Weighing Me Down

Identifying My Weights

The interesting thing about 2020 is all of the reflective time we had due to being on state mandated lock down, if we took full advantage of the "opportunity" to reflect. I did. I had plenty of time to reflect. December 31 was no different - we couldn't go anywhere to celebrate in the usual New Year's Eve fashion - church for Watch Night Service and then a party for some dancing. Not 2020; nope 2020 was different. My eyes hurt from reading all things news and social media. Read, reflect. Read, reflect. Read some more, reflect - you get the drift. One particular read, reflect cycle led me to an Instagram (IG) Influencer's page, @theshelahmarie, where her challenge was to not make resolutions or goals - but to focus on "after the goal"; to connect to the feeling of accomplishing the resolution/goal. Completely hooked!!! In my reflecting on this new way to create resolutions, I came up with two questions to get me started: What did I want to feel different about and what did I want to feel?

Okay Okay For Real For Real This Time

Those two questions led me to wanting to feel lighter and freer - physically on the scale (gained the copious Corona 15 on top of the 30), emotionally on my body (stress carrying around physically), and visually in my home (clearing out the clutter). I closed my eyes to get a sense of what completing these goals would feel like. I connected with wanting to feel a sense of accomplishment/fulfillment and I felt this time, I would really be motivated - because who doesn't want to feel accomplished! I tried really hard last year to lose weight! I enlisted the help of a trainer, got a meal plan, got an exercise plan and saw results - until February 2020.

The stress piled on when the virus hit - shifting from being in the office to working from home; along with the increased pace of work with less walking/movement; equalling a recipe for shoulder tension. Clutter was everywhere, clutter from the Christmas holiday, to clutter of clean folded laundry piles, to clutter of electronic items waiting for recycle, that I affectionately called recycling clutter. Recycling clutter; you know, the things you don't want to throw in the trash, so you put them aside until you have time to deal with them - electronics, mail, clothes for donations, items to return - aka recycling clutter.

IG, reflection, journaling; these three things led to documenting the feelings I wanted to have after accomplishing some much needed tasks. For some reason, I was not motivated to do anything about my weight, my stress or my clutter projects. Apathy? Maybe. Laziness? Nah. This challenge to connect to the feeling on the other side of the task - that was my motivation. To visualize/see the change and write about how I felt once the change was completed - that challenge completely pulled me past the humdrumness of day to day living.

Progress to Date

With thirty days into 2021, I am happy to report that I have made progress and am feeling accomplished! The low hanging fruit on my list, if I had to prioritize weight loss, de-stress, or recycling projects - I started with the recycling projects. The momentum I had from finding out that Best Buy accepts old electronics (yessss!!! my custom built desktop from 2000 finally had another home) catapulted me from my downstairs office, past the Christmas clutter in the den, to my upstairs closet. My only wish is that I took before pictures of my closet. It may not be a huge deal but hey, I can see the floor! I can walk into my walk-in closet! I can find clothes. I have access to my jewelry. My shoes have a home inside my closet. I could gather the clothes for donation, drop them to the cleaners, and drop them off to the charities accepting clothes. Cleaning/de-cluttering my closet enabled me to repurpose a tote for the Christmas clutter downstairs. All the Christmas decorations have been stored neatly in the garage.

I am so looking foward to what the rest of the year will bring! I realize I like the feeling of accomplishment! I'm looking forward to feeling that sense of "hey, I did this and I did this for me" and the way I have my journal set up for 2021, I have multiple opportunities to connect to this feeling all throughout the year!