Friday 5 Mini Year in Review

My Friday five today is a little recap of what I’ve been doing this year. I wanted to connect with my blogging friends in sharing what I’ve done since I’ve been so inconsistent with blogging for a while now and felt like doing so with Running on Happy & Fairytales and Fitness for the Friday Five 2.0 Link Up was a great way to do so!

So here are five things that are new with me.

1.

I am now a Tupperware Consultant! I connected with my personal consultant online and honestly really had no idea what Tupperware was! Now I can’t believe I didn’t know about the brand name and realize that so many items I grew up with in the kitchen of my grandma’s, our own, and even my boyfriend’s house now where I live are Tupperware filled! My interest peaked with my first order of Fridgesmarts and Vent n Serves (I’ll be sure to talk about in a later post to keep this one short!) Then I got the amazing opportunity to enter a drawing for a FREE Consultant Kit and I actually WON! I couldn’t pass up $300 worth of products for FREE and I said YES! My entrepreneur self immediately got into the Tupperware Business Opportunity when I got my kit and connected with my team! So if you have a warranty issue, looking to upgrade old items, want to browse, or just already LOVE Tupperware I’d love to help you with all your TW needs!

2.

I ran my first Mud/Obstacle Course Race this year…and I LOVED IT! I had been eyeing Tough Mudder for a while now but it definitely looks very intense for me. I’m not sure what got my interest in wanting to pursue a mud run, but I’ve been so eager to try one. I found one near me that wasn’t too high in price range that I signed my boyfriend and I up for! Recap to come later, but in short I think I really enjoyed the challenge and excitement of doing different obstacles throughout the race rather than just straight running. I am definitely training next year to take on Tough Mudder 2018.

3.

I’m an aunt!… AGAIN! My newest nephew was just born MONDAY! After Christmas baby! He’s so small (only 6lbs!) but his arrival (3 weeks earlier than expected although still full term) has caused my “vacation” off work this week to be a hectic, scattered few days! I’ve been out of my house almost every day for at least half the day helping my sister with her other three kids. It’s nice to be around family, but it’s also exhausting to be around kids for long! Especially my high energy bunch! My eating and sleeping have not been stable and it’s been hard getting all the things I had planned to do during this free time done.

4.

I’m set on pursuing a career I love! Although I have a job, it’s not where I want to be. My dream is to work from home, or at least for myself for the most part. I have a great interest pursuing blogging more seriously, although mostly just to connect with the world for now. I would love to start teaching group fitness classes for the course I got my certification in back in September, but that requires practice of the routines first! Eventually I want to get into personal training and really help people create healthy lifestyles throughout the whole family! Right now I am pursuing online accountability coaching through support and helping others pursue their fitness and health goals with at-home workout programs. So if you want to jump in a self-loving, self-healing, and healthy accountability community let me know!

5.

I have a lot of self-contemplation to be done. Lately my thoughts and overall mindset have been in a funk. I’m not entirely sure why or what even, I just know something is different within me and I feel I need to have a serious sit down and thought out of everything I am feeling. There are many things I feel I need to change about my mindset and myself not because I need to be a certain way but I just need to figure out my way. I need to understand my emotions and find solutions for my downfalls, as well as pursue what I love and find joy in more. I need to understand myself so that I can keep growing and express myself correctly. Does anyone ever feel off balanced by what they are doing and how they feel? There was a point I felt so disconnected from myself this year, I never want to feel like that again. I want to always be filled with joy, love, and inspiration.

What are 5 things that changed or have changed about you this year?

Joy and Peace Over Stress and Drain

I have yet to decide how I want to “journal” my 2017 year.

My top ideas are to have a one sentence journal of pen and paper. At least one sentence because sometimes I really can’t find time or I am a bit lazy to sit and write out a whole “entry.”

I also want to connect my personal journal to my blog. I initially had the idea of writing for at least 10 minutes a day to write out some blog posts but I’m not sure if I’d really keep up with that even though it does seem like such a small bit of time.

I need to think of something, a habit I CAN create without much strain in doing so to start with that will give me peace of mind. Rather than feeling guilty or stressed over a certain chunk of time I feel having it start small helps keep to it and just starting is usually the hard part. I’m sure some days I will only write one sentence while others I’ll be so inspired once I start I’ll have a whole blog post written out!

I want my blog to bring me joy not stress. I also want to document moments, emotions, thoughts, ideas, and so on. This I feel can be done by writing at least one sentence a day, that I can always turn back to when I’m in a different frame of mind or have more time to expand on. Sometimes I feel like when I write I’m someone else, because when I read back my words I can hardly comprehend that I wrote them.

Writing is interesting, it can be fun, and sometimes it really does bring peace to my mind and heart to just write it out! I decided to hop on Deb Runs Wednesday Word link-up today but I got carried away with goals as I’m sure a whole lot of us are with the current year nearing its end.

Today’s word is PEACE. I like this word at this time because as a new year comes I’ve often filled myself with anxiety and stress over what I’ve done, what I’ll do, and how much I should do still before the new year! I have to clean, sort, organize, etc. etc. etc. but this sucks out the fun of closing a year and welcoming a new one. I feel defeated faster than I can finish the countdown! So for the remaining days of 2016 I will have PEACE. I have plenty of time to work out my imperfections and make progress towards all my goals, and it is not set by any time, date, or person but ME.

 

Is there such a thing as too much blogging???

I know everyone has their own preferences, personalities, and so on. This is why I really don’t believe there is a single answer that is right or wrong. I thought I would still write out this post as I’ve decided to share my thoughts aloud here on my blog more often than not. I feel like writing things out has always helped me find some clarity in my thoughts and emotions. Even more fun if my posts I share can create dialogue with my readers, so please feel free to chime in!

Embrace Your Imperfection

I think I’ve realized I can have (or rather I have) a bit of an obsessive compulsion to be overly organized or structured. I guess you can say I’m halted by a fake vision of “perfect.” Because we all know perfection DOES NOT EXIST!

I’ve been MIA from my blog for 5 months!? Simply because I couldn’t find or make the time to sit down and type out a “post of perfection.” My fear of being disorganized, judged, and imperfect have only stunned my growth and potential! After all we

Still Being A Goal Getter & Weekly Chaser

Despite my lack of blogging recently I have not stopped my weekly habit of goal setting and evaluation. I haven’t been as productive as I probably could have these past few months of the year in achieving my goals, but have seen progress still. I’m not completely satisfied with my habits in goal setting and progression quite yet though. I’ve actually been trying to change my tactics by using what I’ve learned and making it my own.

A New Month Will Bring New Things

Hello readers! I apologize for my long absence! There isn’t really any specific reason I stepped aside from my little blogging space but the fact that I just let time get away me and failed to plan content in an organized manner. Ultimately this lead to me becoming overwhelmed by blogging, and I ended up avoiding this space altogether.

 
When I first started researching starting a blog a lot of advice in how to get started made it seem easy, simple. “Just Start, just write, just do it.” So I did and I was lucky to be welcomed by the blogging community so positively. I was fortunate enough to quickly learn and discover how to network with other bloggers through Runaway Bridal Planner‘s Blog Hops, which quickly connected me with so many great bloggers with common interests as me.

 
I quickly learned the possibilities for my blog as well as connected with some great new people I started to see as my blogging friends. I learned just as quickly that my original “Just Do It” mindset would not suffice in the growth I wanted for my blog.

 
In order to grow my blog and reach people how I wanted to it was a necessity that I would have to put a considerable amount of effort and time into my online space. I knew that in order to provide the value I wanted to give my readers I knew I could not just write a post to fill this space.

 
As I mentioned before, I became overwhelmed by blogging and rather than get myself organized and working I let it sit neglected on the back burner (for too long). However, my blog, my readers, and my vision for what I hoped to create here has never once left my heart nor my mind.
So here I am again at last! There are many things I hope to share, learn and discuss here on my blog. I hope that you will visit back often, share, and engage in discussion with me.
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How to Make Progress on Your Goals

I believe the flu has finally passed its stay with me! I feel so much better than I did the week before. No more nausea, coughing, and loss of appetite! It is taking me quite a bit to start up a routine for myself so that I am able to hit all my goals progressively every day.

I have a strong belief in “progress not perfection” though and truly feel that at the beginning even disorganized steps towards a routine is better than waiting and waiting for nothing to change. So this week I’m going to be a bit of a mess trying to figure out a rhythm I can keep and then hitting it head on day after day! Things are always hard at the beginning especially.

Set your goals. What is it that you want to accomplish or create as a habit?

Set your reasons. Your goals need to really motivate you and pull you forward. They should excite you when you think of them. Really believe in them and think of them to already be true. How do you feel knowing you are debt-free? To be your own boss? Free to travel where and when you please?

Stick to your affirmations. They will keep you going when progress feels slow or motivation is low.

Make a plan of action. I like to think of all the details beforehand, whether you have fitness, finance, or just a personal goal. I always write them out detailed with what I need to do, any tools I need to have, do I need support and help from specific people, who are these people, allocate time slots to work on my goals, and so on.

Have a contingency plan. It helps to be prepared for obstacles and setbacks. First you want to brainstorm what could go wrong and how you can deal with this. I like to emotionally prepare myself for the setbacks I might face. I start by saying this can happen, and if it does I forgive you because you will move forward still. Forgiveness and strength are my two key factors in building and keeping momentum. Too many times I scolded myself over a setback and rather than feeling like I deserved something for my hard work and focusing on all the progress I had been making, I’d only find myself focused on the minor mishaps I had. This ultimately led me down disappointment, frustration, and self-sabotage. So know what can go wrong, and be prepared beforehand in case it does so that you can quickly bring yourself back on route.

Have confidence. No matter what! Every step you make towards your goals is progress. Do not doubt yourself even if others do so. Do not doubt yourself even when you feel the universe is telling you to do so. Sometimes the best things in life are the ones we have to work the hardest for. The road might not be full of sunshine and pretty flowers, but both the journey and end is always what you make of it.

Enjoy the journey. I feel that so many people get discouraged by focusing on the goals they set, and they are constantly looking for results. Some things will take days, weeks, or even years. When we focus on the process we avoid the thoughts focused on where we aren’t or how slow we are moving. Enjoying the journey enables you to appreciate every day, because you will be taking small steps in your daily routine to reach your goals.

For example, I want to be debt free from my student loans by June 2016. I can either focus on the end goal and think how I still have $7K in loans, how I still have so much to pay off, how I don’t feel I have enough to pay off my balance by my goal date. Yet, I refuse to do this, and it really is a exercise of the way you think. I felt these same thoughts for awhile at first. Then when I started focusing on my progress I found myself far more excitable about my goal and the steps I had been taking all along. I was doing the same actions, but changing my mind frame really made a huge difference. Now I focus on the everyday. Wow, only $7K to go from my original $16K. I only had to spend $20 to fill up on gas today, that’s more money to pay off my loan! Praise to not buying that fast food today! I’m staying healthy and saving money in my food budget to pay off my loan! I’m working today to pay off my loans. I feel liberated already from my student debt because I believe in the actions I am taking daily and am grateful for every extra penny that comes my way. Even when setbacks do happen, like how my car battery needs replacement, rather than focus on the oh no less money in my wallet, more money spent. I think to myself great! I only need to replace the battery! It can be worse, and when it is, it is. I won’t let life throw me down because I get to control how I react so that I can accept what is thrown at me, think positively because things will work out, and take action to get myself back on track.

I hope that you find the strength, confidence, and drive to take actions towards your goals. My goals have remained the same since last week, I feel these are very close to my heart and couldn’t scratch one off for another so I ended up adding to my number of goals rather than changing it up again, as you can see below.

1. Pay off my student loans of $7K by June
2. Develop a routine/schedule/budget to enjoy life more
3. Build my running endurance & speed to a 30 minute/< 5k time by sticking to my 5k training.
4. Live clutter-free by decluttering/cleaning 2x a month and removing all my sale items from my storage
5. Develop healthy eating habits w/weekly meal prepping and planning
6. Build strength and complete 21 Day Fix and be able to do a full push-up and pull-up by 2017
7. Grow my blog by blogging 3x a week& visiting 2 bloggers daily
8. Pursue a career in fitness by helping3 people a month reach their goals
9. Create balance w/daily mediation, weekly yoga/pilates practice
10. Learn new skills starting with practicing Spanish daily with Duolingo and audio books
11. Build my social media presence, beginning with Goal: Reach 1K followers by the end of the month by developing a consistent focus with quality photos.

Link Ups: Weekly Chase via Road Runner Girl and Weekly Wrap via MissSippiPiddlin

Over Sickness and into Action

The new feeling of a new month always excites me, but also unsettles me. I dislike to think of time moving so fast forward, but am always excited to set up for a positive and productive new month ahead!

Thursday Tryouts: Pilates & Finding Balance

This week has been a strange for me. Due to a slow season for my type of work, we were given the entire week off work this week. It has been strange not having to wake up or having to get out the door at a certain time. Despite my efforts to continue with my normal sleeping routine, it seems my body or rather my mind knows I do not have work and tries to sneak itself more hours of sleeping. At first I was frustrated but then decided that as long as I

Triumphant Over Our Inner Nay-Sayer

One of the main things I’ve learned about and have really enjoyed these past months post graduation is personal development. I had honestly never really heard the term or knew about the concept before I joined the Misfit Republic team.

It definitely unsettles me that we don’t learn about