making adjustments in 2014

**Warning:  Obligatory Resolution Post below...**

2013 really did treat me well.  My running/training was spot on.  I finished my first year of teaching and my first year as the head volleyball coach.  I watched my sweet little girl go through her second exciting year of life and enter the terrible twos.  And I celebrated 6 wonderful years of marriage with my amazing hubby.

And with it being a new year, I'm all about wanting to get a fresh start on things.  I love giving myself goals for the year to try to accomplish.  I already know I pretty much suck at resolutions (um, that 30-Day Challenge was a complete and utter failure for me), so giving myself some goals to achieve work a lot better for me.  Yes, some are more resolutions, but mostly goals.

Fitness Goals

  • Train to break 20-minutes in the 5K again (goal time = 19:45)
  • Complete a CrossFit workout as prescribed without cheating
  • Set new 1 rep max PRs (goal = 95 pound Clean)

**I will be logging all of my workouts to track my progress.**Nutrition/Health Goals

  • Drastically reduce (or eliminate) gluten intake
  • Add back in heart healthy fish 1-2 times per week
  • Cut out caffeine
  • Reduce sugar intake by eating 1 dessert/sweet per day (no seconds!)

**I can visualize some jaws dropping when reading this.  No worries, I will probably be writing about these goals more in depth since I think they deserve a post of their own for more explanation.**Life/Family Goals

  • Put our house on the market this spring
  • Close on a new-to-us house
  • Potty train and transition MacKenna to a toddler bed (AHHHH!)
  • Spend 20 minutes every night cleaning/picking up the house

**Obviously, most of these are out of my complete control, but I can at least still use them as benchmarks and things to work for.**

As I was flipping through my Twitter a few days ago, I saw someone post something about choosing one word to revolve 2014 around.  I liked the thought of that so I was on a mission to think of a word.  The one word that kept coming to my mind was change.  But, I don't really want to change anything about my life.  Yes, I want to get faster and stronger, fix my eating habits, and take some big steps in our home/family life, but there really isn't a lot of change going on.

The more I got to thinking about my real, concrete goals, the more I realized I wasn't trying to change anything.  I was just trying to adjust the things I already had in place.  So, instead of 2014 being about changing my life, I want to focus on the adjustments I can make to make myself and my life better.  I'm not changing the way I train - I'm adjusting my training.  I'm not changing the way I eat or the foods I like - I am adjusting what I eat to make myself feel better and healthier.  I'm not changing where I live - oh wait, I am, but it is certainly going to take some adjustments in how we run our household.

2014 word of the year

So, my focus for the year is to adjust myself.  And even as the year goes on, I'm sure I'm going to have to adjust some of those goals.  We might not sell our house right away or find a new house to buy in 2014.  And my nutrition goals will definitely be adjusted as I go along to find what the right fit is for me as I'm still trying to figure out some health issues.  I might even have to adjust my goal race time as the year goes on in hopes that I can break my goal time.  But the big thing is to keep my focus on how I will adjust, to keep myself as stress-free as possible during the process, and to make this another year without regrets.