Happy Sunday and down the first official week of this Project! It's definitely been a whirlwind of a week, with lots of ups and downs, but I got through it and happy to report back the victories and needs for improvement. Just in case you didn't read last weeks post, here's a basic overview of what I was hoping to achieve:
For starters, a morning wake up time of 6:20am and a bedtime of 10:20pm. I was giving myself grace on my days off on wake up times but still needed to maintain the 10:20pm bedtime. Every day of the week also had a different workout and hobby planned. Right now, the goal is to spend 5 minutes working out and 5 minutes on a hobby. If either spill over the time, that is not an issue, but the overall goal right now is turning these activities into daily habits/rituals. The more granular you make them, the more likely you are to keep them. That being said, Sunday is for baking & Pilates, Monday learning Chess & flexibility/stretching, Tuesday learning French & boxing, Wednesday Math practice & karate, Thursday improving Typing & strength training, Friday trying a new recipe & dancing, and lastly Saturday with a walk & video games.
Minus my days off, I ended up achieving the wake up and bedtime routine solidly. It has been extremely helpful during my work days, I haven't been as exhausted, I've been more alert and it has helped improve my mood. However, I'm not ready to move forward in adding more time to my hobbies/workouts, which would also affect my wake up and bedtime routine. Before diving into my explanation, let's go over the week.
Sunday I did manage some baking, I made biscuits and a cheddar jalapeno loaf. The biscuits were okay, a little dry, but something I could work with. The loaf was really good though! Need to add more jalapenos because it didn't have the kick I was looking for, but super tasty. I used this biscuit recipe by _ and this load recipe by _. Today I'm going to be trying a 2-ingredient biscuit recipe, will obviously report back how it went. As for my workout, that was not done.
Monday was more successful. I found the Chess app (also known as Chess.com), where you can learn to play Chess for free. I'm practically starting Chess as a complete newbie. I knew the pieces names and some of the basic movements, other than that, I am a novice. I've gone through a few lessons and started making notes in a notebook. As for my workout, I did a bit of stretching working towards greater flexibility!
Tuesday was a success in my workout, although I am going to have to search for a few other workouts for boxing on YouTube, but did not manage to work on learning French. Since that day, I have been searching for more free resources, which I will share at a later time.
For Wednesday, the dreaded hump day, I had a lot going on that day and did not manage a workout in, which was also hindered by the fact I didn't have a workout/lesson picked out to make it easier for me to do the workout. But, I found Brilliant.org for my Math Practice. Like Chess.com they also have an app which makes it even more convenient. It is a free app, but there is a downfall with it. You are given keys to unlock the lesson and you're only given 2 a day for free. So if it's concepts you already understand, you tent to breeze through the lesson quickly. It seems there are a wide range of lessons that they offer, but it will take a long while to unlock them at this rate. So, I have been utilizing the app daily, but I'm going to look into other mediums for learning.
On Thursday, I did a simple arm workout with 5 lb weights. It reminded me why I need to add more strength training into my workout routines, hahaha. But for my hobby, typing, I ended up not completing that after work. I had a long, hard day and ended up getting home around 6pm and then falling asleep at around 7:30. I was thoroughly exhausted. I even ordered take out on my way home because I wasn't even up for cooking anything.
Friday is where it gets... well, interesting. Since I went to bed so early Thursday night, I was wide awake at 2:30am. I tried falling back to sleep, but by 3:30, I ended up getting up. This is where a problem started. I ended up doom scrolling for about 2 hours. This is precisely why I am trying to add more hobbies to my daily life. Doom scrolling has been taking over my life and affecting my mood negatively. By the time I realized how long I had been doom scrolling, I got up to start my day and decided to throw in some Typing practice. Bad. Idea. My mood quickly soured because I couldn't get out of my head and was getting frustrated because I kept making mistakes while typing. I wanted to chuck my keyboard right out the window. When I caught myself about to physically smack my keyboard on my desk, I decided to call it quits. Not a proud moment, but a moment nonetheless. I'm going to have to seriously do a full detox of my IG feed, because it affects my mood so negatively that it trickles into the rest of my day. Needless to say, I allowed my emotions to get the best of me and did not workout or cook a new recipe. In my defense on the recipe, I forgot that was going to be for Friday lol.
Last up, Saturday, which was a much more successful, enjoyable day. I woke up on time, got my walk in, and when I got home from a long day, I made Buldak ramen and played some Borderlands 3. Finished off with eating some Tillamook Coffee Ice Cream. I then had an everything shower, got into some cozy pj's and watched Home Alone 2.
Looking back at this week, I will say I've been in an overall better mood, I've been happier, and feel good knowing I'm actually doing things to add more richness and value to my life. There are definitely room for improvement, but I would call this a success.
A few things outside of this that I was hoping to maintain was my daily reading habit, which I'm sad to say has not fully been maintained. I am lucky in the fact that at work I can listen to audiobooks and managed to finish one audiobook, Smarter, Faster, Better by Charles Duhigg and started Becoming by Michelle Obama (which I'm almost through with). However, physical reading has been lacking.
Another huge accomplishment for me this week was going and submitting my application for my Passport. I'm almost 38 years old and have never owned a passport. This is a huge deal for me, because I never could save up the money in order to make getting a passport a priority, but for a birthday present to me, I made it a priority. I can't wait to get it in.
Now, let's talk about tweaking and rooms for improvement.
As I mentioned, I am going to be sticking with the 6:20am/10:20pm routine. Missing a couple of hobbies and workouts shows that I am not ready to add onto my routine, which I'm not upset or ashamed about. The main focus right now is getting into the subconscious habit of a routine, meaning I don't have to think about what I am doing next.
Utilizing the coffee after the workout I feel was a very smart move, because it gives me something to look forward to, a reward, to help reinforce the habit. But I think I'm going to be switching out a few workouts. After doing the arm workout, I realized more strength training needs to be added to my routine. I've researched that 3 days a week is best, but I'm also afraid I will get bored, so I plan to stick with just 2 workouts a week. I'm also going to have a backup plan that if I can't find a workout in time for a specific workout I'd like to do (say boxing or karate) I will do a simple walk.
However, to help alleviate that a bit, I am going to add 10 minutes a day on Sundays to plan out for my week ahead. When I mentioned about clearing out my IG, I've been trying to find and follow more women who recommend books, tools, tips, etc. on improving your daily life and mind, and found a couple videos that recommended roughly planning out your week ahead on Sunday. So, I will take the time to do that AND find resources/workouts for the certain hobby days to help set myself up for an even more successful week.
Other than that, I am going to try and recreate this week with my original guidelines that I crafted last week and see how it goes. I've also been toying around the idea of creating another IG account that coincides with this blog, in order to share all the free resources I am utilizing to help other people. Especially given this administrations current tactics, I live in the US, women especially need as much help as possible to fight back against this regime.
I think that'll do it for now. Thanks for stopping by and until next week!
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