Today has been a hell of a roller coaster. Some great highs, some really sucky lows, and overall a feeling of instability.

The highs:

• The number on the scale this morning. I’m coming to the end of Week 2 of the Noom program and I am seeing improvements on the scale. More importantly, I’m seeing improvements in my eating habits overall, which means this should be something that is sustainable long-term.
• I went to a new Farmer’s Market this morning and got some really nice looking tomatoes and some fresh corn for my meals this week.
• I explored a new walking trail and walked for longer than I have in the past. I have added a goal of getting out in nature and walking/hiking at least once a week, and so far I have managed to meet that. Considering how hot it’s been around here, it’s a victory for me.

The lows:

• I learned today that a friend’s husband died by suicide this week. I did not know him well, but had gotten to know him in recent months as part of the gaming group that he ran. What I knew of him was that he was funny, smart, creative, and loved his wife. My heart breaks for her.
• The shooting in Pennsylvania. I’m sorry that our country has come to this point, and I’m saddened that innocent people were injured and killed. I’m glad that there was not greater loss of life. And I’m very worried about where things go from here.

There are things I can control. There are things I cannot control. The key for me is to know the difference and not let the things that I cannot control overwhelm me and derail me. This evening I wanted so badly to sit on the couch with a huge bowl of Lucky Charms (one of my “comfort food” staples) for dinner because I was feeling emotional, but instead I chose to make herb-crusted salmon and then clean the kitchen. This is a huge change for me – one that is definitely for the better.

In looking at my previous post, I realize that I have been successful in my other goals, as well. I have definitely increased my water intake – I am drinking one glass in the morning, as well as any time I go into my bathroom for anything. I have been about 90% on my yoga movement habit, and have added more positions to the flow. I have even managed to hold a Downward Dog for several breaths, which is big! I have also been consistent in using the Noom app, logging my food, and using its lessons and tracking tools. So I am going in the right direction.

Tomorrow morning it’s supposed to be in the 80s, so I am going to check out another nature preserve near me and look for some shaded hiking trails. I think I need some quiet time in nature.

I haven’t been sleeping very well in the overnights, so I have generally found myself taking a nap after I get done with work. One afternoon this week, I evidently slept deep enough to get some decent REM sleep because I had a really weird dream. I enjoy analyzing my dreams to try to figure out what they mean, and over the years I have built a pretty decent dream dictionary for myself. This one was a little bit of a challenge, though.

I met this woman who did nails as her job, at a salon, and she did some work on my nails. (In reality I don’t do manicures, because my nails are too short). She asked to schedule a follow-up appointment, and I actually set one. She ended up giving me a discount on my next appointment, but she was very insistent to not let anybody know that she was giving me a discount, which was kind of weird. I told her no problem, I wouldn’t say anything. It wasn’t even that much of a discount, it just felt like she was trying to convince me that she was giving me something of value.

For some reason I had just moved into a new apartment, and for some reason I invited her over to visit as soon as I moved in. I didn’t even have much furniture in place yet, just a couple of beds and a bunch of stuff in boxes. She found someone to watch her 8-year-old child, then came over to the apartment. She ended up massively overstaying her welcome, to the point where I was trying to cook something to eat for dinner and hoping she would leave because I didn’t want to be rude and eat in front of her, but it wasn’t working. She eventually left, and I ate, and then she came back, crawled into one of the beds, and promptly fell asleep.

Somehow fast forward to it being 3 months later, and she was still living in my second bedroom. Her boyfriend, who was a complete jackass/doper, had also moved in. The second bedroom was packed with their stuff. The two of them had absolutely no intention of ever leaving, never paid any rent, and laughed at me when I told them that they had to leave and I was going to get them evicted. They were claiming that since they had been there so long they had tenants rights, and good luck getting rid of them.

I went off. I mean full-blown screaming, yelling, almost getting into a fist fight with the guy, trying to get them to leave. I ended up going over and getting the landlord, getting him to back me up on kicking them out, and basically haranguing and berating them as they packed up their shit and got out of my apartment. The woman was crying, talking about she didn’t know where she was going to go, telling her kid that it was all my fault that they were going to be homeless, and all sorts of emotional manipulation and abuse. I refused to give in, but I woke up before she and her boyfriend had actually finished packing and moving out.

When I woke up I was still a little bit keyed up, but I also wanted to understand what the dream meant. As I started writing it out it occurred to me that there are habits in my life that I am working to get rid of, and maybe it is tied to that. When I had that realization, it felt right. The apartment is the new body/life I’m trying to build, and she and her boyfriend are the old habits that are keeping me from “moving in” to that new life. Even the discount she was trying to give me makes sense – she was playing it like it was some big benefit she was giving me, but it really wasn’t valuable at all. My bad habits seem to have benefits for me, but they really don’t.

I’m using this dream as a reminder that getting rid of the old habits that no longer serve me will be difficult, but it will be worth it in the long run.

So I am going to go with that and use it as a reminder that kicking them out will not be easy, but it will be worth it in the long run. As I work through getting rid of my bad habits, I can visualize them as the woman and her boyfriend, kicking them out of my new life because they are no longer welcome.

I have been using my Audible subscription to try to find self-help books, with mixed success. One of the best finds I had was Dr Rebecca Ray’s “Breakthrough: Overcome Self-Sabotage, Achieve More, Be Your Best Self” podcast series. I listened to the ten episodes several times, and it helped me gain some insight into my tendency to self-sabotage and ways to break the cycle.

The other book I found that has had a huge impact is “Tiny Habits” by BJ Fogg, PhD. He provides not only insight into how habits develop, but also tools for making habits that stick. Some of it is stuff I knew, some of it is stuff I subconsciously did, and some of it was completely new but made absolute sense. I have been using the “Tiny Habits” steps to incorporate and build some new habits into my life in a way that they are sustainable.

The first one is “Doing yoga every morning before I start my day.” I have been having low back pain recently, and I know it’s partially because I have lost a lot of my flexibility and strength. The fact that I have gained weight hasn’t helped any, either. So a morning habit of doing yoga seemed like a good way to help increase my movement and improve my overall wellbeing.

I had tried to do this before, but I got overwhelmed with the duration and sequence that I was trying to do. I don’t have the strength to do Downward Dog very well anymore, but every flow I looked at had DD early in the sequence and held it for longer than I knew I am able to. I felt incapable and defeated, and I quit before I could rebuild my strength to where I was able to do DD.

As part of the “Tiny Habits” process, though, I have been able to scale it back from “do a half hour yoga program every morning” to “build the habit of doing some yoga every morning” – even if it’s just 10 rounds of Cat and Cow. Every morning, before I start my day, I am doing something. I have found a new yoga sequence that has moves that I am capable of doing now, and I am able to break the sequence down into tiny segments. If I only do one segment, that’s fine – it’s keeping the habit alive. If I get done with one segment and want to do the next one, great! That’s a bonus! The thing right now is setting the habit to where it’s second nature to do yoga every morning, then I will build on that to do longer sequences every morning.

This morning I started leaving my bedroom before doing my sequence, and it felt weird – something in the back of my mind said “I’m forgetting something… Oh, yeah!” and I did 10 Cat/Cows. I felt good that I remembered and that I did my habit, instead of blowing it off with “Eh, I’ll do it later” or “I’ll do it tomorrow, it’s no big deal” like I had done in the past. That’s a new experience for me, and I’m excited about it!

I’m using the process to build other habits into my life – things I have wanted to do for years and have tried to do with limited/no success. Moving more. Reading regularly. Writing. Ways to insert small changes that will build into habits that are sustainable. Foundations that I can build on and expand.

“After I get dressed in the morning, I will do 10 Cat/Cows.”

“After I get in bed in the evening, I will read or write for 10 minutes.”

“While I wait for my dinner to cook in the microwave or on the stove, I will walk in place.”

“After I finish work for the day, I will put on my gym shoes and walk on the treadmill for 5 minutes.”

Tiny habits. Tiny steps.

I knew it had been a while since I posted here, but I didn’t realize it had been nearly two years. Yikes. A lot has happened since then, and a lot has stayed the same. I have a new job at my same company, and I’m not sure if it’s where I want to be long-term but it is infinitely better than where I was. I took a camping trip to Colorado in 2022 and discovered the hard way that I am still susceptible to altitude sickness. I lost my heart dog in December of 2022 and I still blame myself. I had a hysterectomy last August, my first time ever having a major surgery and it was a doozy. Not one of those nice laparoscopic ones, no – open abdominal incision, weeks of recovery, spay scar, the whole nine yards. They left my ovaries, though, which means that I still get all the joys of PMS (moodiness, bloating, insane food cravings), which explains why I wanted to cry at yoga on Monday when I saw myself in the mirror.

So where do I go from here? I’ve done a lot of talking and posting and thinking about writing again, and I’ve even (gasp!) done some actual writing. It’s still a struggle to get anything to flow, though, because my Inner Critic won’t shut the smurf up. I keep trying to silence it, so I’m going to reboot and try again.