I was just reading Crazy Aunt Purl's end of July update, where she talks about her goals for this year, and how she's doing with meeting them. She talks about defining success, and how everyone does that differently. For her, success is defined more by working towards her goal, than about saying "ok, that's done, what's next?".
Reading her post got me to thinking about my own goals, and my definition of success. If I go by the "that's done" mentality, I'm a pretty pitiful failure, as I've been working on having a clean house, a healthy body, a stable bank account and a career for years now, and I'm not very much closer to crossing any of those things off my list than I was 10 years ago. In some areas I've even managed to go backwards.
I don't often feel like a failure though, so I'm guessing that while I do get satisfaction from crossing stuff off my lists at work, I don't have the same drivers at home.
I do know that I work better when I set small goals. I joined a gym in February, and my goal for my first year of membership was to still be going at least once a week, and enjoying it, at the end of that first year. So far, so good. I'm actually at a point where I want to expand my fitness goal to say that I want to move mindfully every day. Whether that's going to the gym, or going for a walk, or doing some stretching, whatever it winds up looking like, I want to take some time every day to move, and not just walking from the car to my desk.
I also want to get back to eating food that I've prepared mindfully. I've slipped out of it, but with the recent start up of the summer crop share at Everdale, I've been reminded of how much I enjoy eating freshly prepared, locally produced food. So that's another goal: take the time to prepare and eat good food, and take coffee with me instead of buying it.
So, that covers my body. What about my mind?
I have fallen out of the practice of daily meditation, due to lots and lots of spirituality related stuff that needs it's own post. I know I feel better when I take time, even just 5 minutes, to breathe and connect and pray.
I am also very affected by my surroundings. Our house is...well, let's just say that it causes me anxiety to have people in my house. I get overwhelmed by the fur, and the stuff, and the fur, and the stuff, and then throw up my hands in defeat while the fur and the stuff continues to pile up around us. So, 10 minutes a day, as soon as I walk in the door for the evenings, I'm going to pick stuff (and fur) up, and put it where it belongs.
So, goals for August:
1. Move mindfully every day.
2. Eat mindfully every day.
3. Meditate every day.
4. Spend 10 minutes every day picking up stuff.
I also intend to update every day to keep myself honest. And if I don't cross those things off, that's ok. Because I'm going to measure my success instead of my failure.
