Wednesday, May 8, 2019

Step By Step

And, this blog has reached a new low.  NKOTB.  For the five people that still read my blog, please don't desert me.  You thought it couldn't get any lower.  It has.  I promise, I won't bring back Milli Vanilli.  And that this title really does have a meaning (At least, in my mind it does).

One of those statements is accurate.  I'll let you be the judge of which.

What I do know is that it wouldn't be a random weekday without some kind of soapbox analysis from me, so here it goes.  I've been doing so much thinking lately (which explains the burning smell) about getting myself to where I want to be - the process, the jumping off point, the burnout, the step back, etc. that it seems to be about time to finally stop acting like a crazy person and formulate some kind of sustainable plan that has actionable steps but isn't spinning out at a thousand miles an hour.

It's funny the way big ideas start out.  You get all excited to go "Eat, Pray, Love" on your life and go through so many stages to do so - the excited stage, the "eff it all Imma go do it" stage, the successes, the failures, the "why the hell am I doing this" stage, the inevitable disappointment when you fail, the overwhelmed feelings, and, I assume, most people end with the "the hell with it" stage.

I almost got to that last stage.  When you're kicking ass and taking names, its easy to assume that all of your big scary goals are gonna happen.  Who gets scared?  ME!  Who's going after it all?  ME!  Who's all big and bad and not gonna let anything stand in her way? ME!

Nice try, Rae.  Actually, all it took was my Achilles heel (literally) for me to crumble.  Faced with the inability to run and the fact that I had, by my own personal standards, failed to meet my first A goal, sent me into a ridiculous tailspin full of pessimism, anxiety, and such flat out neediness that I feel like I need to extend my condolences to anyone in my personal circle who stuck by my crap and give them a big, fat hug and (at least) a bottle of wine.

I'll likely need to rob the liquor store to pay my debts, but I digress.  It was NOT a good situation.

As many of these things go, I clearly haven't resolved this.  Or come to any nuggets of wisdom on my own.  As usual, its been a process of admitting my own fallibility, coming to terms with the fact that I am not, in fact, superwoman (this was a horrible realization), and that when I actually take the time to listen to people smarter than me, I tend to do much better.

So here it goes.  Fresh start.  I can't charge forward in my life and make everything better all at once.  But I do have the ability to accept the fact that I'm a work in progress and to take just one step with one of my dreams to go where I want to.

So that's my new plan.  Step by step.  What can I do today to make those big, scary goals happen?  What goals are most important to me RIGHT NOW to work on?

And then it's go time.  I've picked 3 (after all, that's the magic number) things to do each day to take steps to where I want to be.  They could be five minute tasks or more long term tasks, but something that takes at least one baby step to achieving my goals.

Today's three included setting up an appointment for a bike tune up, FINALLY getting some tempo miles in, and un-google porting my old phone number to transition to a better work/life balance (yes, it's the return of the "fake phone number" for those that remember!)



Baby steps?  Perhaps.  But for the first time in while, I felt a sense of accomplishment about multiple areas of my tonight.  I stopped stressing, set my three goals for tomorrow (set up appointment for a tattoo (YASS!), order power meter, content transfer from the old phone) and I'm ready to rock.

It might seem simplistic.  But like most things worth doing, it all starts with that one step.  Forward momentum and recognizing that, in most cases, it's those little steps that add up to big things.

What are you doing TODAY to achieve those goals?

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