Positively Weightless

 Happy Sunday! I almost feel obligated at this point to start every week's post the same way, so as always I hope everyone is doing well and hanging in there! Most weeks I have a plan for a topic for each post set in my mind for a few days, but other weeks they just come to me throughout the week. I was a little inspired by things in the news for this post, but this is also a very prominent lesson I try to remind myself of every single day, and that is that we need to deal with the things we cannot change and deal with them the best way we know how. I know, this is not exactly a new topic for my page but I think this specifically that we all need to be reminded about frequently.

So what brought this topic to my mind recently? Hurricane Laura that hit Louisiana earlier this week. Whenever there is a big weather event like this I usually like to watch the coverage and stay informed. It was just so insane to me to think that I was suppose to be on a trip there just a couple of months ago and now this big disaster was headed right for it. I was upset about it for obvious reasons. But that got me to thinking about the people who live there and their entire lives and homes were in the path of the hurricane. I cannot imagine how hard that must have been for all of them. In a very serious big situation like this I know it is extremely hard to accept, but it is very prominent that this is something we as humans cannot change. We cannot change the path of a natural disaster like that. We cannot change the weather or take ourselves out of that equation. What we can do is work on the things we can change. People in Lake Charles were told to evacuate to save their lives. People in the more northern areas of the state could do some storm proofing on their houses to make the chance of damage reduced. The important part in situations just like this is to change what we can and not waste time dwelling on what we cant. 

If you are sick of me bringing up the pandemic in my posts, I apologize but I feel it is such a present thing still. It seems like a lot of people want to just act as if it is no longer going on and that is incredibly dangerous thinking in my opinion. Look, I get it I am so over all the precautions we are still taking. If I had a magic wand and could make COVID-19 disappear I would of course do it without hesitation, but we do not have that ability. We cannot change the fact that this virus is still running through our world right now. But what we can change, as I have been saying for months, is our impact on this virus. We can stay home when possible. We can only gather in smaller groups and not be hosting huge parties like these "influencers" we are hearing about in the news. We can make sure we are keeping ourselves safe which in turn will keep others safe as well. There are plenty of things we can change during this pandemic that if we all worked on together would make a huge change. Don't dwell on the fact that we cannot go back to our normal lives just yet. Instead change the things you can!

Overall this lesson can be applied into everyday life. Maybe at work you messed something up, missed a deadline, or just overall make some kind of mistake. The reality is at that point that it is done. We cannot go back into a time machine and change it, but what we can do are the things we need to fix it or make things better. If you messed up paperwork at work just make a mental note to be more careful next time. Maybe you forgot about someone's birthday or a special event. You obviously can't go back in time to make sure yo do not forget it, but what you can do is you best to make things up to that person. We simply cannot change the past. If I see older pictures of myself from college I get angry at myself for gaining the weight back that I lost back then but I obviously can not do anything about that now. What I can do is work on myself to get back there again one day. That is always the very best we can do.

Overall I just want you all to remember that preparation and doing better moving forward is always your best bet. Sometimes we can't change the things in the future, and sometimes it is the past we like to dwell on but in either case it is important to come to terms with the fact that you do not have the power to change it. It does no good to sit around sulking about a breakup or scared about an approaching hurricane if you are doing nothing to soften the blow. Time is constantly moving forward if we like it or not. Each second we are alive is a second closer to the moment that our life comes to an end. The most important part is what we do in the moments in between. 

 Happy Sunday! I hope everyone is doing well and staying safe! I am sure some of you noticed that I took last week off of blogging. My nephew made his First Communion, so I decided to take the week off for that. During the ceremony, however, I was thinking about all the adjustments we have all been forced to make over the last few months. From masks in church, to hand sanitizer instead of holy water when you enter the church, it was certainly a different world being in a church during a global pandemic. Adjustments have been made overall pretty much everywhere.

I know, in a lot of ways I am sick of thinking about and talking about this pandemic right now. It still very much is consuming our everyday lives no matter how hard we are trying to get back to normal. In a lot of ways these precautions just are normal at this point, but they weren't for a while. Think of all the little things you are doing differently now than you were in 2019. I have to wear a mask when I am not at my desk at work. At first I thought this was going to be a pretty big nuisance to remember, but now I pretty much just do it without even thinking anymore. Hand sanitizer is usually applied as soon as I get back to my desk or in my car after I have been in a store without thinking about it whatsoever. Habits are formed pretty easily when we need to work them into our routines. All of these habits are formed from making adjustments just like this.

So let's stray from the pandemic here. There are plenty of other ways we make/can make adjustments in our lives under more normal circumstances. A great example would be with our diets. You may feel you need to change things up because you just are not feeling as good as you could be. I mentioned in my last post that I have been having problems digesting dairy and have mostly cut it out of my diet. That would be an adjustment. I personally have not been making the best choices with my diet lately. I think a lot of people can agree with that during this whole quarantine phase of 2020. It has been so easy to not make the best food choices during all of this for a lot of people but now is the time to recognize that and fix it. I am, and probably always will be, a work in progress. Find one aspect of your diet you can clean up and go from there. Make adjustments your body will thank you for.

Another big one is exercise. If you have an active lifestyle you certainly had to make a ton of adjustments to your workout routines during this crazy year. I know some people that have thrived as a result of this and others, like myself, that have struggled. I am excited to get back to the gym, but also extremely nervous for obvious reasons. Luckily my trainer is going to monitor how busy it is and let me know. We are going to adjust my programs based on that. If the gym is too busy, it will be a home workout but if not I will go to the gym and try not to pass out while working out with a mask on. Either way it is possible to work around almost anything if you make adjustments to your new circumstances. Working out from home, outside classes, online classes, there are a ton of options. Enough excuses (myself included) just get it done!

Overall I would say this year has taught us all just how important making adjustments and being flexible truly is in our lives. Every single one of us have had to make them over the past six months in some capacity. You may have had to cancel/postpone a big event you had coming up, or even if it was something as small as not being able to go to your favorite restaurant or store for a while. We are all doing the very best we can and that is the most important part of life. No one is perfect, you should never strive for perfection. What you should strive for is doing the best you can with what you have. As long as you are doing that, you will get through 2020 just fine!

 Happy Sunday all! Let today, as I always try to be, be your weekly day to check in with yourself and see how you are doing both physically and mentally. Although a lot of things have gone to a more normal pace again, it is safe to say life is far from normal still and likely won't be for a while. I don't know about you, but I know this whole pandemic helped put certain things into perspective for me. For today's post I surprisingly want to go back and revisit a few topics from past posts and share how my thoughts have drastically changed on them. A few unrelated posts, but they come together for similar reasons.

Let's start with the main reason I wanted to talk about this topic today. If you have been following me for a little while you might remember my two separate journeys on the Whole30 diet. At the time I raved about this diet and the benefits and results I experienced but you may be wondering if this has changed at all. Well it has, and drastically so. Now before I go into this I do want to make it extra clear I am no doctor, dietician, nutritionist, etc. I am simply sharing stories about my personal body and thoughts on them. Whole30 is a diet that eliminates a ton of different things such as dairy, grains, peanuts, and much more. While I was on this diet I felt amazing I will not deny that, but for me it just wasn't sustainable. I need more carbs than just potatoes or fruit for my workouts. The biggest reason I have changed my opinion on Whole30, however, if because of dairy. 

Now I have for a while now been incorporating more dairy alternatives into my diet for ethical and environmental reasons, but I do also enjoy a bowl of ice cream or a slice of pizza with real cheese on it from time to time. I cannot do that without it wrecking havoc on my digestive system anymore. Do I know for a fact this is a direct result of Whole30? No, but I had absolutely no trouble with dairy in the past, and I have noticed it progressively since I ended my last Whole30 last year. I have done some research and all signs point to it being the cause of my sudden lactose intolerance. Now what is my point in bringing this up? Well I think it is safe to say I wont be eliminating anything like that from my diet again. I don't think completely eliminating anything, especially if it is something you enjoy, is a good idea. I have always said moderation is key and I stand by that. 

You may also remember a post a while ago where I talked about cutting off ties with toxic people in your life. Well this pandemic really had me thinking on that topic as well. Maybe it is the almost maternal instinct in me, or just my (usually 😉) good-natured heart but I was checking in on everyone I could think of when things were at their worst here. I even contacted the person that inspired that post about toxic people. To me when there is something so big going on that nobody is safe from it is time to put pettiness aside and love one another despite our flaws. Now there are certainly some people that deserve to be cut off and stay that way, but I think it is important to think about that before sticking to it. What made them act so negatively? Do you genuinely think they are a bad person? Would it harm either of us to just check in? Ask yourself these questions and if you decide the person maybe isn't as toxic as you though, send them a message to see how they are doing.

If you did not put my theme together yet, I will put it out in plain English here. Sometimes we shouldn't make any drastic cuts in our lives. I think completely shutting down and turning off access to something is our lives is pretty toxic in itself. Are you trying to eat healthy and decide you will not have any kind of junk whatsoever? Well doing so just may set you up to binge on snacks in a moment of weakness (trust me I have been there). If you cut ties with someone and potentially feel guilty about it, perhaps there is a reason for that guilt. If is perfectly fine to need space from someone else but maybe cutting ties isn't the best thing. Monitor your life and grow from these changes. Moderation is key for all aspects of life!