It's a Zen Life for Me!

Life has been very good lately! Work is going well, candle business is thriving and I have been having a blast with my nephews living here.  I am happy to report that my brother and his wife are all setup at their new home and are ready for the boys to come back and live with them.  My time (10 months) as full-time auntie to the wonderful Rylan (5), Aerion (3) and Phoenix (22 months) is nearing an end in just a couple of short weeks.  I am very excited for my brother and his wife and their family, but I am sad because those boys have been my joy for the past 10 months.

So this is a time of change for me.  The reality is that I have spent so much time taking care of other people the past 10 months, I have not been taking care of myself.  Diet habits and exercise have slipped big time.  My initial reaction was to jump back on Medifast, which is a great diet.  But I don't want a diet, I want to move to the next phase of Cody...if that makes sense.  I lost 75 lbs in about 6 months on Medifast and didn't even work out.  I was thinner but I was not fit yet.  I live in the most beautiful state, Colorado, and I have never even climbed a 14'er or went skiing.  Even smaller, fitness held me back.  Secretly, I even long to do crossfit.  So this next stage of myself isn't focused on just being thinner, however that will be an awesome benefit, but I want to be an active and healthy person.  This will allow me to serve my God better, be a better wife, be a better employee and overall be a better version of myself.  

One of the fruits of the spirit is self control and this is something that I have not been manifesting - and very obviously.  I truly believe that God won't tell you to do something without giving you the tools to do it.  Sometimes he puts the right person in your life at the right time to help you with your journey.  My time at Take Shape for Life has shown me how important it is to have the support of a Health Coach.  Since I want an overall wellness approach, I am starting with a wellness coach.  I will be given a goal for something diet related, exercise related and one mental related.  Here are my first 3 goals I was given to start with:

1. No carbonated drinks.
2. I want you to stretch in the morning after you wake up, and again at night before you go to bed. You don't have to spend 20 minutes stretching, just stretch as much as you can. You're not going to believe how great you feel after a week of this.
3. Time to change your perception of yourself. From now on, you are an active and healthy person who is just recovering from some down time. Envision yourself being one of those athletic types when you work out. Take the stairs and never the elevator, and feel and enjoy each step. You are no longer someone who is struggling. You are someone with goals that you WILL reach, because you know you can. Because you are young and have the power to transform yourself.

I also got a FitBit One, so I will be using that as motivation to be more active.  FitBit sets a goal of 10 flights a day of stairs and I FAR exceed that.  Guess that is natural when you live in a 2 story house with 3 kids and your office is in the basement.  Though I don't take nearly as many steps as I should.  I work in IT so most of my day is spent in front of the computer.  Candle making is no big caloric expenditure either.  But I am working on small steps.  I am very much an all or nothing type person, so I am so tempted to want to go all workout crazy and do everything that I eventually want to be doing.  But I am trusting my wellness coach and when it is time for me to add to my goals.  I have a strong tendency to want to control EVERYTHING and over-engineer plans.  It is very odd and somewhat freeing to just follow someone else's plan and not add my own spin to it all. 

And here is a photo of me at day one of my new journey: