A Q1 Update on Goals and Self-Care
As a way to shift some thinking away from the constant news stream of the COVID-19 disease, I thought I would share a progress report on my goals and self-care so far in 2020. Obviously the events of the last few weeks have had an impact, but I have tried to maintain many of the key habits I chose to establish in January.
I tend to be a very routine-bound person, so I can pick up certain habits very easily…yet others, not so much. Even with the disruption to our normal lives over the past several weeks, I have found maintaining many of my daily habits has been helpful in bringing a level of normalcy to each of my days. Many of these tie into the goals that I had established for myself for this first quarter of 2020.
What did I set out to accomplish?
At the top of my list for this year was personal health. I want to improve many of my eating habits, as well as the exercise I do. I have long maintained the habit of getting on the treadmill most days each week. However, I wanted to ramp up and get more out of each day’s exercise routine. With that, I have sought to lose more than 25 pounds in the first half of this year. Further, I wanted to improve a few sleep habits, getting at least six and a half hours each night, being in bed by 10:30 pm.
So, where am I at as we close out the first three months of the year? I am happy to report that I have had success with many of the habit goals I set out to achieve. Maintaining the exercise - check. I did purchase a spin bike to introduce a different routine into my week. I have not quite made this as routine as I would like, but I am happy to report that I have more than 50 miles ridden so far this year. And that is precisely 50 more than I rode last year.
On the diet side of things, I feel like I have accomplished a lot here. I have significantly reduced my sugar intake and typically manage to keep my carb count below 70 grams each day. I believe I may need to reduce that further to reach some of the additional benefits that can come from a lower carbohydrate diet. For me, it helps to maintain my weight and cholesterol. My doctor is keenly interested in that second item. I continue to track my daily intake of food and that keeps my awareness level high. I recently switched to a new app, [Calory], to help with my daily tracking. With some of these changes, I have lost more than twelve pounds so far for the year. Essentially one pound per week. A slow, steady pace that seems to be working, even if it feels like it doesn’t happen fast enough.
Finally, on the sleep end of things, I have made improvements here as well. Though I believe of all of my habit goals, this one needs the most work. Too often when I am reviewing my sleep tracking I fall below the desired six and a half hours. That is all due to not getting to bed early enough. There are just enough distractions in the evening that keep me from getting to bed on time. A precursor to success here is getting out of the office (or in shutting down currently) before 6:00 pm each night. That has been a real challenge. The last few weeks of working from home have actually made this more difficult. It seems so many items end up happening at the end of the day with the constant changes from news updates or state restriction changes. This is an area I will have to work on as we move into the second quarter of the year.
What have I done to help me build good habits
I have enlisted a few tools to help me with most of my habit goal tracking. I recently discussed the iOS application Streaks in a post. This has come in very handy to keep top-of-mind awareness for many of my habits. I track my carbohydrate intake, my exercise, bedtime, hours slept, last food intake time, and distance cycled in this app as of right now. The great thing has been the app’s ability to do most of this tracking automatically from other device feeds. My Apple Watch provides the exercise and much of the sleep data. Completing information in the food tracking application also provides the data to Streaks to allow it to track that as well. I will likely add a water tracking habit goal for the second quarter as well.
Speaking of food and water tracking. I have moved to a new application [Calory], as I mentioned above. It largely does the same thing as MyFitnessPal, which in itself is an excellent tool. Calory just received some significant upgrades and it is simply a more joyful app to use. I know that sounds silly for an app that does nothing more than allow you to track your food and water intake, but just some of the simple interface items and colors make it more fun to do something that is monotonous at best.
What has changed and what am I doing about it?
I don’t think any of us could have predicted what March was going to look like even 7 weeks ago. Things changed and they changed quickly. For me, related to my goals and habits - I am going to continue all of the ones I have mentioned above. I will continue to work towards my weight loss target for the end of June. Breaking this down into smaller chunks has been very helpful. I essentially track my weight in six-week blocks. Once a week I record my weight on a whiteboard in my exercise area so I can see the goal and my progress.
One of the biggest misses I have had so far this year for my overall goals is related to a new website I was hoping to launch by April. My initial plan was to introduce the Productive Retail Leader website by the end of April at the latest. With so many other items coming up and now with the current situation, that project is temporarily on hold. I actually believe it has tremendous value, especially in the current, fast-changing environment. I am hesitant to set a specific date yet, but have it on the list of items to fully review and reassess as part of a full quarterly goal review that I will complete next week. Stay tuned.
It has been an unprecedented few weeks and I fear we have several more ahead of us. It is difficult to imagine what the future looks like right now for most of us in the retail world. There are certainly some heroic folks continuing to support the needs of so many people. Thank you. I am certain that all of us are taking a step back and reassessing what the rest of the year might look like, both from a personal and professional perspective. Now is a good time to think about the goals you set for yourself or your business and see where you’re at and what is still possible for this year. Even with the events of the last few weeks, I have re-committed myself to my self-care and habit goals. They may prove to be even more important now than they were twelve weeks ago when I established them. Be safe and stay well.
How are you doing with your goals, especially the self-care goals you set for yourself this year so far?
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