Thursday Thankfulness and Random Tidbits…

Happy Thursday!

First, the Random Tidbits:

Today, of course, is the end of the Birthday Challenge – and a gloriously Happy Birthday to my girl, Bex; I hope you have an amazing one.  And y’all stop on by and wish her a Happy Birthday if you have a minute, would ya? 

So, today is also the end of Phase One of my self-imposed weightlessness, i.e., life without a scale.  I’m fairly pleased with how I’ve handled it; I haven’t cheated once, even though there’s a scale downstairs at work (a hundred years old, but I know the differential between the reading and the legitimate number, oh, yes I do), and I’ve only had scale-cravings once or twice.  Never enough to actually go looking for it.

I debated whether to weigh in…and decided that if I felt anxious about it this morning, I wouldn’t do it – in other words, if I felt like the number was going to have any impact on my mood or well-being, I would abstain.  I finally decided to go ahead, because I wasn’t feeling like I cared much either way.

170.6.  Hmm.  I looked at the number and realized I couldn’t decide how to feel…which meant I didn’t have feelings about it.  Which, after all, was sort of the point. 

Logically, it’s an okay number.  It’s up 2.4 pounds from my last weight.  Okay.  I’m currently entertaining my good buddy TOM after a six-week hiatus.  I can live with it.  Also, the body fat and hydration numbers hadn’t changed, and I am extremely happy about that.

So I think maybe I’m getting there, “there” being a place where I don’t live by the numbers.  I know that I’ve been extremely lax in behaviors, and I know that in the past week, I’ve turned that around enormously.  That is what I should feel bad and good, respectively, about – and that’s actually what I do feel bad and good, respectively, about.  I’m making progress!

I won’t weigh in again until my own birthday, or actually a few days before as my birthday is just after Labor Day.  So the Friday before Labor Day will be the next appearance of the scale at my house; it’s going back into hiding today courtesy of DH.  And I’m actually not remotely upset about that.  It will, however, be interesting to see if I have scale-cravings a few weeks into my good behaviors.  Are they going to be enough for me, or am I going to feel the need for numerical reinforcement?  That will, I think, be the real test.  It’s easy not to crave the scale when you’re goofing off and know the number won’t be good. 

I do have a goal for my Labor Day Challenge.  It’s a simple one, and hard to quantify, but I like it.  By Labor Day, I want to see a change.  No, no numbers to hit…no pants sizes to get into…no measurements, no weight, no nothing like that.  I want to see a change.  I want to feel my clothes fit a bit differently, I want to feel more strength and muscle tone, I want to wobble a bit less.  It doesn’t have to be dramatic, just a noticeable, visible, palpable change.   It’s a completely achievable goal, I think.  And I’m going to start using my stars on my calendar again, since what I’m really shooting for here is behavioral consistency.  Today is Day One…anyone want to join me?

I had a wonderful conversation with a friend last night about the difference between being motivated by weight, and being motivated by how we feel, how we move and how we’re treating our bodies.  It was a great reinforcement of the ideals and goals we share and it went a long way toward shoring up my motivation.  It is good to have someone to share things like this with.

I did Week Two, Day Two of the Hundred PushUp Challenge last night, and it went well.  At the end, where you do as many as you can but at least a certain number, I always shoot for the minimum for the level above mine, just because then I feel like I’ve sort of gone the extra mile.  Last night, that meant ten…and I did it, even after all the other pushups I had done.  I was quite pleased.    I also did my crunches and reverse crunches.  Still no cardio…unless you count the walking I did yesterday morning when I had to move a turtle out of the road but the nearest place to pull over was about a quarter of a mile up the road.  I don’t know if I count that but it felt good to get out and move a little.

Other tidbits…I haven’t mentioned it, but I have poison ivy.  Like, everywhere.  In addition to everything else.  It’s even on my face.  My face.  It’s extremely distressing to me and for the first time ever, I’m considering going to the doctor for a shot.  But I have to say, the blackberry cobbler that I made with the berries I picked (which is where I got the poison ivy) was so, so worth it.  It was amazing.  And yet, that doesn’t make me happier about my face.

Today they start putting in the new carpet, I’m simultaneously excited and terrified.  I always question my decorating decisions horribly when the actual process starts; I’m so afraid I will have screwed up enormously and when there’s this much money involved, that makes me want to yak.  I’ve never been unhappy with the end result…yet…but I always do this.  But I’ll know soon enough and it’s too late to do anything about it anyway.

And now for my thankfulness.  Nothing profound…today, as I was driving in to work, careening down the mountain with AC/DC pouring out of the speakers at pretty near top volume, I thought, “I’m a little strange, maybe.  You don’t see a lot of 35-year-olds on their morning commute to their job in a law office, careening down the mountain with AC/DC pouring out of the speakers at pretty near top volume.  At least, not in this neighborhood.”  And then I laughed, because I really don’t want to be like the other commuters in this neighborhood anyway.

Today, I am feeling a bit thankful for individuality. Not just mine, but individuality in general.  I am so, so, SO glad that we live in a world where everyone is different.  I tend to choose friends from among the “fringe” so to speak – people who are who and what they are, unapologetically, whether that’s the same as Betty next door or completely different from anyone in the neighborhood.  I don’t tend to be drawn to conformists, or really even to people who just naturally fall into the same niche as 80% of the people around them.  I am drawn to that sparkle, that edge, that something that makes a person stand out just a little bit, and usually there’s some laughing at oneself and not taking life too seriously involved.  I like people who think for themselves, too, rather than taking whatever is served to them as the law.

I am very blessed in having met many people like this, and being able to get to know them.  I also feel pretty blessed in being one of those people myself.  So today, I am thankful for individuality and the fact that we are not all alike – and many of us don’t even want to be.

I love you all for who you are, and I hope that you do, too.  Have a wonderful Thursday!