2025, Look Out for Me

It's the time of year when I take a moment to reflect on the passing year and plan for what I hope to make happen in 2025. 2024 felt like a year of transition. A lot of things started making positive shifts, my day job, my art, our house and our sons. I had a lot of blessings. I relaxed things with my diet far too frequently in 2024, so I did see some of those hard-lost pounds creep back on. I was 153 pounds in January 2024 and yesterday I weighed in at 171. That may not seems so wild to some people but every 10 pound increment typically takes months to lose and comes with a several-month plateau, so it feels like quite a setback. I feel so unfit and lethargic/old at this higher weight. When I tried to get some semblance of control back in October and November, I did have some success, but was quickly undone by me doing the easy thing instead of making good choices, especially around days off, weekends and holidays. On one hand, it's sad that I regained almost 20 pounds in half a year, but I had a blast this year and learned from my experiences. When I look forward to 2025, I have so many things I want to accomplish that I decided to make it into a game of Bingo!

I actually had goals that fell into two categories, one is larger projects and tasks that I've been procrastinating, such as organizing the basement or 30 consecutive days of intentional exercise. The other category are things that I want to make into a habit, so they are shorter goals, easier to achieve, like 4 days a week of standing at my desk for at least an hour. Then, I can increase the goal each week. So I chose 24 smaller habit-based goals and 24 bigger goals/projects and randomly put them on Bingo cards. The smaller goals I will restart every week, so even though they are easier to achieve, if I don't get a Bingo that week, I'll start fresh the next week. I'll keep them in a page protector so I can use a dry erase marker to mark of my accomplishments. For the rewards, I have made two separate Amazon wish lists of items to choose from. For the smaller goals, there are smaller prizes, maybe some bougie paint I've had my eye on or some nail polish. The larger goals have larger prizes like a body composition smart scale or a Continuous Glucose Monitor or dumbbells, a treadmill, etc. I feel guilty spending money on these items, but if it's a reward for accomplishing a goal, it feels more deserved. Most of the large items directly benefit my health journey, so that feels more worthwhile than simply buying an expensive handbag or something. The bigger goals truly are tougher to accomplish so I might only do a few over the year. One of the larger goals is to digitize all my old photos, and another is get consistently under 150 pounds. Both will take a lot of effort. Another thing I did, to help support my goal of exercise, is join a Peleton challenge. The goal is to do 100 days in a row of Peleton classes. It can any classes from butt-kicking HIIT to strength to kickboxing or dancing, walking, yoga, meditation etc. This will help me achieve my smaller weekly goals of at least 5 days a week of dedicated exercise. And for my mental health, a side project I will challenge myself to do is keeping a gratitude journal. I will use a dedicated journal and before the day is over I'll write all the things I'm grateful for that day. Then, if I ever get low and need a morale boost, I'll read back through all my entries to see I have so much more to be grateful for than stressed or grumpy about. I'm actually looking forward to healing my gut and getting back to a place that my body doesn't feel so old from the neglect of a desk job and sedentary hobby. I have started getting ready by using my Amazon Music app that comes free with Prime. I have it play house music and before I know it, I'm standing up dancing at my desk (I work from home), and my mood is great! It doesn't feel like work when you're having fun. I also did 2 Peleton workouts this week to get into the habit of morning exercise. I did 20 minutes of HIIT with dumbells Monday. That left me pretty sore this morning so today I opted for 15 minute reggaeton dance session. I love to dance but I save it for days I'm sore or have low energy because it's a lot less challenging than HIIT or strength training. Anyway, I have a feeling 2025 is going to be absolutely amazing and I'm ready to get started!