January was quite a month for me.

It’s only been thirty or so days of the new year, but I’m feeling good about where this year is leading me. I’ve been experiencing definite highs and lows, but in the best way possible.

I look back to where I was four months ago and I don’t recognize that person anymore. A lot has changed and with the new year, I’m looking to further that change.

It’s been a long time since I’ve truly been there for myself. Since doing my writings, reading, working out, meditating, all the shit they tell you to do.

I got a new planner this year that I’ve been adoring called Cosmoplanner, I got it off Etsy. (I checked her shop and she’s sold out of the physical copies but highly, highly recommend her for the future.)

It’s one of those where you can plan monthly goals and reflect on the month prior. It’s such a simple layout and I think that’s where I used to get lost with my old ones. They’d give me too much to work with and I know myself – I’m not going to make a to-do list, gratitude list, meal plan, habit track, etc all in one day. I’d get caught up with life and forget everything I set out to do because it overwhelmed me. This one lets me plan out for the month and then figure out how to incorporate those goals throughout the next four weeks. It makes everything feel a lot more possible and I gotta say, it has been working so far.

I spent the first two weeks of January kind of losing my mind. I had a lot of things I wanted to accomplish, but honestly, I was in a down place. I didn’t want to work or do anything. I just wanted to lay in bed binging New Girl for hours.

I woke up this Monday and finished Atomic Habits which kind of got my shit into gear. I sat and wrote down all the things I’ve always wanted to accomplish. Once I did that, I wrote out possible steps to make those goals do-able.

That’s the thing with creating new habits. We tend to go all in on the first week and end up feeling completely exhausted by the end of it. Or, we miss a day or a time we wanted to do something, so we axe it altogether.

 

I told myself that I don’t care when I do these things as long as I do them.

 

So, my goals aren’t super radical, but here they are.

I want to begin journaling daily again. I miss how freeing it felt to let things out everyday. It didn’t even matter what I wrote, but the second I started writing, I immediately felt a sense of relief. It helps getting things out of your head and on paper so they don’t weigh down your entire day. It doesn’t matter if I do it in the morning, evening, after work – just let your shit out. It doesn’t even have to be long. Just the act of releasing the thoughts in your head clears you out a bit. You enter your days a little lighter or wind down after a long day in a better state of mind.

On top of that, I’m incorporating meditating back in to my day-to-day. We’re starting with fifteen minutes a day and seeing where that takes us. It’s been nearly three years since I meditated consistently and my brain definitely feels the lack. It sounds simple to put aside time to just close your eyes to breathe but that’s the issue. We write it off as something so little that won’t make much of a difference when it does. It takes you out of your physical reality and lets your brain get to a higher state it wouldn’t be able to conscious. There’s so many guided meditations nowadays as well that help when your mind is prone to wandering the entire time. I’m easing back in with those until I feel more comfortable using just music again.

It’s baby steps, but the act of adding journaling and meditation back in is such a break for my mind.

I’ve become so accustomed to waking up and getting my day started or falling right in to drinking and Netflix when I get home. I don’t even process what’s going on with me internally anymore which is why I believe my lows become as low as they are. I’ve become so encapsulated in my physical reality that I forget there are ways make that reality a better experience. My mental health is something I’ve struggled with for decades at this point, so not nurturing my mind is only asking to keep myself stuck in the same place.

 

I become wrapped up in my personal dramas that really only exist because of the thoughts I create around them.

 

Tuning back in to myself is something I’m dead set on exploring this year. It’s already become the easiest habit to implement lately because of the peace I feel after.

Sometimes we grow past the old things that used to make us happy yet when we go back, we realize these were the things that kept us grounded for so long.

It’s been such a revelation to enter this new month in. I’m curious to see how I’ll feel six months from now, but I’m excited for the day-to-day. It feels good to be talking to myself again as weird as that sounds. I know we never truly lose who we are, but that lost feeling has hit me like a ton of bricks for years. I’m ready to start picking up the pieces.

However, something I didn’t think I’d be saying this year is that I’m working out again.

If you’re followed my blog for years, you know I used to struggle with an eating disorder years ago.

It messed with my mind for a long time. I went vegan solely as a coping mechanism to get over it. I agreed with the philosophy but I’d be lying if I didn’t say that was my main reason back in 2016.

It did heal me in a way. I felt more comfortable with food again yet the obsession with clean eating wasn’t something I anticipated. I used clean eating and exercising in the same mindset I used to track numbers in. I didn’t reach a good place until about 2018, but I only reached that place once I stopped exercising and let myself start eating ‘junk’ vegan food.

I had to let myself just live my life without thinking about anything health-related for a long time. If I even did one workout I noticed that my mind would start back-tracking to how I used to think. I felt it was safer if I just cut working out altogether so I didn’t have to deal with those intrusive thoughts.

Over the past two years, I thought a lot about re-introducing myself to exercise. How I’d do it, when, where, etc. The thought was always with me, but I was afraid to act again.

Well, last month my mom and I made a plan to start going to the gym together. It gets us out of the house, we’re not spending money and you know, exercise is good for you at the end of the day no matter my fear about it.

After that first workout, I realized I might be okay again. It felt good to do it and I didn’t feel those same thoughts like before.

We’ve only been one other time, but I was able to power through that as well.

Today I did an at-home workout video and that was good too.

It’s been like dipping my feet back in the water, but I’m glad I have. I’m more ready than I thought I was.

Unlike my other habits, I don’t have any crazy plans for this one. Even if I do one workout a week, I’d be proud of myself because of where my head used to be.

My goal currently is to do a higher intensity workout on a day I’d wash my hair anyway (my girlies get it) and something lower intensity once or twice a week. Something like yoga or those baby movements they’d make you do in a barre class that hurt like a bitch.

It’s nothing insane, but the fact I feel so open to it now has me excited. I don’t have a plan to get in crazy shape, I just want to move my body again.

With exercising both my mind and body now, I feel more excited for the future. I’m not just letting life come to me anymore, I’m taking charge of it.

It takes me roughly a half hour to journal, fifteen minutes to meditate, and forty-five minutes to work out. It’s not a lot of time to spend once I break it down. Looking at it like two episodes of a show has made it a lot easier to wrap my mind around.

With that in mind, my last habit.

Writing.

Not just in my journal, but back on here again.

When I started Lust for Growth nearly four years ago, (which first of all, insane) I used to be a lot more consistent. Either it was once or twice a month or every Sunday. I always had some sort of plan for it, but that fell off two years ago. You can see it easily over the time span between posts. I wouldn’t write for months because of the gap. It felt pointless because I didn’t think I was building anything anymore. I was venting to the public once every few months in vague ways.

I’d throw in nuggets of wisdom when I was feeling inspired, but those posts were few and far between.

My goal currently is to go back to my Sunday posting schedule a.k.a. just publish a post on Sundays. It’s once a week. It’s really not much and there’s no pressure to do it all in one day.

I tend to write, edit, and publish all within a few hours when I post, but having more time doesn’t make it feel like a time crunch. I have all week.

Thing is too, with journaling more, my mind is running a lot more smoothly. I’m more in touch with not only what’s going on with me, but the world around me.

I’d make the mistake in the past of getting too personal on here because I never properly worked those thoughts out alone. I wasn’t journaling so my personal life would morph itself on here which left me feeling a little exposed days after.

I still want to share a shit ton, but maybe not every little detail.

Plus, actually writing makes those monthly blog hosting costs a little easier to look at. It’s not much money to host a website or have a domain, but when you’re not using it often, it feels like throw away money.

If I throw in a little more reading this year too, I feel I’ll have a lot more to share. That’s one of the main things I used to love doing. I’d immerse myself in a book concept and lay it out in some post one way or another.

I just want to feel connected to this site again.

I feel proud of creating it, so time to actually create.

 

I’ve spent far too much time over the past year focused on everything but myself.

 

I’d let life’s ups and downs dictate how I spent my time and I’m fully tired of living that way.

I want to get to know myself again in hopes of working towards a more fulfilling life.

It sounds cliche as hell, this whole post honestly. Girl creates new habits to be happier. It’s where I’m at though and I’m excited to see what comes of it.

I hope given the pandemic and everything going on in the world, this inspired you even a small amount.

We all deserve to be living lives we’re excited to get out of bed for.

I haven’t been there in a bit, but I feel a great sense of knowing I’m going down the right path.

I’d recommend to any of you to do what I did on Monday.

Write down anything you’ve ever wanted to accomplish or improve on, nothing too big or small, and see where that’s do-able for you.

It can be one thing or ten, but anywhere is a good place to start.

The big thing I’ve learned over the years is don’t bombard yourself with everything at once. Going from no exercise to five days a week is a hard adjustment on the body. Not meditating or journaling at all to committing to long entries or 30 minutes sessions feels overwhelming to start.

Look for pockets in your days where time exists and add a small amount of whatever habit you’re trying to form. If you work two jobs and time is hard to come by, pick one thing you think would improve your life. Figure out a way to incorporate that habit in to your day.

If it’s meditation or reading, play an audio book on your commute. Shut your eyes for five minutes and just breathe during your break. It’s small stuff, but you’re still doing the damn thing. You have to begin seeing yourself as someone who does these things, not cling to the old identity where you’ve failed on said habit in the past.

 

Past is past. You are who you are today.

 

Sometimes when you cling so much to your identity, it becomes harder to move forward. We see evidence of us failing in the past and go back to that thought when we can’t seem to do the things we want to do – as bad as we tell ourselves we want to.

Let go of the idea that who you are is set in stone. We don’t see ourselves change much day-to-day but looking back, we notice all the differences in who we are now. Whether it’s life experiences that morphed us or a new environment we’re in, life is ever-changing.

If the world can move forward without us noticing, so can we.

The idea of who we want to be is a possibility.

Unless we believe that statement, change remains stagnant. We don’t have to lie to ourselves that we’re a fitness expert or world-class writer, but simply that we’re someone who can do a thirty minute workout once or twice a week. We’re someone who can write a page in a journal once a day. Believe the smaller ideas and the whole of who we want to be comes naturally.

I hope you all have a great weekend and I can’t wait to be back again on Sunday.

I love you guys.