As part of the No Excuse Mom 12-week Transformation Contest, I created a fitness calendar based on the guidelines and calendar print outs provided at this link. I loaded up my son in the car, and headed to the store to purchase a few supplies. By a few I mean poster board, and some wall hanging supplies. I printed the calendars and filled them in. I then added a little color with markers.
Honestly the most fun was finding motivation quotes and fitness inspiration on the web. The hubby and I found all sorts of relevant images, including those of the body type that I am going to be working towards. I don't want to be exactly like her, I want to become my own version of what she represents. That is the strong, healthy, and fit Gina Carano.
Here are some pictures of my fitness calendar and inspiration board.
It will be fun to see the calendar become more colorful as I enter my fitness information over the next 12 weeks. One of the motivational photos that we found was very appropriate given the challenge.
It has been quite awhile since my last post, and I now feel that the time is right for me to pick this whole blog thing up again. You may or may not be wondering why, either way I'll explain. While we don't have to start at the beginning, we can momentarily travel back to January 2013.
January 2013 is an interesting time point for me, because it was at this time that I realized that there had to be something better, something more that I was missing. I often thought about a scene from a favorite movie of mine, Beauty and the Beast. Belle has just refused Gaston's marriage proposal, and is singing about her feelings on the whole situation. She runs out into the field overlooking a beautiful, mountainous landscape singing, "I want adventure in the great wide somewhere, I want it more than I can tell."
Don't get me wrong, it's not that I was unhappy with life on the whole. I just knew that I am capable of so much more. My issue was that I didn't have a clue where to start. A friend of mine gifted a teleseminar to me. The course, Call 2 Action by Michael Bernoff, was exactly what I needed. I got the kick in the butt I needed to unlock what I already have inside of me. I took several more of his courses and have been to the Core Strength Experience event twice now, and would go again and again. The portion of my journey that occurred from January 2013 to now deserves a post all its own. I can sum it up by saying that I did a lot of soul searching and became more aware of my own wants and how, up to that point, my thought processes had been keeping me right where I was. Which was exactly where I was trying to move on from.
One of those thought processes is what brings me back to the blog today. I have decided to not only take part in a 12 week transformation challenge, but to also share my journey and transformation here.
This may not seem like a big deal to others. It is for me. I have been battling thoughts in my head that say "you're not good enough" or ask "what if you fail and everyone knows?" Not just in the fitness realm either, in a majority of my life.
Just last week I was talking to my husband about undertaking this transformation challenge. It was well past midnight as I sat in the middle of the living room floor with tears running down my cheeks as we spoke. I realized that I was afraid to say what I really wanted as my fitness goal. I struggled to even let it come across my lips. My mind was at war with itself. Why? What's so hard about admitting my desire, my goal? If I admit it, it means it is real. It means that someone else would know and if I didn't reach that goal they'd see that failure too. Really, who am I to want that goal anyway? As I had often been told in life, "you're so small, why are you worried about weight and fitness?" Were they right? Was I being ungrateful for what I have?
We talked through it, and I realized that I needed this challenge in more ways than I knew. It was going to have me admit to myself and those around me my fitness goal. What is it? I want a visibly strong, healthy, and fit physique. I want my hard work to be visible in the form of defined muscles and toned body. Some may still wonder why I'm worried about that, or think that I want it to look good in the eyes of others. What many don't realize is that while in the grand scheme of things I may not have had to deal with being at an extreme weight, it doesn't always take an extreme to cause an internal struggle. I have been heavier than I wanted to be, yet because of the way my body holds the fat (conveniently around my mid-section) I have been able to hide it under strategically purchased clothing styles. While those around me may not see it, I do when I look in the mirror. I have struggled with trying to lose weight and have had frustrations of no longer fitting in my favorite jeans. I've felt like a failure and been down on myself over my fitness level. I want to feel confident in my own skin, and I want to see evidence of the hard work.
I have decided to be honest with myself about what I really want and own it. In this journey, I feel that in order to truly tackle it, I must write it out. Not only to hold myself accountable, but to also tackle another struggle in my mind. That's a topic for another day...
I invite you to follow along, or even take on your own challenge. Step by step, one day at a time, I will walk this journey.
