How's Your Year Going?

So here we are, at the beginning of September, entering the 4th quarter of 2019. How has your year gone so far? Did you set some goals for yourself last January, and if so, have you reached them or made progress towards reaching them?

I did set some goals for myself...one was to lose 50 pounds. I needed to lose about twice that, but that felt like a reasonable goal that would still be a significant accomplishment. I have not done as well as I'd hoped on that one. So far I've lost 18 pounds. I can feel ashamed of the fact that I haven't reached my goal, or PROUD of how far I've come. My natural response is to beat myself up, but I'm fighting that and focusing on the positive. One thing that helps is to put some tangible value on what I HAVE accomplished. Tonight I will gather up 18 pounds worth of canned goods and bags of beans and such and put them all into some of my reusable grocery bags and pick that up and hold it for a few minutes...maybe put it in a backpack and walk around with it on for a bit just to remind myself how much that affects my body.

Another goal I set was to pay off my credit cards. I had gotten a debt consolidation loan in June of 2018, but it didn't cover everything, so I was still whittling on the remainder. I am proud to say that I have accomplished this goal and have a $0 balance on all of my cards now. I have closed any that had an annual fee, or asked the company to remove that. My credit scores are vastly improved.

One thing I didn't expect to accomplish this year, but have, is to buy a new car...my first EVER ACTUALLY NEW car, as in nobody else has ever owned it. I know that most people would say that a new car is a bad investment, but I am a single woman who doesn't have a lot of money to spend on repairs and doesn't have the tools or knowhow to do them myself, so a reliable car with a full warranty is a smart choice for me, plus I got a very good deal on it...it was actually LESS than the used 2017 model of the same vehicle that I was considering because I bought it when they were starting to get the 2020 models in, and they wanted to get rid of the 2019's. It's a red Buick Encore...very cute, gets great gas mileage, and is a joy to drive. My car payment is under $250 and no, it's not leased, that's BUYING.

I also got my house refinanced, and took some cash out to do some much needed home improvements. I have had some trees that were a danger to the house removed, and have scheduled an appointment to have my ancient heat and air system replaced as soon as it cools down a bit. By the end of the year, I hope to have purchased all the flooring I need to tackle that major project. I am replacing flooring in all 3 bedrooms, the hallway, the living room and the dining room...in other words, the whole house except the bathrooms and kitchen. I plan to lay down vinyl plank flooring. Right now I have torn out carpet in most of those areas and have the concrete slab exposed. It ain't pretty, but it smells better than the old nasty carpet!

So...back to my weight goal. I've lost 18 of the 50 I wanted to lose this year. I have 4 months left to work on this goal. 32 pounds in 4 months is actually pretty do-able, especially when you consider that I have recently been off the rails a bit, so the first 8-10 will probably come off pretty fast. There are 17 weeks left in the year. If I lose just 1.9 pounds per week, I'll reach my goal!

Today I started pushing myself to get at least 500 steps per hour on my pedometer starting at 8am when I get to work. By the time I leave work at 5pm that will put me at 5,000. I've started tracking my food again. In a few weeks I will be starting a Couch to 5K training program to prepare for the Spa Running Festival that will take place on November 16th. I plan to participate as a walker this year.

Will I reach my goal? I don't know, but I will certainly make more progress towards it, and that's a plus no matter how you look at it. It would be SO EASY to just kick back and tell myself "the holidays are coming...I may as well wait until January to start again, but if I do that, those 18 pounds are likely to come on back to roost on my hips and thighs and I am not ok with that. I need to .

So what will you do with your final quarter of 2019? Make it count!