Tag Archives: life

The Power of Writing Down Goals

22 Mar

image from online success with greg de tisi

Last week Trainer Kenny gave me homework. No, it wasn’t to do more squats correctly. 🙂 He wanted me to write down a fitness goal, to make it specific, and give it a time limit. Then he wanted me to write down five positive reasons why I wanted to reach this goal, and five negative reasons. Procrastinator that I am, I didn’t remember until last night, and we’re meeting today. Overachiever that I am, I decided to write down two. Notorious Over-Sharer that I am, I figured I’d share them with you lovely people. (You’re not sick of my many goal lists yet, are you? Good.)  After all, what’s better for accountability than making a goal public? (Please note, Trainer Kenny was very careful to say that these goals don’t have to be realistic. So keep the snickering to a minimum, please.)

Goal #1: Build lean muscle mass and a strong core to help me perform better when I run (hopefully) two half-marathons this October. 

Why?

  • Muscle = speed. I want a better time than what I achieved last October – ‘Finished.’
  • Muscle = endurance. Running all or almost all of (hopefully) two half marathons, instead of walking most due to a ankle injury, will feel amazing
  • Core strength = stability. Stability = better form. Better form = more efficient running, which equals less chance of injury and better time. A win all around.
  • Core strength also improves balance. I could do with less falling down on my runs, or in life in general.
  • A’s running one with me, and I’d love to keep up with him so we could cross the finish line together.
  • To prove to myself I can do it.

Why not?

  • I need my legs and hips to be stronger to support my knees. I don’t want my knee to almost go out again and have to fear that I won’t be able to finish what I started.
  • Weak runners are injured runners.
  • Try putting on a backpack with sixty pounds of weights in it and tell me if it makes running 13.1 miles easier. No? That’s what I’m dealing with now, and I’m tired of it.
  • A’s running one with me, and I don’t want him waiting around for hours for his slow wife to finish.
  • I don’t want to fail.

Goal #2: I want to lose all 60 pounds this year. (Hey! He said it didn’t have to be realistic!)

Why?

  • I’m 28 1/4 years old right now. I’m not getting any younger, and as far as my weight is concerned, I figure it’s either uphill or downhill from here. I choose uphill.
  • That will put me right in the middle of a healthy body-fat percentage.
  • I’ll be happier in my body.
  • I’ll be able to choose clothes from a store based on their style, not on whether or not they have my size.
  • I have a whole wardrobe – an awesome wardrobe, a fun wardrobe – in my closet that I no longer fit into. I want my clothes back!
  • Um, hello? 30 Before 30 list!
  • These boobs are seriously ridiculous to exercise with. They’ve always been big, no getting away from that, but I’m looking forward to getting back to big and away from obscene.

Why not?

  • I don’t want to be too tired/fat/out of shape to play with my kids one day.
  • I don’t want to wonder if my weight affects A’s attraction to me anymore. (He says it doesn’t, but you know how those nagging doubts go.)
  • I feel heavy, clumsy, and ugly right now when I dance. And I love to dance. Plus, I have little stamina so when I dance I can’t do it for as long as I’d like.
  • I’m afraid if I don’t change now, I’ll be this way forever. And I don’t want to be.
  • I don’t want to die early, or get any of the diseases connected to obesity.

So those are my goals! What’s the power of writing them down? Dunno. I’ll have to ask Trainer Kenny and get back to you.

Do you believe in the power of writing a goal down? Have you ever done it? How’d it go?

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Mid-February

16 Feb

It’s that time again. Sometime around mid-February I see the weight of the season settle on my man’s shoulders like a bag being slowly filled with sand. He comes home, his walk from the car a little slower. The look on his face when he enters our home – his refuge, his sanctuary – tells me he’s needing more, that the long hours over a longer stretch of days is starting to wear him thin. When he leans into my neck as I reach out for a hug, sinks into my ready kiss, I know that he sees home each time he rests his eyes, weary from seeing patterns in numbers.

My man, the accountant. The provider. My hero.

He works so that we can build a life. So that I can have options. So we can plan a future. He loves what he does, true, but months of all work and little play gets old quickly. He’s proud of his work, and comes home with stories of conquering mountains of tax law. My weary conqueror.

Sometime in February I can expect that he’ll need more hugs, more time lingering over a good meal and a glass of wine, more priority placed on the little time we can call our own. Sundays are off-limits to everything except church. My dutiful man, who makes time for the laundry and still does the dishes, sometimes a day late, but they’re done just the same. He knows that, unlike years past, I have a full plate as well and pulls his weight. My partner, my helpmate.

In February I make sure my bosom is extra soft to catch his weary head; my embrace is extra warm to last him until he comes home again. I miss him, and cherish each bit I get.

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Friday Five – My Life According to Nidhi

3 Feb

In case you couldn’t tell from my header, I love the art of Nidhi Chanani. So many of you have asked where I got my headers that I thought I’d share a few of my current favorite pieces, as well as giving her a much deserved plug. She is letting me use her art just because I emailed her and told her how awesome I think she is, after all. Her work embodies the exuberant spirit, the sense of freedom, and the appreciation of quiet moments I wanted to bring to life in BiRL. It also pays homage to my heart-home city and my heritage. I so love everything she makes, and really want some Nidhi art to be part of redecorating our bedroom one day.

As I was going through some of her latest creations, I was struck by how well a few of her prints illustrated my life right now. For those of you who don’t know, A is an accountant. He ceases to exist from January through April 15th. This year it’s been more like October through April 15th. He gets home late and works on weekends, and I miss him. This year he’s really laying down some boundaries and just saying no to working on Sundays, so we can still go to church and have the rest of the day together. So this Friday Five has a double purpose: to celebrate my favorite parts of my day with my man, and to share some truly great art.

We set the alarm clock at least half an hour before the earliest of us has to get up so we can cuddle up and spoon. Usually A. hits the alarm and whispers to a sleepy wife to turn over so he can hold me. We spend every morning in each other’s arms, dozing, hitting snooze, until the reality of the day forces us up. It is, without a doubt, my favorite part of the day.

Especially now, A usually leaves the house before I do, planting kiss after kiss on my sleepy lips. Half the time I have to call him when I wake up to confirm his ‘notes’ to me before he left. He always tells me when he’s going to be home and if he fed the dogs, but in my sleep-addled state I never can remember. I remember the “I love you’s” though, and the “I’ll miss you, have a good day’s.” (I think the girl kind of looks like me, too. Yes?)

This is so how I feel when A comes home. I don’t always show it – I’m usually up to my elbows in dinner prep – but the thrill, the joy, the peace that’s in this piece is there. Oh, and sub two over-exuberant dogs for the cats.

Ok, this one is a bit of a stretch. We do this sort of thing – eating in bed – when we’re on vacation and I absolutely love it. But by the time we get under the covers we’re both in the  mood for quiet down-time, not a snack. But we often have the late night snack in our living room, just before bed. So bad, I know, but these nights A gets home so late so we end up staying up talking or watching a show, and a snack just helps sometimes.

This is absolutely us, every night I don’t have trouble sleeping. We both love to read before bed. It sets A at peace, it calms my mind. This piece shows us one light-click away from dreamland. And the next day we get to start all over again, in each other’s arms.

Thanks to Nidhi  Chanani for sharing her art with Bigger in Real Life. You can view Nidhi’s etsy shop here, or click on any of the images to view their listings.

If someone drew a picture of your life today, what would it look like?

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(Re)Learning to Dream

5 Jan

Did you ever give up on a dream because life got in the way?

photo from thewonderforest.com

It seems like everyone is talking about dreaming lately. I suppose it’s fitting; we tend to examine our lives more closely every time January 1st comes around. From a talk I recently attended at my church on helping women to achieve their dreams, to several blogs on my blog roll, to talking with my best friend about whether we have the right dreams for our lives right now, having dreams is on the brain. The most common lament I hear, especially from other women, is that they don’t even know how to begin to figure out what their dream is. Either they don’t know how to look ahead, the future is too big with too many options, or they’re just not used to thinking about their own desires anymore.

I’ve had some amazing responses to my 30 before 30 list since I made it public. Friends have shared their own lists with me that they dreamed up a long time ago, others have started lists of their own. I’ve had more than a couple of my (crazy, loveable, absolutely fabulous) aunts ask me what I thought about them making a six before sixty list, or other some such integers, which I told them was an amazing idea! I never thought when I published my little list that I would get to hear all about others’ dreams, both the ones they look forward to and ones they’d given away. Which got me wondering: how do we keep dreaming when life keeps on coming?

When I starting writing down what I wanted to accomplish before I turned thirty, I surprised myself by thinking about all the things I’d ever wanted to do instead of shooting blindly into my future. For example:

When I was a kid, running down the street to ask the neighborhood kids “want to ride bikes?” was the highlight of my Summer’s day. I stopped riding sometime around junior high – I must have outgrown my bike or something – and haven’t been on one since. But I always looked wistfully at the kids cruising the strip down Huntington Beach while I was on vacation and envied the bike messengers streaming down the streets in SF when I lived in the city. So “Own and Ride a Bike With a Basket and a Bell” went on the list.

I love school, I’m good at school, I was happy when I was in school. I stopped going before I reached my personal academic goals, so ‘Go Back to School’ went on the list.

Since turning 21 I’ve been invited on approximately 50 wine tastings trips. Due to consistently poor timing I’ve been able to go on exactly none. I’ve dreamed of going wine tasting on a gorgeous Spring day, wearing a sundress and sandals, laughing with the man I love while sipping a wine that will remind us of this perfect day months later when we open a bottle to compliment the perfectly prepared meal I set on the table. So that went on the list as well.

Every time I tried to imagine what my life might look like years from now, and what sort of goals I’d have to set to get there, I got so hopelessly overwhelmed that my potential dreams quickly drowned in the sea of possibilities. The future is large and nebulous, but my past? My past is set. My past is a vast ocean of memories – times I was happy, times I was inspired, times where I felt like I was doing exactly the right thing for myself at the time. Our pasts are a veritable field of dreams, ripe for the harvest.

Jon Acuff wrote a brilliant post on what he calls ‘dreaming backwards’, and he had this to say on dreaming:

Instead of asking forward-facing questions like, “What do I want to do with my life?”, we dream backward and ask, “What have I done in my life that I’ve loved?” And the answer we get is not a bottomless, faceless list of options that could apply to anyone. It’s a personal, small, uniquely tailored to our hearts and our souls, handful of life experiences that made us feel alive.

It hurts my heart when I hear people say they don’t know how to dream anymore. So this is my antidote to being overwhelmed with possibility and not knowing where to start: start by thinking about times you were happy, when you were doing something you loved, when you felt needed. Think about what you might have done if no one ever said “you can’t.” Think about what you were working towards once upon a time, before life, finances, relationships, and busyness got in your way. Think about it, and then dream big. Because life’s too short to live it halfway.

What dream might you dare to revisit?

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Haloo, Martigan!

20 Dec

image

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We didn’t think we’d find a dog this quickly. But you know what they say, when the world closes a door, God opens a window.

We’ve been trying to adopt a dog since October. We’ve wanted a dog since I wrote My List, and between now and then we lost a dog, gave back a dog, so, yeah, this dog has been a long tine coming. But Martigan is perfect.

He’s funny, fuzzy, and non-sneezy. He loves us, loves Logan, and loves kids. He hates riding in the car, which honestly I find rather funny. He’s part cat, soft as a bunny, and super smart. Already house trained, but keeps bringing his toys outside and sticks inside. He’s young – only one – and brings a much-needed energy into our lives. I didn’t expect to hit the doggy lottery so soon, but I’m so glad we did. I’m grateful and humbled, and happy to finally have a dog who’s not sick, and who’s the right fit. Hooray for keeping a goal crossed of f the list, and praise God for a new puppy!

Update: Our last dog, Westley, found the prefect home, who signed the adoption papers the day we adopted Martigan. Thanks DPS for making two families more complete.

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