Well there goes the month (it doesn’t seem like its been that long since June turned into July). It is a day of reflection on how the goals set for the month, how I did with them, and to plan for the coming seasons.

I basically made it through Shift Shop (I say basically because I had week 3 spread out basically over two and half weeks). I enjoyed the program, though when it comes to short programs, I do like a little more variety in the workouts (I have a love/hate relationship with Autumn’s 21 Day Fix and 21 Day Fix Extreme programs [also from beachbody]. This isn’t to say that I won’t do another round of the Shift Shop, because I will—just not right now. I’m thinking for September I want a little different pace so it will be a coin flip between Yoga Booty Ballet on BOD (beachbody on demand) and Country Heat (Autumn’s 30 day dance program). I enjoy both programs and both are a little more low impact than Shift Shop was. I also managed to lose four pounds this month as well—which is exciting since I wasn’t following the meal plan for Shift Shop, and I have been letting my sweet tooth have a little more control than what it should (maybe the weight lose is due to not having my caramel high rise latte every day at work??? Probably has a little something to do with it).

I came close to my goal of 310,000 steps (basically 10,000/day) this month. The final tally will probably be about 306,000 by bed (so I manage to come pretty damn close). There were several off days this month—the half a week I had to recover from the bruised little toe, and then trying to get back into a routine of going into the lab to do work. I think coming to the conclusion that I need to move on, helped me to get past some of the problems yesterday and I managed to get a good number of steps in. I did have this big goal for the year of reaching 5 million steps for the year (which was basically a little over 14,000 steps/day); but when the mild bout of depression hit in early spring (due to a combination of not being happy on the job and the way this country was going), the daily steps went down and I fell behind on the goal—technically I’m a little over 2.6 million steps for the year (I’d basically have to do almost 20,000 steps/day for the rest of the year to get up to 5 million), so I may fall short of this yearly goal again.

I have been doing a lot of personal development reading for the month; I’ve finished:

Declutter your mind: how to stop worrying, relieve anxiety, and eliminate negative thinking by S.J. Scott and Barrie Davenport

23 Anti-Procrastination Habits: How to stop being lazy and overcome your procrastination by S.J. Scott

52 Small Changes: One Year to a Happier, Healthier You by Brett Blumenthal

I’m currently reading the following three books (the titles of two should explain why I’m reading multiple books):

Rise Sister Rise: A guide to unleashing the wise wild woman within by Rebecca Campbell

Self Discovery Questions: 155 Breakthrough Questions to Accelerate Massive Action by Barrie Davenport

The 52 week Life Passion Project: The Path to uncover your Life Passion by Barrie Davenport

All three are great books (I’m probably further along in Rise Sister Rise, because I’m only answering every few questions; which means I will need to go back and answer all the other questions that I read through [mentally answered], but actually write the answers out and see how they’ve potentially changed since I started the book).

I like Rise Sister Rise, mainly because it talks about spirituality in terms of connecting to nature, the planet, the four major elements, and the old ways. I’ve never really been a follower of the major western religions (though I have nothing against them—I just don’t agree with how they’re taught or how people cherry pick the parts they want to follow that go with how they act). I am glad that the founding fathers put in the freedom of religion and worship how one chooses into the Constitution as part of the First Amendment (okay, off my little history/religion box).

I’ve also decided that I need to learn how to program—so I bought a couple of e-course bundles, and will slowly start working my way through those as well over the next couple of months (so that I can add those to my CV as additional skills).

I’m slowly working on accepting and welcoming my anxiety to where I can function without the potential anxiety/panic attacks that could leave me feeling nauseous for a week or so. I’m also job searching still, but realize that for every job there are probably 50+ applications in addition to mine, and that many of them are also younger than I am as well (plus probably have a few more skills). So in the coming months, I will be heading to career fairs, to see what could be out there, plus get an idea from recruiters there if going back to school for an MBA would be feasible or not.

I do have a Skype interview coming up next week for a potential postdoc position in Florida. I’ve never been to Florida, so I think it would be interesting to go there—learn some more skills, but also try to keep the balance of work with having a life (I’d like to explore a little bit of the state [at least around where I could potentially be living], and may a little of the surround states).

I’ve also realized that it will take awhile to work on breaking old habits and incorporating new ones from some of the books I’ve read into my day to day life. It is hard at times trying to silence your inner critic, especially when you realize that you are your own worse enemy at times. I’ll be the first to admit that at times I can have an overactive imagination and probably dwell on the worse case scenario a lot of the times—these are things that I’m working with—I’m not going to try to quiet my imagination (but I will try to tone it down at times), and instead of dwelling on how things could go bad (after meetings, etc)—I will imagine that things went wonderful and everyone got something out if.

Another big thing I’ve done this past month–was that I launched this blog. Right now there aren’t many followers and that is perfectly fine as I’m learning as I go (as with anything in life). Some days will always be better than others, and I know that some days no one may visit, and other days numerous people may visit–its the cyclic nature of life.

September’s goals are going to be:
(1) At least 300,000 steps (10,000 steps/day)
(2) Make it through the 30 day squat challenge
(3) Make it through another round of Country Heat
(4) Finish Rise Sister Rise, write and post reviews
(5) Determine next book to work into personal development reading list
(6) Work on the programming course bundles
(7) Determine which job fairs/expos to potentially go to
(8)—Potential move????

So until the next post–remember that there is beauty and kindness all around us–if we only open both our eyes and our hearts to see it. Smile, laugh, live, and love.