100-day challenge: Day 50

If anyone had told me the first 50 days would pass by this fast, I wouldn’t have believed them. (Much like the years of my life - I blinked, and I was in my 50s.)

On 1 May 2015, I set myself a 100-day challenge: to dance for 20 minutes a day, for 100 (consecutive) days.  A bout of flu saw me stopping for about 12 days. When I resumed, I decided to approach it differently, for a number of reasons.

This was my thinking: I LOVE dancing, it makes me feel fabulous, I’m getting steadily fitter, and I want to keep doing this for as long as I’m able to. However, my life gets really busy, and it’s not always possible to fit in a workout. There’s so much to do, that I often get to 10pm and realise I still have another hour of responsibilities. In order to get enough sleep before the next hectic day, it doesn’t make sense to force myself to dance, especially when it means I’d get even less sleep. If life has taught me anything, it's that sleep is very important. 

After thinking it through, I committed to dancing every second day, which turned out to be a lot more realistic. I promised myself I would not skip more than one day between workouts, and…. so far, so good (for the past 9 days). I also told myself I’d dance on consecutive days, whenever possible. School holidays are ahead, my life will assume a more relaxed pace, and I’ll fit in as many dance sessions as possible.   

Yesterday was Day 49, and I did my 27^th workout. It’s the weekend, I have some Trudy-time coming my way, so I look forward to dancing. I used to do just 20 minutes, but now I can last for 35. It’s a wonderful feeling, moving freely to music and feeling myself going from being cold to getting so warm that I feel I could dance forever.

The truth is, it’s been only 7 weeks. I’m working through unfitness that took years to settle in. I need to stick to my resolve, and not give up. I can feel my body changing. I can even feel my spirit changing. I feel good, doing regular exercise. I feel younger. I’m starting to feel stirrings of a past time, a time when I used to run and do aerobics. A long time ago. J The point is, I need to be patient, and just ‘keep on keeping on’. External results always appear after the internal ones.

I knew the 100 days would teach me something, and that’s exactly what’s happening. In 2003, I did the Mind Power course, with Robin Banks, Early in the course, we discussed why people don’t reach their goals. Personally, I’ve found that my main reason for not achieving some of my goals is that, often, I’m just too unrealistic. For me, to think that I could add anything to my daily routine is unrealistic. Maybe I’ll get it right someday, but, right now, it’s not sustainable.

In the past, I’d set a goal, fail to stick to it, become demotivated, feel like a failure, and give up. I’m no longer that person.

This is my reality: I have a day job that takes up 7 and a half hours per day (excluding the extra time teachers work at home!). Travelling takes up about one and a half hours per day. Those two alone take up 10 hours of my day. Then there are all my domestic responsibilities – maybe another 3 hours? 13 hours. Being so active makes me tired, physically and emotionally, so I have to do downtime things, to restore some sense of balance. Before I know it, it’s late at night. In order to fit in regular dancing, I’ve got to arrange my whole week a certain way. In addition, for the past four and a half months I’ve had a bi-weekly gig at a restaurant, so that kept me even busier. It took trial and error to get me to the solution of dancing every second day.

I’m grateful for this lesson in setting realistic goals. Someone else helped me understand more about goal setting – my friend, Patricia Manshon, founder and head of the Academy of Life Coaching. She adapted the goal-setting acronym “SMART” (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time-bound) to “SMARTIE”, adding the words “Inspirational” and “Emotional”. If my goals aren’t inspirational and don’t have an effect on my emotions, I feel too disconnected, and there’s very little chance of my sticking to them.  

Interestingly enough, one of the quotations in my appointment diary, this week, was:

"To be all that you can be, you must dream of being more. To achieve the possible, you must attempt the impossible."  Karen Ravn

After quite a few years of becoming increasingly unfit, I have just lived through 50 days during which I danced 27 times. That’s a huge achievement for me, and I’m super-proud of myself!

Wish me luck for the next 50 days.   

    

About Blogging

As an English lecturer, I have to teach students “how to write a blog”. Firstly, I think the textbook writers fail to make a clear distinction between a “blog” – which is your own, free website, which you can personalise and use like a journal, to write about anything you like - and a “blog post”, which is an article you post/upload onto your blog/website. 

It’s quite a technical approach, in the textbook, and of course I have to make sure every student knows s/he has to include a title, name and surname, and the date. Other technical aspects to be reminded of are paragraphing, the ‘Big 3’ – introduction, body and conclusion - and sticking to the word count.  

As a blogger, myself, there’s so much else I want to teach them, and I just hope that those who do enjoy writing, actually go on to start their own blogs and enjoy the journey.

I’ve come to the conclusion that most things that we end up doing well, later in life, are things we’ve loved all our lives, and usually have been doing for most of our lives. For me, writing is one of those things. I started blogging in 2009, but I’ve been journalling since 1977 – 38 years ago. Before that, I was always writing letters, and I know I had a few pen-friends, as a child.  

Over the years, my journalling has played an increasingly significant role in my life, but one truth that I’ve been living with for many years is that, in order for me to feel right, I have to write. If I go for a few days without writing (especially journalling), I feel like something’s missing. I would actually call myself a compulsive writer. When I sit at the hairdresser, I’m given magazines to read, but what I’d really rather be doing, is writing! Yes! Maybe I should buy myself a tablet, something nice and portable, then I could do just that.

My cellphone? Well, now there’s a story. I’m one of those people who use my phone for just a few things – mainly texting, making calls and taking photos -  so if my current phone, which I’ve had for about four years can do those, I don’t see the need to buy a new phone. I actually have a phone which pre-dates the Smart phone, so I suppose an upgrade is overdue. I annoy everyone because I’m not on WhatsApp. :-)

So why do I blog? Quite simply - I love writing. I love writing to express my thoughts, my views, my questions, my frustrations and my observations. Doing so on the internet, on my own blog, was suggested to me by two people, a few years apart. Once I’d started, I was hooked. In my first two years, I think I wrote 50+ posts each year. Now, six years later, I don’t blog anywhere near as often as that, but the truth is, I think about writing every single day. I would love my daily routine to include blogging. Because we share one laptop at the moment, I can’t always access it when I have the time to blog. So, for now, I’ll just do it whenever I can.

I learnt, a long ago, that, when you’re a busy person who takes on extra projects and challenges, you aren’t always able to find time, on a daily basis, to do the things you’re passionate about. However, you always have a choice: would you rather follow your passion some of the time, or give it up completely?  For me, the choice was clear – even though my life is laden with responsibility and duty, I find the time to fit in what I love.

At this point in my life, my loves are playing my guitar and singing, writing, and dancing. I’ve also loved swimming ever since I was a child, but right now, it’s not logistically possible for me to swim. Once I have a car again, and I’ve regained my independence, a lot more will become possible.

So - what are you passionate about? And why aren’t you making time to do it?  

What are you waiting for? 

100-day exercise challenge: Day 33

Day 33. I've just started the second month of my 100-day challenge, and it's certainly been different to what I'd planned. But, as I keep telling myself, the most important thing is that I see the 100 days through, without quitting. 

After 14 consecutive days of dancing, I had to interrupt my exercise routine, because I'd caught the flu. At first I danced even though I was sick, hoping it would pass, but I could feel myself getting weaker, as my condition worsened. People (on Facebook) cautioned me against exercising while sick, as it would strain my heart. I didn't want to complicate my life, and I looked forward to continuing my programme after the flu, so I stopped. At first I stopped for just  three days, then danced for two, but felt so bad, that I had to give myself a good talking to. Sometimes I'm so keen to achieve a goal, that I get tunnel vision. 

I then stopped for ten days, while I took meds and gave my body a chance to rest and recover.  Getting back into the routine was not straight forward; I danced on Day 30, but not the next day. Last night, however, I did my 18th dance workout - I've discovered it's called freestyle dancing -  and I felt that wonderful buzz of being back on track. 

It was a very cold day yesterday, and when it was time for me to dance (I dance at night), I had to fight the urge to skip exercising and lie in a hot bath, instead. Brrrrrr! However, once I'd put on my exercise clothes, I started feeling that familiar excitement. Once  I heard the first few notes of the music, I was hooked. After the first song, I was quite warm, and after the second, I needed to remove my long-sleeved top. 

From then on - and this happens every time - I'm in the zone, as they say, and I just have fun. Dancing makes me smile, it makes me forget my stresses, and allows me to believe that anything's possible. 

I plan to stick to my 100-day challenge, as far as is humanly possible. Day 33 - only 67 to go.  And then? Can't see myself stopping after 100 days.