Time to Prepare to Return to My Journey

Christmas is over.  The new year is just four short days away.  That means it's time to start preparing for getting back on my journey of losing weight, looking fabulous, and living healthy.

I know, I know, hold your applause.  Admit it, you're a little tired of hearing about my personal, boring life and you're ready to start hearing about what this blog is supposed to be about....my weight loss.  Well, congratulations!!  It is time.  Before you start cracking out the champagne bottles, I will forewarn you.  Even though I'm starting my journey, again, and I'm starting it guns blazing at full throttle - I won't necessarily be posting about my eating and my working out and my training and my calorie counting (or lack thereof) every day.  This is a diary of a mad, fat woman, and there is/ will be more to my life than just the weight loss aspect of it.

OK, now that's out of the way, let's get to a few things.  I'm going to start off with my plans for the new year.  I'm really going to be hitting it hard starting Saturday, so here's what is in store for the beginning of 2011:

1.  Couch to 5K. This is something I've wanted to do for a while, but never really got around to.  As I type this, I am downloading the podcasts from 5k101.com.  It's an 8 week program, so a little slower pace than other C25k programs and I'm OK with that.  The podcasts are upbeat, and will help with my training - I'm excited to start using them!

2.  Yoga.  This is not for working out.  I will be starting the practice of yoga - for meditation, de-stressing, and strengthening my muscles.  I really want to start getting on a more spiritual platform with my lifestyle - and that will include the practice of decluttering my mind as I declutter my body.

3.  Meditation.  This goes hand in hand with the yoga.  I will do a yoga flow first thing in the morning, and then ending my day with 30 minutes of meditation.  I used to be very "into" meditation a while back, and I really want to get there again.  I am not a religious person, but I used to be very spiritual...I want that person back to help guide me through my journey.

4.  Balanced diet.  Duh, right?  Can't lose weight without a proper diet.  Not the 'D' word that I hate so much - but wholesome, clean, foods.  I will remind you all that I'm not "dieting" I'm changing my diet so that the foods I prepare and eat will be with me forever.

5.  2:1x6.  This goes with the diet, but I wanted a list of 5 things.  I, unlike many of my weight loss journey friends, do not count calories.  I base my diet on portion size and a ratio of two servings of carbs to one serving of protein at each and every meal.  I will also go back to eating six times a day - something I haven't done in far too long.  I will eat my three 'square' meals a day and three snacks - but all of the meals will have the 2:1 ratio.  Lots of veggies fall in to my carb quota...that and my all time fav: brown rice.

OK, so there's the first 5 items on my to-do list.  This isn't something I'm going to ease myself in to.  Starting Saturday - yes, January 1st, everything goes in to full-speed ahead, complete change over, I get my life back!

You may recall that I mentioned a few weeks ago my "Eat, Pray, Love" mentality that I wanted to experiment with.  That included me spending the months of October - January eating basically whatever I wanted.  I stopped exercising, and focused on school - which was taking every spare minute and every other minute of my life.  My body has paid the consequences of that hiatus - let me tell you - and now I'm more motivated and pumped than ever to step into the next phase: Pray that I can make up for the lost time.

I kid.  In all seriousness, the second phase is to connect more on a spiritual level to my weight loss.  I truly want my journey to be a life long event - something I always work for, something I always maintain.  In order to do that, I need to connect with the lifestyle.  My goals with haven't changed.  I'm not just doing it to see a smaller number on the scale.  My goals are: lose weight, become healthier, stronger, and athletic.  Losing weight has to be the biggest part of it right now because I'm overweight.  Once I get down to my "goal" weight, I want it to stay there - which means never stopping, always fighting, always living a healthy life.  I feel like including yoga as a practice and meditation, I can help drive away the negativity that often becomes a road block to getting the results I'm seeking:  too much work, not enough time, stress level through the roof.  I truly believe that taking a small amount of time to deal with those issues EACH and EVERY day will help.  Let's hope, anyway.

OK, enough for today.  I have some errands to run and more preparations to make.

Till next time.  ;)