My why for not freaking out...

I feel like I have always been on a journey to become a better person. I have failed many times in this journey. Some days are better than others, but overall, each day seems to get better and better. When I first started in the direct sales world, a common practice that they use is to determine your why for doing the thing that you are doing. I remember sitting with a stack of magazines and cutting out pictures to put on a "dream board" and hoping and wishing for the kind of life that those people high up in the company had accomplished. 

One thing that I have learned with any goal is that someone isn't going to walk up to you and hand you the finished product of your goal and say, "Here you go!". Unfortunately life doesn't work like that. It takes hard work and sometimes sacrifice to achieve the goals that really matter to you. 

My "Fabulous by Forty" goal started from a low point in my life. I have been lower. And to be honest, life wasn't that bad around my 38th birthday. I had just made some poor financial decisions. I felt like I was at the maximum potential at my current job. I was at a weight I said I would never get to again. I just was overwhelmed and stressed and wanted change, so the goal setting started. 

I sat down some time after my 38th birthday and developed a plan to get out of debt. I was relying on credit cards for non-essential needs and was racking up too much debt. I was ashamed and needed to change my habits. I wrote out all of our debt and used the "Dave Ramsey Snowball Effect" method to see how long it would take me to pay it all down if I truly committed to it. That is when I realized that in less than 2 years it could all be gone. That anvil swaying over my head that could crush me at anytime could be gone in less than 2 years! It was liberating! It made me wonder what else I could accomplish in 2 years. 

My next goal came about slower. I started looking at my career and wondered what I could do to get paid more. My options were to either leave my career and start fresh which really didn't seem that fun to do or to look at what else I could do with my rad tech license. The decision to go back to school to obtain my Masters happened when I started tutoring a friend who was having trouble passing her national registry. I had mentioned that I loved all the physics and imaging aspects of radiology so if she ever needed a study partner I would be happy to help. Now I have offered this to several students in the past. This friend was the first to take me up on it. We started meeting in the morning and I would sit and explain things in a way where it made sense to her. I loved it. I loved the light bulb that would appear and the smile that came across her face when we made up some goofy acronym to help her remember something. It solidified that I truly wanted to teach this full-time. So that is why I have started my Master's degree since most colleges require a Master's to teach at a collegiate level. 

This final goal that I have started has been a long time coming. Since I am working on all the other goals and have a timeline now, I figured it is the best time to chase after it. I have always wanted to be strong. I'm not talking body builder strong. No, something less, but not just thin. I have watched movies where a person is hanging on the edge of a cliff with nothing more than their fingers and then they pull themselves up back to safety. Whenever I have seen these moments I have always thought, "Yeah. I would die. I could never do that, even with adrenaline helping." So my goal has always been to be strong enough to pull myself off of a cliff if I were to fall and be only hanging on by my finger tips. Or in other words, I want to be able to do a pull up. Its nothing fancy, but its something I have always wanted to do. I would take the presidents challenge in school and there would be kids who could do a pull up. I was the kid who just kind of hung there and struggled and finally dropped. It was a sad day in elementary school. It has just gotten worse through the years. 

That is changing though. At the end of May I had contacted my friend Carlye about personal training and what the costs were, etc. I had talked with her prior about it but really couldn't afford the training at the time. We were in a better financial position to possibly do it and so when I inquired she told me of a contest going on where she worked. She tagged me in a Facebook post for Anytime Fitness and shockingly, I actually won. I got a free month membership along with personal training 3 days out of the week. Today I finished my 6th day of training with Carlye. I'm not sure that strong is the word that I would use at this point in my training since I am only on week two. What I have noticed is that my belly doesn't stick out as far, my soreness doesn't last as long, and I have a renewed desire to eat healthy and be a better form of me. I love having a personal trainer because she pushes me to do more than I think that I can do. I would never think to pick up a 25lb weight and do squats with it. I would never have gone into a plank with 10lb weights in my hands and then alternated lifting up those weights. I have gone further, pushed harder, and seen results quicker having her there next to me. 

I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia in my 20's. Basically if you don't move, you hurt all over like you have the flu. I know that sounds weird, but pushing past the pain is the best way to deal with Fibromyalgia. I was seeing my symptoms that I had kept away without medicine and adjustments to my diet start to return and it scared me. I needed to reduce stress and get moving. So I changed. I don't want to end up that person who can't move when they are in their 70's because they stopped being active at a young age. I want too much in life to have that kind of end. I don't know what the future holds. What I do know is that I WILL be Fabulous by Forty!