Starting over. Again. For the bazillionth time. I guess that if you put an optimistic spin on it, I never give up! I have never lost hope that I’d get to my goal weight and maintain it for the rest of my life. To put an optimistic spin on that, the older I am when I finally get to my goal weight, the less time I will have to maintain it… Ok, that really doesn’t work, does it? No.
For my first step, I made a journal in Microsoft OneNote. I love that software. It’s like one of those 5 subject notebooks, but with a Turbo setting. Picture an open notebook, with tabs across the top for the sections, as many as you want. In each section are pages, as many and as long as you want, and when you title a page, the title hangs off the right side of the page on a tab, so you can find it quickly. These pages are not pre-formatted like Word is. You can plop something right in the middle of the page if you wish. You can put anything in this notebook:
- Copy and paste interesting things from the web
- Create a chart in Excel, and copy/paste it, and you can add to it on the OneNote page
- Add audio and video files
- Add pics and graphics
This is my favorite Microsoft program (and no, they did NOT pay me to say that!). I have one set up with sections labeled “Journal,” “Food,” “Exercise” and “Motivation.” The exercise page is a chart from excel with columns to fill in. Motivation contains separate pages to categorize what kind of files are in there: Ralph Marston, ditties I find on the web, my own personal thoughts, anything I think might have value when I need a boost. And best of all, I got a Windows phone for my birthday last month, loaded with Word, Excel, Power Point, and OneNote. When I make notes on my mobile phone, they automatically sync with my MS Office stuff. So if I hear something interesting or motivational, I can add it. If I change my food plan for the day, I can update it. And when I sync the phone with the computer, it’s all there waiting to be organized into its proper section in my notebook.
If you are thinking that I am a geek, you are 100% correct. I am, and I am proud of it! Maybe that’s why I bought a motorcycle–to balance out the geeky half of me. I don’t think it worked though. I’m really the geekiest biker EVER. But I want to be a slim, healthy, biker-geek, and that is what I am working on. Eating right, working out, taking care of myself, dealing with the overload of stress heaped on me by my employer, doing all the things I need to do. I’m on the right path. I have the knowledge of 10,000 diet books, etc. I just need to make it all work for me.
I see that my eating is not all that bad right now, without really monitoring what I’m eating. This is a good place to be starting over. I’m going to journal what I eat without counting points or calories. I’m just going to do what comes naturally, and try to work enough exercise in there to knock off some weight. That’s my starting point, and I’ll re-evaluate at the end of the week to make course corrections. I’ve always started out with a bang, joining WW or buying into some book or plan, buying new toys. Maybe I don’t need to buy or do anything new, maybe I don’t need to focus on all the “stuff” that’s supposed to “help” me do this. Maybe I have everything I need to make my dream come true. (Could it be that easy? Hmmm…)
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