Image Credit: Daniel Friesenecker |
Hi there! I’m not going to lie, I’ve been feeling incredibly
guilty the past few months when it comes to my New Year’s resolutions. I made
them but I feel like I haven’t taken a big enough step to accomplish them – you
could probably tell by how often I write this column. I guess that’s something
that comes along with writing these resolutions. You sit down at the end of the
year and basically write down everything that you didn’t like about what you
did the year before and things that you want to change for the better.
When you’re doing any form of self-improvement, you’re
constantly teetering on the edge of having an optimistic and motivated mindset
and a negative one that plunges you into a never-ending sea of guilt and self-loathing, which is hardly the goal.
I think my problem has been that I’m trying to approach this
too theoretically, or maybe that’s not the word I’m looking for. The way I’ve
been looking at it for the past couple months is as a to-do list that I have to
check off everyday, if that clarifies my meaning a bit. But now that I look
back at the list of resolutions, I’ve been doing pretty well. Not fantastic by
any means, but pretty good. Keep reading to find out how exactly I’m doing on
each one of them!
1. Blog everyday. Okay,
this one is probably one of my worst. Obviously, ever since April or so, I’ve
been blogging four times a week, but I’ve been blogging, which is the first
most important thing. Consistency is something that I’m aiming to fix this
month, especially before school starts again. My plan of attack is to make
blogging a routine as opposed to something that I’m frantically squeezing into
whatever time slot is empty in my schedule, have lots and lots of ideas at my
arsenal at all times, and have a blogging schedule planned out well in advance.
2. Write three
comments on other blogs everyday. And I’ve been bad with this, too. There’s
no denying that I’ve had no time to read blogs and it’s really something that I
should be doing more. I will comment on blogs whenever I read something that
really strikes a chord with me, but I haven’t been doing that nearly enough. I’m
on the hunt for new blogs to read right now, so I’m hoping I’ll get a lot
better with this particular resolution.
3. Use my agenda
daily. This happened in July, guys! I actually used my agenda every single day
during the time period that I went to summer school, including the weekends, so
I’m pretty proud of that.
My good friend and I are planning to get ourselves some
pretty fancy schmancy agendas for the next school year that are just the
perfect format and everything, so I’m crossing my fingers that this will get me
more motivated to use it. Well, that and the guilt of having spent such a
ridiculous amount of money on a freaking agenda.
4. Drink at least 2L
of water daily. I also did this, too! Drinking plenty of water was a big
goal of mine as I started 2014 and I’m really glad that the habit’s stuck.
Before, I’d get by with like three glasses of water which was absolutely awful,
but now that I’ve been drinking more water, I can really tell the differences
in my skin, mood, what/how much I eat, etc.
5. Keep a food diary.
The intention behind doing this was so I would refrain from eating bad food, so
if I were to write it down, I’d feel guilty about it and then I wouldn’t eat it
unless it was a treat of some sort.
While I haven’t kept one consistently at all, I have been eating twenty million times
better than I was last year. It’s rare that I’ll indulge in junk food because I
just don’t find it appealing anymore and I, for the most part, am on a healthy
diet (as in what I eat, not like a meal plan) of plenty of greens, fruits,
whole grains (save for the white rice that’s a staple in every Asian’s family
that you just can’t get rid of), and healthy proteins and fats. I will try to
keep a food diary (and a regular diary!) for the remaining months of the year,
but I’d say that in terms of eating better, I’m doing very, very well.
6. Follow the workout
schedule. Oh my goodness, there are no words to describe how happy my workout
schedule makes me. I’ve gotten into the habit of going to the gym 5-6 times a
week and if I manage to keep this up for the rest of the year, I will have
pretty much exceeded my expectations from the beginning of the year.
Of course, with the stress and time limits of summer school,
last month wasn’t as great as May and June, but I’m going to try my hardest to
stick to it religiously with the occasional break for the next five months.
7. Follow the
one-minute rule. I’m pretty guilty of not following that rule this past month. I would blame it on summer school, but
that’s just unfair. I think I’m going to throw in weekly cleanups of my room
and some areas of the house just to keep it in better shape so I don’t get
overwhelmed by the end of the month by how messy my space is.
8. Get at least eight
hours of sleep every night. Hmm, I’m not even going to bother elaborating
on this one. I’ve evidently not
followed that at all and really need to work on it a lot or else I’ll start getting premature grays and I really don’t
want that.
9. Practise sewing
once a week with Mom. We’ve both been busy. Yeah. After visiting FIT, I’ve
definitely realised that I’ve been slacking way too much in that department and
really do need to get my butt up and moving when it comes to learning proper
techniques, so our sewing room is currently being cleaned up and reorganised so
we can start sewing this weekend.
10. Calm down and
just breathe. I’d say I’m doing pretty well with this. Last year, I was a
psychotic perfectionist always up and moving and trying to get too many things
down at once and forgot to just relax. That led to me relaxing at the worst
possible times and then to guilt for slacking off and not getting x and y done.
I’ve learned to be less of a perfectionist and while I’m
still running around doing too many things at once (I doubt the overachiever in
me will ever go away and it’s not like I want it to, either), I’m significantly
happier and less stressed about it all. I’ve started approaching it as “I want
and am excited to do x and y” instead of “I have to do x and y.” It’s funny how
you can just flip a few words around and how it totally changes your mindset.
How are you doing with your resolutions? Did you make any resolutions? If yes, do you have any that are the same as mine? Leave your comments below and here's to hoping that we all accomplish our goals this 2014! Good luck!
Thank you so much for reading!
- J
I really love the idea of commenting on other blogs daily, I think I might give it a try as well! :)
ReplyDeleteYou definitely should! :) - J
Deletegood goals! and the most important thing is that they are written down and can come true :)
ReplyDeleteMost certainly! I feel like if I write down what I want/have to do, it makes it a physical thing that I have to look at and it really helps me accomplish my goals. - J
Delete