Self-Confidence Sunday #25—Reclaiming My Time (A Work in Progress)

Ask a woman, especially a woman of color, how she felt watching the video of Maxine Waters “reclaiming her time”  as U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin tried to dodge her questions with some BS, irrelevant flattery and you’re likely to get responses that include pride and empowerment.

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Productive Procrastination and My 2018 Goals

I have some fairly intricate (and stressful) health and finance-related decisions to make right now, so I'm doing the mature, responsible thing: procrastinating!

...by putting my 2018 goals on paper/WordPress, so it counts.

Who knows what all I will actually accomplish, but during conversations with the last guy I started seeing, I realized that one of my biggest flaws is that I am afraid to dream big anymore. Frequently because, unfortunately, I am afraid to fail (yes, cultivating more of a growth mindset is something I'm currently working on, too).

I plan to edit this post as I think of more, but here we go for now! In 2018 I aim to:

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Self-Confidence Sunday #9

Delts Fitness Progress PhotoThis post isn’t particularly inspiring or exciting, but I took this photo last Saturday when I hit the gym and noticed that my “coaching delts” are certainly back in full-force. People often are surprised that coaching alone keeps my upper body in such good shape, but that just goes to show that they often don’t understand what goes into the job! For a great many reasons that go beyond physical fitness, I am so grateful to have the opportunity to be a coach. It makes me happy, and it flat-out just makes me a better person all-around.

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Self-confidence Sunday #7

Sometimes, I catch myself falling into the faulty thinking that when we find the things we are “meant” to do (who knows what that really means, anyway?), they come easily. When we find the person we’re “supposed” to be with, the dream job, our “purpose,” etc…we should just “know,” according to all the popular wisdom out there. That’s an easy mistake to make, given that we as a culture prize finishing things fastest and with seemingly no internal struggle.

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Self-confidence Sunday #5

This past week, I have really struggled with feeling as though I am not “enough.” Not in terms of my relationship to anyone else, but rather not enough for myself, like I am sub-par according to my own expectations. I feel as though I am not accomplishing as much as I should be, that I am not as dedicated or tough or focused or disciplines as I used to be, and that perhaps I’m wasting my time, my potential. This meme was really helpful for me, and I am going to print it off and look at it every morning as I visualize the “best version of me.” I am determined to accomplish great things in 2016; I want to be proud of myself and who I am, and I never want another year filled with so much doubt and confusion.

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A Case of the “Mondays”

When you feel like giving up September 14: As goes the saying, “When it rains, it pours.” Today, it poured.

It’s funny, I wrote the above draft a month ago, yet today I am unsure what exactly prompted the post (though I have something of an idea: that was probably the day of the two totaled cars in the family and totaled car for the boyfriend, among other things). That is a good reminder that troubles never last forever. On another day during which the stress seems prone to multiplying, I want to remember this simple phrase: Better Things Are Coming. I may not yet know what those “better things” will be, but I do know that everything will work out. Hitting the gym and pounding the track used to be my methods for coping with problems; I’m looking forward to incorporating those back into my life in a much more hardcore manner, like before (I do miss those abs!). I’ve just got to keep my head up, continue working hard (and indeed, begin to work much harder), remember my purpose, and aggressively go after all that I want. I may be looking at a setback or two, it’s true, but if I keep pushing, everything will pay off in the long run.  And if not I can always lie in bed and drink wine with my cat, so we’re looking at a win-win situation here, let’s be honest. 😉

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Windshield or the Bug?

It Never Rains Forever I can’t decide which of the two I am this week, it seems. There certainly have been lots of ups and downs: I’ve gotten great workouts in; been notified that I did not get the job I somewhat thought I had in the bag; accomplished a decent amount on my parents’ house; successfully managed a (stressful) promotional event; spent much-overdue time with one of my best friends; fought with the boyfriend and felt terrible about it/been over the moon about my success on what (I hope) will be a pretty darn badass birthday surprise for him; family dog was successfully treated for heartworms; felt fat then strong then slow then fat-ish; more financial stressers for the parentals…etc.

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