Set A Goal, Take Small Steps Toward It, Succeed!

PURPOSE. PATIENCE. PERSISTENCE. PROGRESS.

I think I’ve mentioned this before but it’s only been in the more recent years that I have made a few goals and followed through with them. I’ve tried doing the goal setting thing at the beginning of the year many times but typically end up forgetting about the goals all together or half-heartedly working on them until my motivation sizzles. Practice, patience, and persistence definitely pays off when working toward a goal – in whatever area of life. I definitely fall into the trap of looking for the fast and easy way to accomplish something but I have of course learned that most things in life take persistent work, focus and a series of steps to achieve the end goal.

My latest achievement was getting a fun transition between crow and handstand poses. I started focusing on handstand in the summer. I’d been doing crow for a while and was able to kick up into handstand against a wall but was not able to hold it without first touching the wall. After several months of practice and extra work on my core, arms, and focus (what I gaze at), I finally mastered handstand in the early fall. In mid-December I saw an Instagram clip of Patrick Beach doing crow to handstand and I was inspired to make that my next goal. I’ve been building up to it one step at a time since then and I finally nailed it last Saturday. I didn’t get it on video that time but after a week of attempts I was finally able to get it again. Check it out! It was a great reminder for me that I CAN achieve what what might first seem impossible if I set my mind to it and take the necessary steps to make it happen.

Here are a few inspirational thoughts to leave you with!

Persistence pays off!

Set some goals,
Then demolish them!

I may not be there yet,
but I’m closer than I was yesterday.

Make changes and move forward but don’t worry about how far you need to go. Keep the end goal in mind but focus primarily on the very next step you need to take instead of how far you need to go to achieve the end goal. If you focus too much on the end goal, you will become paralyzed because it seems overwhelming.

 Have a great day!

Comparison

“Comparison is the thief of joy.”
Theodore Roosevelt

Our kids are constantly comparing with each other – the amount of food they have, how much money they have, the toys they have, length of show time, punishment received, rewards they get, etc. It drives me crazy! I think comparison is inherent with siblings. As kids, we desire fairness and equality but this problem often follows us all the way through adulthood. Comparison is a struggle for so many people and is a vicious cycle. There will always be more to accumulate and someone who has more than us. We will never feel content with our lives or ourselves if we are constantly comparing ourselves with others. We will never feel satisfied with who we are or what we have and void of a thankful heart. I’m not preaching this to anyone more than to myself! I struggle with comparison on a day to day basis. And I know first hand that there is nothing good that comes from comparison.

Our church recently started a sermon series focused on having an eternal perspective and this has made me even more aware of how silly comparison truly is when you look at it through an eternal lens. Comparison is all about this world and what we might obtain or become in this world. It is about desiring worldly stuff. It is a totally natural battle for all humans but is one that we must fight in order to find joy apart from things or circumstances. Comparison takes us away from the present moment and will rob us of any joy we might find in our own lives. It often results in judgment of ourselves and others. Comparison destroys relationships as it is often a source of resentment. It might make us feel good for a short time as we might feel “better” than someone else, but that is a fleeting feeling and a false sense of worth. And most importantly, it takes our eyes off Jesus and eternal things.

Yes, it’s good to be others’ focused, but not when it comes to comparing. Let’s not be so wrapped up in what everyone else is doing, what they have, or even what they think of us. Instead let’s turn our focus and energy inward and upward, examining our own hearts and focus, and determining if they line up with God’s desires for us!

“For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” Galatians 1:10

Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth
Will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace.

(Lyrics from “Turn your eyes upon Jesus”)

Play by Play of Half-Marathon Day

Sunday was an amazing day – exhilarating, emotional, and exhausting all in one! The day started dark and early just after 5 am. Last year I was very anxious on race-eve but this year I, surprisingly, had a pretty good night’s rest. After dressing in my running gear + a few extra layers, I headed out to the kitchen for some fuel to get me through the big race. At the suggestion of a friend I had been eating a little before my long runs. That seemed to help a ton so I did the same on race day but had a little more since it was more than 2 hours until the start. I had a mini whole wheat bagel, scoop of nut butter, scoop of raw honey, half a banana, coffee, a glass of Thrive Sports Drink from No Meat Athlete, and lots of water.

I took the rest of the banana with me but never ended up eating it. I also wore a fuel belt this year and filled one of the bottles with water and one with the sports drink. E woke up before I left and gave me a good luck hug and kiss (I’m pretty sure he stayed up reading until he was allowed to watch a show at 7am!). I also spent some time in prayer and reading God’s Word. The verse of the day was perfect: Matthew 6:34, “Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” I certainly had enough to think about for even the next three hours let alone start worrying about the next day and on!

My friend Kelly so kindly drove me downtown and dropped me off on her way to work (for the 2^nd year in a row). The race started in a different spot this year and it seemed way LESS convenient than last year. There was a ton of traffic but fortunately Kelly knew an alternate route to bypass the mess of traffic and she got me to where I needed to be with plenty of time. After finding my way down to the corral area, I backtracked a little to check in my extra clothing and then made my last potty stop. I was greeted by unorganized chaos again but I made it thru the line and got to the corral just before 7am (when they technically closed). My goal time was 1:38 so I wanted to stay in between the 1:30 and 1:40 pace leaders. I lined up behind the 1:40 guy and anxiously awaited the 7:30 start. There was so much energy in the air that you could almost reach out and touch it. The music was blaring and everyone was eagerly dancing around to keep warm. Finally the time arrived and we were off! After a bit of walking and jogging, I was finally able to pick up my pace. I weaved in, out and around other runners to get my spot in front of the 1:40 pacer and never looked back! I caught up and passed the 3:15 marathon pacer and left him in the dust 🙂 I started out quite a bit faster than my normal pace and stayed within 7:05 and 7:34 for the whole race. It was a struggle though! My body ached and I felt like I was in an intense mental and physical battle. One voice seemed to be saying “just walk…I feel terrible” while another said “I can do this…I’ve trained for this….I have it in me…don’t stop now.”

I pressed on through the aches and fatigue and crossed the finish line at 1:35:58. I finished almost 3 minutes faster than my goal but I felt like it was a struggle every step of the way. It was a very different experience than last year when I finished thinking I wanted to run the full next time!

The fans were amazing and it was so encouraging to hear fans I don’t even know cheer for me by name (first names are on the bibs). I was especially encouraged when I got about half way into the 12^th mile and saw Scott and the kids and then a little further along saw three of my best buddies!

 

It was an emotional day to begin with but the sight of them all elated me and gave me the extra boost I needed to get to the finish line. Last year, I had several moments along the route where I was overcome by emotion and started to cry. This year, instead of crying I felt like my chest was tightening up and I struggled for breath almost like I was hyperventilating. I was glad to be done and have that behind me! We stayed around for a while after the race to chat and for the kids to play in the bounce houses and then headed for home. On the way home we stopped at the Starbucks drive-thru for a post race latte treat. That helped warm my still chilled body! Scott had a meeting in the afternoon so I let the kids watch extra shows while I stretched and rolled out some of my aches and sore spots. We hosted small group later in the evening so by the time I finally got to lay on the couch I was EXHAUSTED! It was a great day and a great personal accomplishment for me. It’s so cool to see what our bodies can accomplish with proper training (physically and mentally). And, to be totally honest, it feels pretty neat to feel like a rockstar for the day! All the hoopla, cheering fans, and then the after race celebrations (and FB posts), etc. sure make you feel special! It’s easy to see how a real celebrity could get addicted to all the attention. It is so fun to experience even if it’s only one day a year.

My training runs were significantly faster this year compared to last and I attribute that to the running interval training I did last winter and spring (I used variations of workouts like this HIIT Treadmill workout from Peanut Butter Fingers), the jump rope training I’ve been doing consistently for the last many months, the cross-training ½ marathon plan I followed, and lots of yoga of course!

What next? I don’t know. I felt a little depressed the day before the race and I think part of it was that I knew I’d been training all this time for something and it was soon to be over. Now that it is over, I feel the need for another goal to work toward. Last year I did a 50 push-up challenge so maybe I’ll do that again. I’d love to hear your ideas too!

Mixed Bag From the Last Few Days

We’ve had a busy weekend so far. The zoo and Family Fitness on Friday. Teaching, the Y 10 year anniversary celebration, a graduation party, dinner and playing outside yesterday. Church and a birthday party today.

Checking out the arctic foxes

The Y’s celebration was really fun for the kids yesterday as they got to play in bounce houses, get their faces painted (see pic below), play carnival games, sit in police vehicles, and get into an ambulance and fire truck. I volunteered for two hours and got fried standing out in the sun. One of these days I’ll learn to put sunscreen on myself. I was talking with one of the other volunteers while we were filling water balloons. He performs all kinds of roles at the Y including child care, teaching hip hop dance (which E took one time…he tried out chest popping!), teaching a HIIT class, swim instructor, and more. I also know he competes with two different dance teams. I’m always curious about what people do for their workouts and love to talk about it, so I asked him about his. He told me about all kinds of crazy things he does for workouts including trying to bear crawl for 1 mile straight!!! He stopped at 1/4 mile totally wiped out and hands hurting. I think I would have stopped much before then. Just hearing him explain it made my back and hands hurt. Later after lunch he led a HIIT demo and had a small group of guys and one girl do a 30 minute class. They did 15 burpees followed by bear crawling to the other end of the lawn, 14 burpees, bear crawling back the other direction, and so on down to 0 burpees. We watched the first few rounds (E even participated in the first 15 burpees and bear crawl) and several of them were toast after the second round. It was hot and the sun was beating down on them. We encouraged them as much as we could before we had to leave. I thought about joining in to try it out but I had a full stomach from lunch and figured that would come right back out if I did even one burpee! Anyway, I’m always admiring the different challenges people take on and the things they put themselves through to accomplish the challenge.

E and I started our June fitness challenges today – Body of Iron for me and Ironboy for him. I wanted to measure the distance around a path through the woods by our house so when I got up I got E out of bed and the two of us took a little bike ride before C and Scott awoke. Riding with him means I need to go a lot slower than I would on my own but it was fun and a great way to start the morning by spending time outside with him! We had a nice 3 mile ride enjoying the sun and stillness of the morning. I love taking in God’s creation while most everyone else is still sleeping.

The sermon at church today was the last in a series called Fan Into Flame. Today’s sermon focused on the role of parents in teaching their children about their faith and raising them to be lovers’ of Jesus (and that it needs to be done diligently!). I liked the following quote that was on the back of the sermon notes:

“Parents, Love God And Love People,

Teach Your Kids To Love God And Love People,

So That They Will Teach Their Kids To Love God And Love People.”

I feel like we could be much more diligent with our kids when it comes to being spiritual leaders – guiding them and teaching them about Jesus. Two ideas I took from the service are: incorporating Bible reading into our nightly book reading routine and memorizing Scripture as a family (maybe a verse a week). E does lots of Scripture memorization in Awana but the rest of us have a little work to do in this department.

Lastly, the kids are getting really excited about VBS this summer. They are attending VBS again at St. Luke’s here in Gahanna. They are doing Weird Animals – Where Jesus’ Love Is One-of-a-Kind. We’ve been listening to the CD a lot and the music is great. There is nothing like a good VBS CD here at our house (or in our car!). We love to blast it loud, sing, and dance. And I’m getting excited about co-hosting a summer women’s study called Divine Redeemer – A Journey Through the Book of Ruth in July. I posted a few times about this earlier in the year and am looking forward to taking the journey with some new and old friends very soon. If you are interested in joining us, please let me know!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Up For a Challenge This Summer?

Yesterday was the last day of kindergarten for E! It was a great year for him and it flew by from my perspective. He’s had themed days at school pretty much every day for the last two weeks it seems. His year culminated with a butterfly parade to send the kids off to first grade followed by awards and a picnic (at 10am!). E and his friend Kate earned leadership awards for their class and he won an award for most books read in the class. We / he read more than 900 books during the school year. We love to read and it was fun to have the challenge of completing his reading log + some by the end of the year. Here are a few pics from the day.

Last day at bus stop

Butterfly parade

E and Kate – proud leadership award recipientsschoo

Summer is unofficially here and we have been talking about goals for the summer. We set a few school and reading related goals for E to help keep him on track for school and we both have fitness goals for the month of June. While I love to workout, I don’t often set specific fitness goals. I know, I know…..goals are a great way to keep on track and stay challenged and focused. I’ve just never been good at creating and sticking to them. I found training for an event like the half-marathon last fall to be a nice change of pace for me (as it was a specific goal I was working toward) and decided it was time for another challenge. I signed up for the Y’s Body of Iron challenge in June. So, by the end of June, I will have completed an Ironman – 2.4 miles of swimming, 112 miles of biking, and 26.2 miles of running. The swim and run portion will be fairly easy for me to attain as they are both part of my normal routine but the biking will be a challenge since I haven’t been on a bike regularly since last August. I used to take an indoor cycling class three times per week but stopped while I was training for the half and haven’t gotten back into it. I’ll need to make some time for bike rides with the family and/or time on the bike at the gym in order to complete this portion of the challenge. I’ll be keeping track of my progress on the Y’s online tracker and look forward to reaching this goal and maybe even going beyond it. There was an option to double the distances but I decided against that since I will already struggle to fit the bike mileage in. In addition to the Body of Iron challenge, I am doing a 99 Days of Summer challenge at GoYoga (one of the places I teach). I am challenging myself to do yoga 90 out of 99 days. I typically practice on my own at least some each day so I’m hoping I can maintain this throughout the summer. E and I were talking about my challenge the other day and he wanted to do a fitness challenge too, so we created an “Iron Boy” challenge for him. His goal for the month of June is to run 56 “laps” around our cul-de-sac and take 12 bike trips around a path by our house and the adjacent park (he’ll need an adult with him for the bike portion). We will be keeping track of his progress on a calendar taped to one of our cupboard doors. It’s encouraging to see how he is motivated by goals and challenges.

A little side note: A man in the pool this morning (who is probably about 60) told me his goal for the year is to swim 800 miles!!! Wow! He asked me if I had a goal and I told him about the Body of Iron challenge, though I felt it a bit piddly of a goal compared to 800 miles of swimming in a year. However, I realize we are all at different places in life and certainly a wide range of fitness levels. The Body of Iron challenge is a good one for me right now.

E and I are excited to take on our June fitness challenges and we would love to hear about yours! Feel free to join me on the Body of Iron challenge either through the Y or on your own. If you need help finding a fitness (or other type of challenge), a quick search on Pinterest will yield plenty of great ideas.

Finally, here’s a little motivation to leave you with on this beautiful Friday afternoon!

Shelter in the storm…

Living with purpose…..

Like many others, I often find myself working toward checking off things on my to-do list but feeling no sense of focus or purpose. This is a great piece of advice to focus in on a few of the best things (and do them well) instead of trying to do everything and spreading yourself too thin or committing only halfheartedly.

This quote comes from Money Saving Mom Crystal Paine. She’s a young woman full of great practical wisdom. I follow her blog and she recently released her new book Say Goodbye to Survival Mode. I haven’t read it yet but I’m sure it’s a great book!

The Hard Life of a 6-Year Old

While we eat pretty healthily in our household we do enjoy treats and I have felt it only fair to let the kids have a little something sweet if they are awake when I have dessert (they’ll never know what they miss when they are asleep….at least for a few more years!). However, I’ve been trying to cut back just to keep portions in check and teach them about moderation. E’s normal routine is to have a treat after C goes down for a nap before his rest time. I recently explained to him the new rules: no more than one small and one bigger treat each day. When he asked last week for ice cream at lunch, I reminded him of the new rules and he replied in his most serious and concerned voice: “I keep forgetting about big and small treats. This is a hard life for me.” Oh to be 6 again!

Tackling Pride

An encouragement for all of us – let us have an accurate view of ourselves – as individuals and in our relationships with God and others!

I’m currently reading (albeit very slowly) Letters to Lindsey by Terri Brady. The book is a compilation of many of the posts from Terri’s blog in addition to hundreds of her most popular tweets. The posts cover a host of topics – some serious, some funny, and all filled with the wisdom and experience of a mom of four. The post titled “Wanna Talk about Me!” resonated deeply with me so I wanted to share it with you. In it, Terri shares a glimpse of her struggles with pride and lays out a few steps to move toward focusing less on yourself and more on others. We can all be found guilty of being prideful at times even when we don’t want to admit it (in fact it’s probably in these times that we are most prideful!). Here are a few lines from the post that struck a chord with me:

– “Like a skirt accidentally tucked into nylons, revealing a woman’s undergarments for an entire wedding reception dance, pride is a sin that is evident to all those around, but seemingly hidden from the bearer.”
– “Whether it’s a business team, a church team, a marriage or a family, pride is a cancer that will starve the body.”
– “Whether it is ‘low-self’ or ‘high-self,’ when we esteem ourselves as anything other than God-esteemed, we are doomed to live lives of conflict.”
– “I can change ANY subject back to me, and I used to think it was quite a talent!”
– A few of her practical solutions for talking too much about yourself:

• “Talk less about yourself. Some will read this and think I am saying that we should NEVER talk about ourselves; however, it is truly a matter of the heart. Are we listening to others? Are we caring about others? Or are we pushing opinions, experiences and ourselves on others, trying to uplift ourselves?”
• “Pray. Well …maybe that should have been #1. Since pride seems to be the king of invisible sins (Invisible only to the beholder, visible to all others…), we must ask God to open our eyes to where we are blind.”
• “Think more of others than of yourself.  C. S. Lewis said, ”true humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.”

She ends the post with a great reminder for all of us from James 1:19 – “Let every man be swift to hear and slow to speak.”

Check out the complete post here: “Wanna Talk about Me!”.

Take a breath, calm down, and do not yell….

I have this quote taped to my cupboard as a reminder to take my voice down a notch when I have the urge to yell at the kids. These past few weeks of mostly cold weather (and staying inside) have challenged me immensely in this area. It seems the kids get along for a short time and then they are just at each other. And I just want to scream!!! I’m sure many of you moms and dads out there can relate. Unfortunately I have succumbed a few too many times to my tendency to yell, but I have confidence that with continued focus I can get better at taking a few breaths, re-framing my mind, and being more positive with my choice of words, tone, and volume of voice. Note to self – these precious little children are not perfect and rarely do their actions actually warrant yelling. Situations can most often be handled in a much more positive way and they will probably listen better when I have myself under control.