July is coming to an end. How have I done the last few months?

Not that great.

I have given up on working out. I was being so sporadic I didn’t feel it was worth it. I did better in June than July but I can’t get my head in order. My 9-5 has been crazy this month and despite having good intentions every morning I am dead by the time I get home. My head is spinning and all I want to do is zone out and relax. I have been giving myself permission to do so. I think it is important for my mental health to just have some downtime.

I have been focusing on eating better. And I would say 90% of the time I have been doing pretty well. I am eating fruits and vegetables and filling up on protein. I am limiting my sweets and doing really well in this category. July has seen me eating a lot of potato chips and pretzels. I apparently am heading towards a salty binge. Week days are so much better than weekends because I tend to graze when I’m writing or editing photos.

I am giving myself permission to take time and get one area of my life somewhat controlled before I add another element. For July I really focused on my food and will continue to do so through August. My plan is to reintroduce workouts in September. I want to try running again plus restart the Bikini Body strength program. It’s a 6-day program but I plan to start slow and do just Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and the weekends. I will rest on Tuesday and Thursday. Once I feel comfortable with that, I will add in one more day to do the program as written.

I think mental health is just as important as physical health. Stepping away from exercise is both bad and good for mental health. I know I feel better when I workout but right now working out is causing me to stress more. I am still taking walk breaks every day, just not doing strength or cardio workouts. I would love to but I need to get my mental health in order.

I have not journaled much in June and not at all in July. I plan to start adding that back in during August. I will start off with once a week and build from there. I also want to start reading before bed again. I have a stack of magazines that are calling my name but I have picked surfing Facebook or playing Candy Crush instead. As much as I enjoy mindlessly playing around on Facebook, I need to use my time better.

It’s been a rough summer but everything gets better eventually, right?

How do you keep yourself motivated? What do you do for mental health? Tell me in the comments!

June 21st is international yoga day and I’m taking that as a sign.

I need to get back on the horse. I used to do yoga after *most* of my runs and all my long runs. I stopped running and therefore I’ve stopped doing it.

I probably need more yoga than most people because I am literally the least flexible person on earth. I’ve never been flexible, even when I was dancing five days a week. This is probably why I never became a professional dancer. I do much better and actually get a little flexible when I actually stretch daily and do yoga at least once a week.

And now with my increased emphasis on strength training, I need to do more stretching.

I am the least flexible and I am pretty sure I have the world’s rightest hips. My squats are nowhere near ass to the grass. I’m lucky if I can get parallel. I use a lit of hip openers to work on gaining flexibility in my hips to help improve my lifting.

Like most people, I sit at a desk for 8-9 hours a day. I try to get up and do posture checks but I know I need help here too. Even at home I have horrible posture. What helps posture? Yoga.

I also benefit from the mental aspect as well. I feel less stressed when I take the time for yoga. I need to learn to shut my brain down and certain poses help with that. I always feel better after a good session.

Lastly, I’d like to work on my balance. You’d think after 20ish years of dance I’d be a pro at balance. Nope. I’m only graceful and balanced while dancing. Yoga, and many of the individual poses, are great for balance work, which is helpful in real life.

I pledge to start doing yoga once a week and stretching daily. I really want to feel strong and healthy, both mentally and physically.

What do you pledge to do to be healthier? 

Follow along on Instagram to see my workouts!

Struggle is my word this month.

May has been a rough month.

I got aboard the struggle bus and keep trying to get off. I don’t know why I am having such a difficult time. Or why I can’t seem to get myself to workout, despite wanting to workout and wanting to change. I started bikini body on May 1st and should be starting week five but I am only in the middle of week three.

WTF is wrong with me?

I did the first week pretty easily but the second week started off badly and went downhill from there. Monday of week two started with three buses not showing up so I stood outside for 30 minutes then, of course, the bus was packed and I had to stand for another 30 minutes. By the time I got home, I was exhausted and my feet/legs were killing me. Tuesday I actually did my workout (Yay me!) but Wednesday was a Dbacks game and Thursday we had to run to Costco. Friday was another bus fiasco. I really don’t know why I keep taking the bus. The afternoon ones are always late or non-existent. I am always good on the weekends though!

Then I took pretty much a week off.

I don’t even know or remember why. Bad week at work. Feeling sorry for myself. Frustrated at my perceived lack of progress. All of the above and then some probably. I did finally decide to workout again on Sunday. I started where I had left off, plyo + HIIT day. I did three of the four rounds of plyo and was done. I couldn’t do anymore. I was exhausted, about to get dizzy, and had zero energy. But I did what I could and that is what is important.

So then I decided to try getting up at 4 am to see if I could do better before work. It lasted two days. I went back to after work and have done pretty well.

I started a personal photography project to track my health, fitness, and progress. I hope it will help keep me more accountable to myself. It seems to be working and also helps improve my photography skills. The project is making me think more creatively about what health, fitness, and progress represent and how I can show these in different ways.

Follow me on Instagram to see posts of my progress, food, and puppies. Ok, they are full grown dogs but they are still puppies to me!

The struggle. It’s real. What have you been struggling with lately?