Filed under: Life Choices
I have a feeling that I am not the first person to utter that statement. “Gini” is our training director. She a high-fiving, ex-Marine, newlywed, who drives a black SUV the size of Memorial Stadium, says “awesome” a lot, smiles constantly, and just went a couple rounds with P90x. Everyone loves her (including me), and how could one not? She perspires fun and makes achieving new things seem normal. A few months ago, she committed to a 30-day challenge of self-improvement.
Now’s a good time to watch the 3 min. video.
Gini sealed her commitment by telling the world in her first ever blog post and daily tweets @ginisays. She also got to work. Her monthlong saga was hard, but wow, she got results. Her followup post impressed me.
So I’m going for it. Sept. 1-30, I’m on a 30-day challenge. Gini tells me she’s going for round two. I know she reads my stuff, and hope this post will shame her into revealing her new list (even though she’s slammed with opening Mighty Fine #4 in Cedar Park).
Here’s my list:
- Walk dog 6x/week. More to help Janet & dog than to get in a walk. Maybe she will go with me ;^]’
- Limit TV to 14 hrs/week (incl. football), meaning that during September, I plan to watch ONLY football.
- Check email only 3x/day. I’ll hate this one, but productivity & sanity gurus say it’s a good move.
- 5 healthy dinners/week. More greens, less whites (sugar, bread, pasta, taters).
- Water, water, water… gallon/day = pee, pee, pee, which is not easy when you’re in the car all the time. I’ll be inspecting the plumbing a lot.
- 5 workouts/week. I’m averaging 3.7 now, so this should be doable.
- 5 small meals/day, 5 days/week. Very difficult, we shall see. Not a matter of “eating healthy,” I already do that. This is how to amp up metabolism and have more energy through the day.
- Read 1 book on relationship development, 1 on leadership.
- Spend 1 entire day in prayer. An old habit I’ve drifted from the last year. Need it.
- Invite friends over to discuss what we can do to help Africa. Enough procrastination–AIDS and poverty crises are calling shouting.
- Meet w/ financial planner. Might not make the cut. To me, this sort of thing is necessary evil like the dentist.
- Knockout 3 items on my honey-do list. Two is cake, three is a challenge.
Life is short. It’s easy to slip into a rut, pushed down by our comfy Western lifestyles and virtual friends who hope you don’t succeed and make them look bad.
Ruts (and bad relationships) lead to unbalanced lives, which leads to most of the dissatisfaction that keeps me employed–so, I should be against 30 day challenges, right? Wrong! I hate seeing people lonely, sad, overweight, walking around with starved souls and caustic relationships, confused about God and how life works. There exists no sound excuse for stepping back from an abundant life (find Jesus’ teaching on the matter, John 10).
Join me, follow me, encourage or laugh at me if it helps you. My twitter is @jacksbuzz, and the tag is #TR30days.
