Tuesday, August 23, 2011

What's My Motivation?

Second day in a row of blogging, who am I?  If you missed the first day here's a link to my Versatile Blogger Award post from yesterday.

I'm going to do my best to put my thoughts into words in a focused manner for all of you readers out there.  I want to improve my writing so please feel free to leave feedback in the comments section after reading!

Anyways, moving on to what I really wanted to talk about in this blog post.

This morning I was reading a post by Claire who blogs at Navigating North, you can read that post here.  Her post focused on being flexible with yourself.  I thought the message was great, remember to take some "me time" for yourself every day where you do something you enjoy that relaxes you and not worry about all of the things you need to be doing.  As I was reading all that was going through my mind was - you take too much time for yourself and as a result are spending less time on things you need to be focused on (homework) which then leads to stress as you're trying to meet deadlines at the last minute.  It really applies to all areas in my life, not just school.

I left a comment saying as much, that I take going with the flow to the extreme and do not accomplish much with my time.  This is where Claire comes in with some awesome thoughts that really hit home for me.  Because finding the balance between "me time" and being productive is challenging you need to find out what really motivates you.

Despite being at work I immediately got to thinking about what is motivating me to be productive with my time.  My thoughts immediately turned to my weight loss and came up with these reasons for being the motivation behind my goal of losing weight - I don't like the way my body looks, I'm overweight, and my doctor has advised I should lose weight for my health.  All three are strong reasons to motivate me to lose weight and yet I am not completing the necessary steps to accomplish this goal.

I am extremely frustrated with myself for doing just the opposite to reach my weight loss goals.  Knowing what I need to do is not a problem, but actually doing it seems to be.  For what reason I don't know.  If I don't like the way my body looks I should workout and eat healthy to change the way it looks, what is so hard about that?

There are so many reasons excuses for not doing what needs to be done - I eat what my family buys and prepares for food, I don't have a workout buddy, I can't get up early enough to workout before work - blah blah blah!  They're all excuses!!  If I want to change my habits it is up to me and no one else.

So why then am I not changing what needs to be changed?


Do I not want to change?


The only logical reason has to be that it is hard to make changes to the lifestyle you are comfortable with.  I say this can be the only reason because I definitely do not want to continue with the lifestyle I am living.


If it was easy everyone would be doing it.


My blog is called Living and Learning to be Country Strong (more on where that came from in another post) for a reason.  I need to live my life and learn how to handle the hard stuff in it - changing my habits being one of many.


Before I go off on another tangent I'll stop here.  I have so much more to write about but I will save that for another time.


So what was the purpose of writing this post?  1) To spread the word about Claire's blog because I am absolutely loving it and think everyone should at least check it out! 2) To share my struggle with finding that balance between "me time" and being productive - maybe someone else struggles with this and will benefit from reading about my own struggle 3) To put into "words" what my motivation is to lose weight and finally 4) Honestly, to get the support of the blog community because I need all the support I can get!

If you made your way through all of the above, congratulations!  I welcome any thoughts or suggestions you may have for me.

Good night everyone!
~Living N Learning~




4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I suffer with not having enough me time, most certainly. That was actually my August goal to work on. It is coming along though and I take at least 1 hour before I go to bed off the internet most of the time.

Amy @ Living N Learning said...

@lolzthatswim - Glad to hear you're working on incorporating some me time into your days. Instead of twinnies we're opposites right now haha. We need to meet in the middle and become twinnies I think :)

Tessa @ Amazing Asset said...

This is an interesting post. This may sound odd, but I think I give myself too much "me time." I am selfish in the fact that I make sure that eat what and when I want to (although so much better about this now!) and that gives me too much time on my own

Amy @ Living N Learning said...

@Tessa - It doesn't sound odd at all! I completely understand how you can give youself too much "me time".

To all: I realize that I missed a bit of connection between how I give myself too much "me time" and how that relates to not doing what I need to do to reach my goals. I'll include this missing piece in my next blog post so be on the look out for it!