert
• Read a total of 6 books and going to finish 1 more before the end of the year (although my year goal was 12, I still read some life changing and inspiring books and I am proud to say I even read that many)
• Volunteered for a new local CrossFit competition – The Veteran Games
• We got multiple massages throughout the year (my all-time most favorite gift to receive)
• We (aka I) started planning our vacation to Iceland in 2019 (tee hee hee!)
• I am making moves to buy life insurance. Folks this is the realist, most #adulting thing I have ever done in my entire life besides buy a car from a dealership
• I made a leap of faith, messaged a woman COO I admire to see if she would mentor me, and it led to a new job opportunity!!! I am happy to announce I will be starting my new job 1/2/19!
• Best of all, my Mattchew and I celebrated our 5-year date-iversary. I am more in love with that man as each day passes.

I also had many work highlights, but I am not trying to bore you to death by listing that crap. This year for me was focused on bettering myself through reading and learning more about how to reach my goals and true potential in my personal life and professional life.

It has been a year about learning how to listen better, work harder and smarter, take care of myself physically and mentally, saying no to more things so I can focus on the things I really want to do, saving my money, paying off my debt, only spending what I can afford (Matt even hid my credit cards from me), planning for the future, being the best partner/friend/daughter/granddaughter I can be, and setting myself up for success.

I really manifested what I wanted in my career and, to my surprise, it became a reality! Never would I ever imagine I would be starting this new job. But I told myself I was not going to be scared and I was going to find a mentor. The worst she could say would have been “no”. Instead, I was offered an opportunity to work under her and concentrate my career in an industry and position I am more passionate about.

Of course, there have been some very trying times this year, not to mention some VERY challenging and discouraging months. Good news is that everything is moving in the right direction and improving, and THAT is all that matters.

What I could do is look at the bad months and focus on them and tell everyone how terrible this year was and how, hopefully, next year will be better. But I’m not, because truthfully, it has been a good year overall. There will always be problems and low points and the sooner you are willing to accept that, the easier it will be to work through the problems and low points as they arise. If you focus on the bad and the negative all you will ever see or find is the bad and the negative. We must be appreciative for all of life’s experiences, even the not so good ones. Without the bad we would never know what is good. Bad experiences give us a point of reference and molds us into stronger, more capable humans. We are never given mountains we can’t climb.

With next year right around the corner, I could not be more thrilled for the journey I am on.

I am choosing to focus on the good and positive in life. I am choosing to manifest the future I want for myself and my family. I am choosing to continually better myself personally and professionally. And I am choosing to have an amazing new year.

So, be awesome. Commit to yourself. Find the good in everything. And cheers to a fantastic 2019!

Failure & Sugar

I walked by the table and saw the colors through the clear Tupperware container. Immediately I felt my stomach get that excited feeling, jumping up in my body, making me take a gulping breath. I walked by a few more times, trying to contain myself. I kept repeating to myself, “You don’t need them, you should not eat them. Control yourself!”

Next thing I know I am walking over to the container and opening up the lid. I whip my gaze to the kitchen door to see if any of my coworkers are about to pop in. My mind goes blank. I come back to my thoughts as I am shoving a cookie into my mouth, chewing rapidly before someone walks in and exposes me. “Lean over the sink, don’t drop crumbs everywhere” I tell myself. I feel as if fireworks are going off in my brain. Then I swallow the last bite of cookie and those colorful fireworks start to dull. My heart sinks, my brain starts kicking itself. I failed.

My goal was to not eat any sugar (cookies, cupcakes, candy, ice cream – all my faves) for the 6 week Cut the Crap Challenge at the gym (CrossFit Albuquerque). My soul felt heavy and I hung my head in shame. Quickly I walked back to my desk as to not seem as if I were away too long. I got a little work done and quickly got up and went back to the kitchen, repeating the cycle. But the second time around, I ate two cookies. I repeated this throughout the morning and before I even left for lunch I had 5 cookies. I felt gluttonous and foolish. I felt shameful. I felt as if I am never going to be able to kick this addiction, this habit of hiding and eating sweets, shoving them in my pie hole. The saddest part? I did the same exact thing the very next day, but only ate 3 cookies, because that was all that was left. I ate ALL the frosted sugar cookies. Talk about no self-discipline. It felt as if I couldn’t stop myself.

I know I am not alone in my struggle though. What makes it difficult is my coworkers constantly tell me that I can “afford” to eat anything I want and however much I want. It makes me feel guilty for not wanting to eat sweets. But then I feel guilty for eating sweets. I feel as if I am having a set back in my quest for a healthy life.

Recently I finished reading The Case Against Sugar by Gary Taubes. It took my quite a while to finish it. As I got further through the book it became more interesting to me. A lot of the book focuses on the history of the sugar industry and how our society has gradually increased sugar consumption over the decades. It also discusses how diabetes was “discovered” during this time and the issue around metabolic syndrome, insulin resistance, hypertension, and other diseases that can be linked to sugar consumption. While reading this book I felt very compelled to quit sugar for good, not just a month here and a month there, but completely.

The author poses a question towards the end of the book – how much is too much? We will never know what the threshold is for the amount of sugar we can take in that will not cause disease and health problems because these diseases take years to manifest. So, a lifetime of eating “very little” sugar can still manifest problems many years down the line. This really struck a chord with me. It made me sad to think that something that brings people so much joy and pleasure (myself included) is wreaking havoc inside people’s bodies over years and years. Something that seems very simple and harmless is added to many different types of foods for various reasons.

What joy is living your life with health problems? That is not a life I want to live. I also don’t want to live a life of shame, regret, and “feeling bad” for failing to reach my goals.

If I want to succeed, I need to think of my failure differently. For me, my failure was a teachable moment. It was something I learned from. I learned that I feel powerless against my weakness, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I learned that I LOVE frosted sugar cookies and have a really, really, really hard time turning them down, but it is possible. I found that my failure is not a failure at all, but a moment to learn from and gain experience from, and grow from. My failure was not a failure at all, but merely a setback.

When we hear the word failure, most people cringe. Failure is seen as a bad thing. It is seen as not capable, not strong enough, not smart enough, not determined enough, not enough self-discipline. Why do we tie such negative connotations to failure? Why are so many people afraid to fail, myself included?

There is a small portion of the population that understands the importance of failure and gladly accepts it in their lives. Why are they so happy to fail at something? When you think about what it takes to succeed, you must understand that success inevitably comes with failure. If we have goals, we must 100% know and accept that accomplishing goals is also going to come with failing goals as well. The most successful people in the world understand this, so why don’t we?

Brooke Castillo of The Life Coach School says: “If you want success, you need to double your rate of failure”. What she is saying is that in order to meet or reach the goals we set for ourselves we have to be willing to fail. We have to be able to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and try again and continue on; not dwell and cry and whine over not succeeding.

A lot of people never achieve their dreams because they are afraid to fail. Albert Einstein is considered one of history’s preeminent geniuses. What people do not realize is that Einstein made dozens of mistakes in his life and during his career. Einstein is best known for the “world’s most famous equation” E = mc². He did not magically come up with this theory. He actually made 7 mistakes in the proof of E = mc² over the course of 41 years. 41 YEARS!!! He failed over the course of 41 YEARS and kept trying and kept failing until he got it right. If Einstein did not continue to try and try and try again after failing so many times, imagine how different the world would be.

On that same note, Thomas A. Edison is credited with the quote, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work”. One of the greatest American inventors developed many devices including the light bulb. If he had failed once or twice and gave up, where would we be today? How long would it have taken for someone else to invent the light bulb?

My point is that we must encounter failure in order to move forward and succeed at anything in life. One thing we must realize and understand is that our thoughts cause our emotions which then spur our actions. If we see failing as negative, we are going to feel bad and down and lowly, which in turn may cause a negative action to proceed (like eating more cookies in my case). If we see failing as positive, we will feel positively, which will spur us to try again and again until we succeed.

What many people do not realize is that they have complete control over their failures. We get to choose and decide what our failures mean to us. Nobody else makes this decision, we do. We are the ones who cause ourselves to have negative emotions about failing. If we choose how we think about failure and see it as a positive instead of a negative, it will trickle down to our emotions. If we see failure as positive, we will feel better about it, maybe even happy about it. If we are happy or content after failing, that will lead to positive actions, whether that be trying again until you succeed, or going for bigger, hairier, more audacious goals, knowing that it is ok if we fail and that eventually we will succeed.

If we choose to change how we look at and feel about failure, our fear of failure will dissolve. If you realize it is ok to fail in front of others, more so if you are willing to fail in front of others, it becomes less scary once you realize it is not a big deal and most people don’t even care! In fact, it may give you more confidence once you realize it is not a big deal to fail in front of others.

Brooke Castillo says, “Failure is something you have to consider as something you want to include in your life. It’s not something to avoid. It’s actually something to pursue and to get very good at. If I feel confident about my ability to fail, you can see how I’m probably going to try new things, put myself out there, and probably be successful because as I fail and as I plan to fail, I will continue to do it, to move forward.”

Failure can be summed up as not meeting your own expectations. Instead of seeing yourself as having failed, see it as you did not meet your own expectations. Change the way you are looking at the so-called problem. If you didn’t meet your own expectations, what can you change to meet your expectations? Figure out the correct action, make adjustments as necessary, and change it until you meet your expectations. Think of failure as something to move towards, not away from. Here is a different way to look at it: If you get really good at falling down, you learn how to fall down really well. Then, you will have more confidence falling in the future, whether that be in public or by yourself. Eventually you will not fall but you will have confidence knowing that if you do fall, it is going to be ok, not the end of the world.

Now, there is a difference between failing by taking risks and putting yourself out there versus failing by not showing up or sabotaging yourself. If you don’t show up or you self-sabotage, you are failing because you omitted the required action that it took to produce the desired outcome. The same goes for confusion. Confusion is way to hide in our comfort zone and not make a decision. You have to take action, put yourself out there somewhat in failure’s way. Don’t say you don’t know, say you are figuring it out and then figure it out! Don’t use confusion as an excuse not to take action.

Well, that was a lot, and I apologize for going on a rant. But I just have to say that I am excited. I am excited that I failed because, to me, I am improving and moving forward. I am working towards my goal of cutting sugar out of my diet. I am not perfect and I will never be perfect, but I am ok with failing because the more I fail the more confident I will become and I will eventually succeed. I am still working on getting comfortable failing in front of others, but I am already ahead of the game knowing that I can fail and I can get back on track and keep working towards my goal. Believe me when I say, next time I have a setback, I am going to forgive myself, I am going to be gentle on myself, and I will graciously hold my head up knowing that my positive thoughts will lead to my positive feelings, which will lead to my positive actions. It will not lead to me smashing more cookies multiple days in a row because I already feel horrible and gluttonous and guilty.

Go out there, fail, be proud, and move closer to success. My name is Kellie and I am addicted to sugar and sweets. It does not define me nor will it keep me from achieving my goal.

Trying to Love the Skin I’m In

 

Image credit: Alexandra Dal

After my last challenge went so well, I made the decision to try another challenge. I thought it would be a great idea to embrace a piece of me that I’ve never seen in a positive light. I thought it would help me appreciate my inner beauty and accept my flaws. My challenge is to stop wearing foundation/powder and blush on my face. I am still allowing myself to wear eye makeup, but the challenge is not to put any other makeup, besides eye makeup, on my face for 20 days.

How is that going? Let me be reeeeaaaal honest here. It’s not going as well as I hoped. Ok, ok, maybe my skin is doing a lot better and I’m not breaking out as much. However, my confidence is very low and I am uber self-conscious of my skin. Some days I feel as if I am reliving my teenage years. I’ve been trying not to cover my neck and sides of my face with my hair. I’m trying to exude confidence when I walk into a room and I think I feel all eyes on the red bumps on my cheeks and neck and chin. I think about my skin constantly. It’s an absolute full blown obsession at this point.

Let me preface this for a minute. For those of you who don’t know me, I have been dealing with “problem skin” (aka acne) since I was a ripe 12 years old. In 8^th grade my acne was at its worst. I wouldn’t leave the house unless I absolutely had to. I walked with my head down and my hair around my face. I didn’t want to look people in the eye and tried to avoid conversation as much as possible. I was utterly embarrassed. My mother took me to what would be my first of many, many dermatologist appointments. I was prescribed my first round of Isotretinoin (well known brand name Accutane).

I absolutely loved this medication. It worked wonders and it made my complexion clear and blemish free. My confidence went up 110% and I felt comfortable and beautiful in my skin. I didn’t have the horrible side effects that others experienced, which I am eternally grateful for.

However, after being off the medication for a while my skin started breaking out again. This turned into a cycle. I’ve been on Isotretinoin 6 times total and continue to deal with this rutty, problem skin of mine. After my last dermatologist appointment a few months ago, I was informed that they would not be putting me back on Isotretinoin again because they didn’t want to “go through the cycle again”. I was crushed! I’m pretty sure my heart broke. in. half. Instead we are trying a mix of an oral medication and a topical medication. Let me just say that it’s no cure all, but it’s helping.

Of course makeup can cause acne to get worse and I thought maybe if I were to stop wearing foundation/powder and blush it would help clear up my skin more so. After all, my skin did clear up a little bit when I cut desserts/sweets out of my diet. I really wanted to embrace and truly love the skin I am in.

My first day of wearing no cover up was the absolute worst. I have not felt this self-conscious since I was a teenager. I have slight acne scars on my cheeks from years of battling zit nation. My skin tone can be described as a light lobster red shade. My pimples just smile and wink at me every time I look in the mirror. Side note, I’m an obsessive pimple popper, which only makes matters worse.

As I sit here typing this, I am on day 9 of no cover up. Each day is a struggle; a struggle to love my flaws; a struggle to love my skin; a struggle to know I am going out in a beauty obsessed world showing all my imperfections to everyone I come across. But what I’ve learned through the challenge thus far is:
-I will always be my worst critic. Nobody notices as much about my skin as I do.
-Although I may not have the confidence I want or once had, if I can fake it, nobody knows the difference.
-What may be incredibly embarrassing for me may be the best, healthiest thing for me.
-Although I may not stick with the no makeup campaign forever, I know that I can use makeup from time to time to help me on a day when I just need a little confidence boost.
-I am trying every day to love the skin I’m in, accepting each and every flaw of mine. It will never come easy and it’s something I need to actively work on.
-I am in complete control of me and my life (and hopefully, one day, my acne too – come on 30’s, bring me some clear skin!).

Here’s the good side of this challenge. I have seen an improvement in my acne and breakouts. Now, if I could just stop picking, it would be even better. For the first time in my life I feel like I am starting to gain control of my skin. Never mind the fact that I am 28 years old and getting closer to 30 every single day and shouldn’t have the skin of a pubescent boy. But I’m learning and I’m growing and I’m trying my darndest to love this skin I’m in.

4 Ways to Come Back From Vacation Recharged and Ready

I was absolutely honored to write this guest blog post for an incredible site: Radiate Daily. This website focuses on mind, body, and heart and is incredibly inspiring. You can read the original blog post here.

You’ve probably heard it more than once – “I need a vacation” (insert crying face emoji here). We all need a break every once in a while. Naturally, many see vacation as the perfect time to destress and get some respite from work. Often times we get back from vacation and find ourselves dragging our butts back to work, less motivated than when we left.

After spending seven days in beautiful Kauai, I came back recharged and ready to go! I was ready to go home and get back to work (gasp!). I know, strange… Instead of lamenting that I couldn’t spend endless days on the beach, I was itching to get back to the grind.

Vacation for me is a time to regenerate my mind and rejuvenate my drive. Just like a battery, our minds need a jump-start after being drained from the day-in, day-out hustle and bustle of our daily lives.

Here are a few ways I use vacation time to recharge my mind and bounce back to work ready to conquer.

• Do something that scares you a little bit. While in Kauai we went on a helicopter tour (without doors – yikes!) which scared the living daylights out of me. Surprisingly it gave me a moment of clarity. It taught me that life is short and the petty issues I face on a day-to-day basis should not consume my mind and waste my precious time. Plus, the adrenaline boost got my blood rushing and my heart pumping!
• Go on an adventure or do something new (try new foods too!). This helps get the creative juices flowing. For me, it always opens my eyes to a new component of the world I never knew I was missing out on, leading to new ideas, inspiration, and problem solving skills (no, it won’t always turn out favorable). Hiking the Hanakapi’ai trail on the Na Pali coast was quite the adventure! Not only was it absolutely stunning, it was challenging to say the least. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into and didn’t realize how muddy and slippery the trail was going to be (completely foreign to me – the trails at home are very dry). I learned new ways to cross rivers, use walking sticks (who knew these would be SO helpful?!), and how to get over and around obstacles (physical and mental). Boy, that hike certainly made me think hard, brainstorm, and discover new ways to approach unfamiliar situations.
• Take time to clear your mind. Whether it’s lounging on the beach, sitting on a rock overlooking the mountains, or walking down a bustling street, void yourself of “busy” thoughts and just soak in every element around you. Keep yourself open to new sounds, smells, and sights. Clear the clutter from your mind (thus boosting brain power) and appreciate just being.
• Reevaluate your goals and reflect on your career and passions. You may not be in your dream job or even a job you like, however, being away from the situation can help you see everything from a different perspective. The crises you face at work may not be as bad when you are removed from the front line. Think of new ways to tackle issues and work around problems. Use this time to review your career trajectory, if you are on the right path, and set some goals to get to the point you want to be. If you aren’t on the right path, work on a plan to get you there (do you need to take a certification course or online class?). Set those goals, make them measurable, and attach dates to them. Then get ready to get back to work and take charge!

2016 Goal Check-In

Instead of 2016 New Year’s Resolutions, I like to call them my 2016 goals. Some people say that resolutions are meant to be broken. Is that why herds of people viciously abandon their New Year’s Resolutions? Or do they haphazardly make resolutions up just to tell to friends and family how they are going to change their life at the stroke of midnight of a new year? Who knows? For me, goals are something I constantly track and work towards (baby steps peeps), all year long. Not just a wishy washy promise made at the beginning of the year, forever to be forgotten by February (mid-January in some cases).

You may be thinking, it’s the middle of April. Why are checking in on your “2016 goals” now? Here are a few reasons. I do a goal check-in every few months to:
1. See if I am on track. If not I reevaluate my timeline and adjust the completion date. Sometimes these run over into the next year. It doesn’t mean they are not a goal for the current year, it just means I need to continue to work on them and I will eventually accomplish it, whether that be this year, next year, or the following year.
2. Make sure my goals are true to me. Why would I try to accomplish a goal if it no longer fits me, my life, my passions and dreams, or my focus? Nix them if they no longer apply to your life.
3. Adjust the goals to make them realistic based on the baby steps I’ve been working on. If there is no way I am going to accomplish a goal, even with the baby steps, I modify to a more manageable, but still challenging goal.
4. Reaffirm these are the goals I set for myself, not that others have unintentionally set for me. My goals are for me, by me. End of story. I’m not going to let someone get into my head by telling me, “I bet you can’t accomplish XYZ”. Who cares? Don’t make something a goal just to prove someone wrong (or right). (Read more about my struggle with proving myself in CrossFit HERE)

 

So…What are my goals?

To start, I accomplished one goal already in January – going through hundreds of family pictures and sending them off to be scanned and put in the cloud (I just didn’t have time and the money was worth it). The rest of these goals were already modified once in March. Looking at them, it’s uh, time to get real with myself…

• Pay off final credit card by 4/1/17 I am changing the date to be more realistic. This is a bit too aggressive considering I’ll be paying rent again starting in July and need to reevaluate my budget. My new deadline is going to be 5/11/17 (my 29^th birthday eeek!)
• Move out of the parental units casa by 7/1/16 We are on track here!
• Complete Associates degree in Computer Information Systems- Digital Media by December 2018 I have two degrees already. Really, I need to see if the entire degree is necessary for what I’d like to do or if it makes more sense to take the classes that apply to my needs and wants. I am already signed up for 3 online classes for this summer.
• Get Powers of Attorney drawn up by 12/15/16 Working for estate planning attorneys I have come to realize how important this is. If I get in a wreck and go into a coma my parents and boyfriend cannot access my bank account to pay my bills or make medical decisions for me… Yikes!
• Pay off IRS by 12/31/16 This goal is on track and not by choice. I’m on a payment plan.
• Run 1.5 miles in 12:30 and run 1.5 miles 2x/week by 11/30/16 I’m nixing this goal and creating an entirely new one. Most people that know me have come to find out that I am a mermaid and mermaids don’t run.
• Save $1,000 in my emergency fund by 12/15/16 I’ve recently had a set back with this. I emptied my emergency fund to pay a bill because I decided to spend money a lululemon instead of follow my budget (whole different blog post to come!)
• Do the splits all the way down (center and side splits) by 12/31/16 I work on this pretty consistently 4-5 days a week. I don’t feel like I’m getting very far, but I will continue to chip away at it.
• Only eat sweets on the weekends by 4/1/16 I have definitely already failed this. Boooooo. What do I do? I’m going to adjust the goal, reset the date, and try again.
• Start my company (apply for LLC and have a product design ready to be manufactured) by 10/31/16 This is definitely something that I’ve been wanting to do for a while. I need to figure out some baby steps to get here first.

Drumroll… Below are my adjusted goals for 2016

• Pay off final credit card by 4/1/17 5/11/17
• Move out of the parental units casa by 7/1/16
• Complete Associates degree in Computer Information Systems- Digital Media by December 2018 Complete three online summer classes by 8/7/16
• Get Powers of Attorney drawn up by 12/15/16
• Pay off IRS by 12/31/16
• Run 1.5 miles in 12:30 and run 1.5 miles 2x/week by 11/30/16 Increase my aerobic capacity and general rowing ability by doing the Rowing WOD program and incorporating Assault Bike workouts 7/2/16 (read more about how I’m focusing on myself, my fitness, and my workouts after the 2016 CrossFit Open HERE)
• Save $1,000 $500 in my emergency fund by 12/15/16
• Do the splits all the way down (center and side splits) by 12/31/16
• Only eat sweets on the weekends by 4/1/16 5/14/16
• Start my company (apply for LLC and have a product design ready to be manufactured) by 10/31/16

There you have it, my 2016 goals! I will do another check around July, stay tuned!

What are your goals? How did you choose them and how are you staying on track?