This week should be a lot easier than the last two with my work responsibilities winding down for a while and I plan to spend that time catching up on all the time I missed spending on my own hobbies and personal pursuits.
This week I want to:
Take care of myself. I’ve stressed my mind and body too much and skipped too many doses of my medication these last couple of weeks. Moving forward my sleep, food, and medication schedules have to become my top priorities again. Also, as a consequence of my self-neglect, I need to contact my doctor and discuss my returning symptoms before things get any worse.
Update: I made sure to keep my work schedule light, to go to bed on time, to eat my meals on time, to move my body a little more, to get outside a little, and, most importantly, to take my medication. I wasn’t perfect, but I was so much better than the last two weeks. I count that as a win.
Walk on the warm days. The weather forecast is predicting six out of the next seven days will see near 60-degree highs. I know that nothing eases seasonal depression like the warmth, sunshine, and exercise. Soon there will be days and days where the cold wind will blow and the clouds will stick around. Fight the melancholy while you can!
Update: I’ve been feeling so tired that dedicating any block of time to walking felt beyond any amount of energy I could muster. I did make an effort to take short walks between the buildings at work throughout the day but because I didn’t even hit my step counts goals I can’t count it as a win.
Finish reading the last of Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst by Robert M. Sapolsky. I have less than 150 pages left now and if I buckle down and read a little every day, I could finally move on to something else, something I’m looking forward to desperately.
Update: I did it! Just before bedtime Sunday night I turned the last page of the nearly 1000 page volume and set it down for the last time. I loved the book and I plan to write a proper review soon. I even plan to read it again, next year perhaps, but right now all I want to do is start a new book, The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, something to get lost in.
Post a short introductory post to Zen and Pi. I purged the site over the weekend in preparation for a new beginning and like a new notebook or a pristine canvas, it’s only after you’ve marred the perfection that you can allow for creativity and mistakes.
Update: It not very good, and it’s not very interesting, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, and it isn’t even exactly what I had hoped to say when I started it but it’s up. I plan to post more, weekly, maybe, or closer to monthly, probably, but as often as I can for sure. I only need to work at it every day and to remember that the goal is to get each piece just 80% where I want it.
Mark everything off of my to-do list every day. My list isn’t very intense. It’s just one or two small things to do both during my breaks at work and after I get home from work. I’d like to get these small things done during the week rather than saving all the small things for the weekends and leaving no time for larger projects or time to get out and do something fun.
Update: I was doing really well at first, but just after midday on Thursday I’d lost the momentum. I want to say I got 50% through my weekly list but that might be a little too generous. In my defense, it was the first week since I merged all my lists and put so much effort into completing so many tasks. I made progress.
This week I won’t be too hard on myself and I won’t ask too much of myself either. I need to destress. I need to take a break. I need to focus on me while I can. That isn’t a weakness, and that isn’t wasting time. It’s being protective, disciplined, and healthy, and it’s admirable.
Photo by Luke Stackpoole on Unsplash
Lisa Marie Blair 
One thought on “Goals // Week 46”