When I first glanced over this first chapter, I thought, “got this” it doesn’t seem that hard or even that far out of my comfort zone.  The diet is somewhat close to what I eat already (…. Ummm most of the time… ) I am not a lover of junk food and after hitting 35, have mostly already moved away from greasy food out of preference more than direct intention or dieting. I looked over the exercise plan and was not horrified by it (there was no mention of the word “gym” which usually makes me nauseous.  The muscle memory exercises and the sensory awareness stuff all sounded pretty interesting to me.  No prob!

But wait! It then hit me, how am I suppose to think about all of this all of the time? How am I suppose to fit everything from playing guitar to jumping rope into my schedule and be intentional about what I shove into my mouth in the 20 minutes that I usually allot myself for lunch. Up until now, I really haven’t directly thought about or carefully planned any of these things in my day.

I have to say Joe, You may have without even knowing it, zeroed in very quickly on one of my biggest weaknesses… planning!  In order to fit all of these things into my life, not only am I going to have to think about each and every task but also figure out how to “structure” my week to do it all. For those of you who know me, you realize that creating structure, means killing spontaneity,  it’s something even more difficult for me than jogging (which is probably the second most difficult thing to ask me to do – good job Joe!) So somehow I am going to take on my two biggest challenges AND try to learn how to play the guitar and become aware of my senses – this will take some serious planning.  I find it hard to blend one major change into my life let alone bring in a series of them all at once.  But here we go, y’all are gonna watch me give it a go.

Let’s get something straight though, I am the first to admit exercising has NEVER been my forte. Not something I would consider “fun”.  I actually do not hate exercise. I just hate the feeling like I have to do something outside of something that I would normally want to do.

I do truly believe though, that if my goal is to incorporate exercise into my daily existence that it must be done in some way enjoyable if I am going to stop fearing or avoiding it.

As I hatch my plan for juggling all these active tasks for the rest of the month, I will dive into what I think to be the most fun and the least fun… right away…jumping and jogging. To keep to the task, I will attempt jogging at least a few times a week, start a jump rope journal, stick to the diet, clear out my allergies to prepare the senses, and start brainstorming sea shanty guitar songs (that preferably only have 3 chords). In the past few days, I have adopted the stretching /upper body strength video into my morning and evening, started swimming when I can get to a pool, jogged twice, and picked up my walking routine – lets just say my body is already sore …. it might be a tumultuous week.

Post script: Special thanks go out to Team players this week:

Greg Lines, an architect and sailor that combined his skills to create me a fine jumping rope out of materials he had on board. And thanks to the Confidant, Elizabeth Brady, who showed me that jogging can be fun if you are accompanied by a German shepherd, a great friend, some post rain mud and the roaring sound a river!