Combatting Resistance

Anyone who is trying to overcome bad habits and make positive lifestyle changes faces it. Resistance to change. I'm struggling with that right now, so I'm trying to make tiny changes that I can slip under the radar of my subconscious. :D Additionally, I'm struggling to rebuild a body devastated by three years of chronic pain. This week (and you may notice my weeks run Thursday to Thursday because that is when my TOPS Chapter meets) I am working on two things: totally removing refined sugars from my diet and just getting back in the habit of exercising every morning.

So far the sugar is going pretty good, but that's because this is a goal I return to regularly and have made permanent progress on over years of behavior modification. My goal for this week is to have no more than one sweetened soft drink. I allow myself the one because I have a very public life and chances are I'll be somewhere in the next week where a soft drink is my only option and I'm thirsty.

At home I use raw sugar, when I use added sugar at all. The only things I add sugar to are coffee and oatmeal. Raw sugar, at least in my opinion, is better than refined. It could be all my head, but when I miss my morning coffee and have to have coffee at office where the choices are white sugar or artificial sweetners, I notice I am more . . hyper. I'm not sure of a good way to test the validity of this observation, but I figure, eh, if raw sugar works, even in my head, I'll just use it.

I've having a more difficult time with exercise goals. Anyone who knows me knows I have a ferret-like mind that is easily distracted and so, as I've been doing searches and reading books about physical training, it is easy for me to see a cool link and end up pondering a page on the effects of climate change on larval termites or something bizarre like that. I've been adding to the links at the side though and have added a page to my Food and Exercise Log (see links at right) where I am compiling exercises I can manage and the reps each day.

So, I guess my exercise goal for this week should be to come up with a program I can manage and stick to it.