Growth
I am definitely a person who seeks out opportunities to grow and develop myself. I find change refreshing and rarely shy away from it.
Moving house is always a time for change. I am settling into my new apartment, and I must say, it feels a lot more like home than any of the other places I've lived in Melbourne. I certainly felt moving in here that I could set the place up however I wanted, or at least Jess and I could have a discussion about what we want and come to a mutually satisfying solution - and that has been the case.
Settling into a new space calls for a massive reorganization of all my crap, of which there is a lot! I'm still figuring out how best to organize my space and coming to terms with the fact that I actually have to put stuff away if I don't constantly want to be living in what looks like an archeological dig. At the moment I've got a set up that requires me to rearrange furniture to move around, but, it's a set-up that I think will work. My bedroom just sort of looks like it's a self-contained unit is all. And as long as the lounge room stays fairly clutter-free, I'm quite ok with this arrangement.
But with the move I've been feeling inspired to change more than just the space I occupy. I have been making all sorts of changes to my life for the past few years, and I am quite happy with the results, and now I want to amp up the progress.
A friend of mine from high school who has always been morbidly obese has just come to the decision that she wants to turn her life around for herself. I am very excited for her, as since reconnecting on Facebook I've often felt that she is unhappy, surrounded by negative people, and making unhealthy decisions because of it. I've often wanted to say something to her, but since we really don't have that much history between us, I always felt like I would be intruding. Now she's writing a blog about her journey to a healither self and I'm very happy to get the chance to follow along and offer encouragement, support, and maybe the odd piece of advice.
This journey that she has begun on has got me thinking about the journey that I am on. My goals are not as specific as her's, probably because I am quite ok with my body and physical ability, but I do want to lose about 20kg (I can't remember how much off the top of my head, but I believe that's the amount). Since I took up swimming I've been steadily losing small amounts of weight, but I feel like there is more I can do. I am a healithy eatter, but I have a few bad habits. Namely, carbs and cheese. I have pasta for dinner most nights, and I have toast for breakfast most mornings. And I eat cheese like I won't ever have the opportunity to eat it again. I used to also have chocolate in that equation, but I've managed to break that habit by not having chocolate in the house anymore and allowing myself to buy something chocolate when I'm out.
Jess is intolerant of yeast and so doesn't eat bread. She likes to have a pint of icecream for lunch on the weekend and has made changes to her eatting habits so that she can do that and still maintain her weight. This means she rarely eats pasta and always brings a healthy lunch she's cooked to work. And she does lots of exercise.
So it's got me thinking about changes that I can make in my life to both be healthier and live on a tighter budget, as I am now paying $50/week more in rent.
I have a membership to the pool, so I can swim as often as I want. And when I go for a swim, I do at least 30 laps, and normally do 50 laps (1.5km). I am working on getting my speed up, and as I get faster I will probably add more laps to my regime.
I can cook and bring my own lunch into uni. Today I made a curry that was quite nice (though it's missing something, green pepper I think) and I have plenty left over. This saves money and ensures that I eat a decent portion size of something that is healthy.
I can eat fewer carbs. The curry I made today, I didn't make any rice to go with it, and it's fine without. Rice isn't the carb I need to cut down on, but it's a for instance. I can have cereal, oatmeal and/or fruit salad for breakfast instead of toast all the time. I can make more hearty veg-filled dishes for dinner, the left overs of which I can have for lunch the next day.
I can give myself a budget on how much money I am allowed to spend on food/snacks while I'm at uni. What I am planning on doing is putting $20 in my desk and allowing myself to only spend that much per pay period on eatting out at lunch. That's only $2/day, so I'll have to eat in most days.
I can eat better portions. I do have a tendency when I make pasta to make a lot and then eat it all. If I make a huge amount, I will use it for left overs, but I often still eat 2 servings when I only need 1.
I can keep other things around the house to snack on if I'm still hungry after dinner - like fruit, cereal, nuts, and yoghurt.
I think that if I start making these changes in my life I will see the benefits of them fairly quickly. None of them are hard changes to make, all of them are small things that I am already on my way to doing. Now it is just time for me to step it up and start being a bit stricter with myself.