Not a food-related post today, but something I’ve found to be encouraging over the past couple of weeks as I’ve stuck to two habits:
- Doing my floor exercises, including the core ones, three times a week. As I write this on Wednesday morning I haven’t yet done the set for today, and I should probably start telling myself that I can’t have my coffee in the morning without doing the exercises first. Remember, the whole set takes only 10 minutes or so. Here’s that video I made about the abdominal ones–it’s a little on the amateurish side as far as production values go, but the exercises are genius. (I didn’t come up with them.) I plan to do a further video about the other ones in the set.The encouraging aspect comes with a couple of observations I’ve made. First of all, Jim and I went on a trip to Utah last week to celebrate my birthday. (I’m always up for a trip.) We did some pretty serious hiking for three days straight, and I have to say that I felt absolutely great doing it. I said, “My legs feel as springy as a gazelle’s!” I’m sure the higher level of fitness came partly from my walking/treadmilling, but at least some of it probably comes from the fact that the core exercises I do are also good for the thighs. When I finish my 100 mermaid moves my thighs really feel it along with my abdominals. And I’m now able to do 15 girly pushups. When I started doing them faithfully about six months ago I couldn’t do more than 6-10 of them without collapsing on the floor. I HATED them. But, amazingly enough, I now just DO them. My arms feel great, and they’re a little less flabby. And I even squeezed in a set during the trip.
- Cleaning up the kitchen every single night. (I’ve written about this subject before.) This habit was going to be a New Year’s resolution, but I started on it last December. It’s been great to get up every morning to a clean kitchen. Last night I had thrown together a quick dinner that was late starting because Jim and I were working on a video. (Which has to be re-done, because apparently at some point the cat knocked a switch. Sigh.) I needed to get dinner on the table by sometime before 6:00, and I have to say it turned out well. But I couldn’t do my clean-as-you-go routine that I’ve been trying to develop, and then we decided to watch the last two episodes of “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” (which is quite good), and it was after 9:00, and I sighed and slumped my shoulders, but then thought, “Suffer for 15 minutes!”–a great little motto from Gretchen Rubin that was repeated in last week’s podcast. Guess what? It didn’t take all that long. I had quickly loaded the dishwasher before we sat down and run hot water and soap into the pans I needed to wash by hand. (And yes, as I’ve said before, Jim and Gideon often help me–and I’m not shy about asking for that help. But Jim was busy working on the video, the one that now needs re-doing. And Gideon was gone.So I just did it.)
I tell you this as a gentle nudge about whatever habits you may be trying to form in your own life, especially if you’re like me and get PROFOUNDLY BORED with doing small consistent tasks. Let me remind you (and myself as well) of Debi’s Law of Inverse Drama:
The more consistent, steady and undramatic a habit, the greater the results.
The more dramatic and difficult a habit, the smaller the results, because you won’t stick with it.
Be sure to subscribe if you haven’t already done so. My next post is planned for Monday, when I’ll tell you all about my first big food event in a long, long time, a breakfast Sunday morning at our church. See you then!
PS Full disclosure: I just did the aforementioned exercises, and it took 11 1/2 minutes.