2:04 AM

A huge part of why I am not taking care of my health is that I refuse to go to bed early. I am naturally a night person and get my peak awake time after 11:00. Most nights I get about 5 to 6 hours of sleep and that will defeat any weightloss goal. I need to stop it! Why do I keep staying up late doing stupid stuff?

Tiny Victories

Junk Drawer After and Before...

So I went back on the Weight Watchers website and read some posts from the 100+ chat room. That was a small step. Another step was continuing my "work dance" of organization. The junk drawer is done. I know, Whoooooooooooooo HOoooooooooooooooooooo! : / It is motion forward. Just how many orphaned mittens does one person need?????????????????????????

Closet "After"

It actually took less time than I thought to organize and purge the closet. It took about 3 hours. It is much more fun with a friend and some loud music. I can now look into my closet and wear everything. No messages in the morning about all of the things I used to be able to wear. My hope is that as I get more fit, I can bring in more clothes from another closet and give away clothes that are too big. Giving away clothes that are too big is another topic for another time...

I feel much better already. No, I have not dropped five pounds today. In fact, I am eating chocolate as I type. My mind is preparing though. I will keep you posted!

Love, Joy

Does My Closet Make My Butt Look Big?

I have been meaning to get to my closet for months and procrastinated. The more I procrastinated, the less "centered" I became. I had a mishmatch of clothes that I could wear, clothes that were too small, clothes that were drab and stained, and a ton of unorganized, random crap. When the closet got to be too much, I used by bed posts as hangers. Did you see that Oprah show where the topic was hording? I am not a horder, but my closet was starting to resemble the rooms in the horder's house. The disaster closet has been a pattern for my entire life. At some point or other, my best friends would step in and help me get a handle on the mess. My best bud, Jeannie helped me today.

When I looked into my closet, I saw a sea of clothes that I wish I could wear and an overwhelming sense of visual noise. Each day, it took my energy. I was irritated that I could not quite fit into these beautiful clothes that were in front of the ones that actually fit me. Today, I had a strategy...
*Move any piece of clothing out that does not currently fit

*Give away clothes that are not attractive on me

*Toss drab or tattered clothes

*Get some bins to streamline my other stuff

Here are some before and after photos. I thought about photos after hauling out all of the clothes on the floor, so it is actually worse than pictured. I think the thing that helped me get unstuck was enlisting my friend that would not quit and sit on the counch to watch a few hours of procratination television (like what has been happening in the past). I feel so much better already. The next area is my junk drawer, laundry room, garage and excess kitchen gear. I will keep you posted!

Procrastination Station!

Okay, it is 1:38 in the morning and I am procrasting going to bed because I still need to clean up the kitchen, deal with the dogs and maybe get a second wind to be inspired to clean out my closet. I am blocked and feeling uncentered. There is no chance for any type of program of weightloss to work if I am not centered. A few things that really center me are:
* A clean house, including the garage, drawers, closets, weeds, carpet, and tons of organizing bins
* Organic, tasty food from Whole Foods or Trader Joe's
* A clean purse
* A clean car
* A Costco sized amount of paper towels and toilet paper neatly put away
* Laundry all done

It is so strange that I feel that all of this needs to be taken care of for me to focus on weightloss. Are these excuses or is there something to organization being a reason for motivation? That new book by Peter Walsh, Does Clutter Make My Butt Look Big might be on to something. We will see!

Other issues are:
Not enought sleep
Eating trigger foods
all or nothing thoughts
Being too tired to get off of the couch

We will see how these issues get handled as I move forwar.

What centers you? Love, Joy

Before the Beginning

This is a rare photo of me. I have banished all photos of me for several years now because of my huge weight gain. You may be wondering why I would post this on a blog. I love Lynn Bering's Blog about her weightloss and it has inspired me greatly. My problem right now is that I have no motivation. I am thinking that if I start a blog before I was motivated to lose the weight, I might help someone else who is struggling. I have about 168 lbs to lose at this point. That is my best guess for now. I will keep you posted. Love, Joy