Caring for myself with a Healthy Habits List

I have this deal worked out that if I do everything on my Healthy List, I get a treat. If I do a few things on the list a get a smaller treat.

I created this idea of the last four days because I realized I work best on a rewards-based system. My first thought was that I would get one dollar for accomplishing at least one thing from my list, a dollar a day. Or that I would get $5 if I did EVERYTHING on my list that day.

That way I would earn either $30 or $150 in a month, give or take, if I stay with this.

The problem was, where would the money come from? I couldn’t pay myself - i have no money. So then i asked hubby if he would pay me. He said he would if he had any money, but he didn’t either. I thought of my mom but didn’t want to bother her with this.

We decided I needed a sponsor.

I didn’t feel like asking people to give me money so I could give myself incentive to do good things for myself, so I had to wrack my brains for some other reward.

I settled on massages. Dan agreed that he would do one minute of massage on the body part of my choice if I tackled some of the things on my list, and five full minutes (timed) if I get everything checked off.

So far I earned (and received) a one minute jaw massage for yesterday and a five minute foot massage for the day before. Today I am working on getting my entire list accomplished and will be able to earn my five minutes - maybe for a neck rub.

Here is my Healthy List: (daily tasks)

• Pushups
• Hanging on the chinup bar
• Crunches
• a Yoga sequence or stretching
• 5 minutes Meditation
• at least 15 minutes of something that lifts my Heart Rate
• Hydrate
• Take my Vitamins
• Take my Medications
• have Veggies in at least one meal
• have Protein in at least one meal
• have a serving of Fruit, or the equivalent of antioxidants
• Put powdered Fiber in at least one beverage
• Floss teeth
• Exfoliate and Moisturize face and neck
• Do one thing to Pamper myself or provide Me Time

So far this has been a very good list for me. I make sure to set my timer to go off every half hour when I am working at my desk, so I can remember to get a few of these things done.

The One Thing For Me item is variable. One day I read a book in bed during the day. Today I took a nice long bath with scented salts. It could also be getting a pedicure, buying myself something nice, going to a thrift store or walking around down town, being artsy or crafty, working on my Vision Board, enjoying a sunset or looking at stars…whatever little item that isn’t otherwise on any to-do list that will help decrease my stress levels.

What do people think of my idea? I am really hopeful this will encourage attention and accountability to healthy habits for me.

Addicted to Stress - weaning yourself from adrenaline

I’ve been reading about how people these days are addicted to stress. Our society encourages it. I always considered myself an ‘involvaholic’ - too many things going on all the time, until I read somewhere about how this exhausts our adrenals and burns us out. Our bodies are not meant to run off adrenaline and cortisol except in true emergency situations.

I decided to stop living on adrenaline. One of the things I did was get away from caffeine. I drink decaf coffee, for one thing. Caffeine stimulates the adrenal glands. I know decaf is not totally devoid of caffeine, but it doesn’t get me jittery at all, and I don’t get a headache if I miss a day. And there are tons of yummy brands of decaf these days.

Weaning oneself off full-caff coffee and caffeinated sodas is one of the first steps to getting away from needing adrenaline to get through the day. And it’s a much easier one than getting into the nitty gritty of examining one’s life.

The next step is to take a look at what you do each day that gives you a ‘kick.’ Waiting for deadlines to approach is definitely one of these things! As a ex-journalist, I lived for deadlines. There was an exhilaration to it all.

Then eventually I burned out. Now I resist anything that requires me to write by a certain date. It bugs me to even have a deadline; just having one gives me anxiety. I don’t think I ever would have developed a clinical anxiety problem if I didn’t live on adrenaline for so long.

So everyone should take a look at the things you do, on a daily basis, that bring you stress.  Make a list of the things you can eliminate from your life, and don’t be afraid to make a big change to protect your health and sanity. Learn to ask for help if you need it, and learn to say no to more tasks. Decide to spend more time in relaxing activities - make a daily prescription of it!

I am trying to find peaceful contentment and creatively joyful activities to pursue these days. I want to live on proper fuels, like glucose and amino acids, and reserve adrenaline for its intended emergency use. You never know when you will need to have that adrenaline reserve ready to go, instead of having burned out adrenal glands.  :)

Living on Adrenaline, Decreasing Stress

All evidence these days points to stress as a major contributor to ill-health, in both body and mind. Apparently stress stimulates the body to respond with creating the hormone cortisol (in the adrenals).

Cortisol is the flight and fight hormone. High and prolonged levels of cortisol decrease bone density and muscle mass and increase sugar imbalances. Cortisol leads to increased abdominal fat. Also, cortisol inhibits collage formation (hello, wrinkles!).

About.com writes, “Studies have also shown that people who secrete higher levels of cortisol in response to stress also tend to eat more food, and food that is higher in carbohydrates than people who secrete less cortisol.” http://stress.about.com/od/stresshealth/a/cortisol.htm

The wikipedia explains that cortisol addiction also contributes to clinical depression. The Mayo Clinic lays things out clearly about the negative effects of allowing stress to continue eating away at your body: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/stress/SR00001

In our modern world, we’ve created a high-stress culture using adrenaline as a fuel source. The adrenals were never meant to be stimulated like this - it’s a very unhealthy fuel.

I’ve been seriously working to decrease stress in my life. I don’t think we take stress seriously enough; we just live with it. Trying to actually eliminate stress is a worthwhile goal! And one I do not think is too far out of line. The adrenals are intended to help us work through temporary stressful situations - ones that we cannot control. Using cortisol as a daily fuel; that was never intended. That is what I am going to work on eliminating from my life.

You do what you can to not stay insane

People have been suggesting I try to get my life and mind in order by scheduling out my days. I am happy to report that after a few months of this system, it seems to be working.

Here is my weekly schedule, living in an RV:

• Monday - sleeping
• Tuesday - hike
• Wed - sit in the sun and read
• Thurs - napping
• Friday - organize the RV
• Sat - more sleeping
• Sun - watch birds do bird things and wander around

It’s been pretty good. I highly recommend this routine to people who feel like they are broken inside and need lots of internal, unbothered, quiet time.

It’s been so successful that I ACTUALLY feel like writing again. And working on my inbox, answering emails and thinking about possible ways to make money. The best part is no one is pushing me…it’s just coming out organically. I feel like doing things again.

I hope I have really found a turning point for myself, but I don’t want to put out too much hope into it. I will just roll with what is given.

One Year Goals Update, October 23

I am documenting my life goals on this site as a way to keep myself accountable, and to possibly inspire others to do the same on their blogs. One friend already took my example to make her own life updates on her blog: Adventures in Writing, Goals for 08-09.

With no more ado, here is my most recent update:

* My next shorter term goal was to break in to the 20ks at Amazon (and have 100 reviews up) - Reached 28K this week. Yeah! Teens are coming next! I have set until May 09 for this goal so I think i will get there way before that. I still haven’t posted 100 reviews yet - I seem to do reviews in batches. I am waiting for the next time I feel inspired to make a batch.

* Taxes - There’s been some crazy IRS stuff. I finally filled out my 2007 forms and need to figure out where to hand them in. ASAP. I hope I can do this tomorrow on my way out of town. We don’t like heading down the mountain unless we have to - gas is too expensive! I also need to figure out how to roll my 2001 penalty into the rest of my penalty plan. AND got to get together with my new taxes person to figure out how to get 08 in order. I don’t want to be late, ever again.

* Stuff in Storage - We are heading to AZ this weekend to pick up our things from storage. We’ve rented a uhaul trailer ($200! Yeeps). We arranged to stay with a friend for two nights and to see some people while out there. Just need to pack a few things tonite. We won’t be getting my RV this trip, but i’d like to grab a few things from it. So I will still have to make another trip out there soon.

* Organizing Utility/Laundry Room - This has been a fun project and I am almost done. I am pleased with how this came out. YAY me!

* Paint Living Room - The kid we hired never ever showed up. So I just did it myself last week. I’ve never done anything like this before and it was trail and error. But my accent wall came out lovely and DH really approves too. As far as the flooring, this will wait. The economy is too sucky right now. And we decided to return the ceiling fan and just use the one that is up already (get our $119 back from Lowes).

* Office Organized - I did most of it but still need to set aside time to do the drawers. I documented my office cleaning project.

* Crestline Living Website - Still improving in traffic, now has a page rank of 3, and is getting much much closer to my goal of number one Google search result for Crestline California.

* Making 1k a Month from my Projects - Still not seeing things pay off, but I am still in the building phase. Sigh. Too much to do. I think this goal is too big for one year. Maybe I should break it into smaller steps.

Misc New Goals -

* Organize walk in closet
* Organize bathroom shelves

One Year Goals, September/October Update

I had not reassessed my goals for the year since early August, so I may as well do that now. It’s after a long trip, it’s now officially Fall, and it feels like a good time to look at things once more.

Reassessing my one year goals:

1. “Have begun art portfolio” - I am starting to itch to paint. This is a good sign. I won’t push it. I have a long to-do list and want the painting to happen organically.

2. “Both our credit scores are good” - No change from July. I haven’t even looked at them or tried to get Dan’s again. My SIL recommended trying freecreditreport.com; says it works well for her. I like their commercials. Does that count for something?

3. “All my stuff from Arizona is here” - We decided it would be a bad idea to run to AZ in the middle of the Mojave in the summertime. DH and I plan to get our behinds out there in October, no excuses. Should we just clear out the storage and come back? Or bring back the RV as well and save another trip? With the RV, there will be far more stress. It needs a smog check, renewed registration, some insurance, probably new tires and who knows what else. Save it for anther time? Suck up the stress and do it now? Thoughts?

4. “I have one or two ebooks up in Cosmetics” - This is being backburnered while I get lots of articles preloaded for the year.

5. “JillFlorio.com is up to date with all old articles and current ones and back online” - The site is back online, is looking good and has much of my old work live. YAY! I still need to move my fish and hiking articles up, and then find my old sci-fi reviews (not sure where I stored them). That will be enough for this year. Next year I will scour my old floppies, zip drives and old hard drives for copies of previously published print articles. Since that will be a huge project, I am not going to worry about that just now.

6. “Cosmetics site is preloaded through end of the year” - I am on a roll! I need only 13 more articles to finish out 08. Then I can reassess a new goal for 09.

7. “Crestline Living is up to date and number one Google result for Crestline” - Getting closer to the prize position of number one! The site was not up-to-date for several weeks while I traveled, but now my paid Crestline Living writer Michelle Snow has set daily articles to drop for a good long while. I am pleased as punch. Things are moving along.

8. “Break 500,000 in Amazon reviewer rank” - More good news! I am now at 47,226 and look forward to achieving my new goal of breaking the teens by May 09.
9. “Earning $1000 a month from my various projects” - No love here. Still earning about 225-250 a month.  This is a time of building and I hope it pays off. I try not to get discouraged: it’s a Long Tail game, after all. I am using my Blog Mastermind program and it’s, quite frankly, thrilling.

10. “Go camping with Dan or alone at least every three weeks” - I am happy with how this is going. We’ve had some great camping trips and then some long travels in Orlando. Our next trip will probably be to Flagstaff to grab our things from storage. It would be nice to do some camping in Sedona or the Grand Canyon during that time.

11. “Have an accountant/tax person and all business/taxes will be well in hand and no longer a source of confusion and stress” - We decided to hire an expert in town, as the friend we wanted to hire already really has a full plate on her hands. New issues with the IRS came up, so we re-hired our old Seattle lawyer a few days ago. I have no idea what the lawyer will cost us, but the new amount the IRS dug up is an additional $2500 owed. While this is discouraging, we are plowing ahead with integrity in the hopes of clearing everything up shortly. On Monday, I will call our new local tax accountant and make a date to finish handling our 2007 taxes.

12. “Revised Yoga goal is to be comfortably solid in the Intermediate camp in a year and playing around with Advanced poses” - I have fallen behind in doing yoga  - it was too hot all summer to feel inspired. Now that it’s cooling off, I will re-energize my practice again. I even have a new, eco-friendly yoga mat to test drive.

13. “Office will be organized” - I did it! The space is reorganized. I still have to work on the paperwork, shelves and drawers and will hopefully do this in October or November.

14. “Kitchen/utility room will be organized” - I seriously want to pull everything out of my cabinets and shelves and redo these areas. I want to do my bedroom closet as well. These will be GREAT Fall/Winter projects.

15. “Will have new flooring, ceiling fan and wall paint done” - Nothing has been done. The neighborhood kid flaked on us. The paint and ceiling fan we bought are just sitting around. I might paint the wall myself this Fall (another good autumn project) but we still need a contractor for the other jobs.

16. “Will have tried all local yoga classes and reviewed them for CrestlineLiving.com” - Once I get back into my practice, this will happen again as well.

17. “Will no longer find getting packages to me as a nightmare” - Once again we are having trouble with our packages. I think we will need to make a bin, add a lock, put it on the street and notify Fed Ex/UPS. We will make sure, once we buy a house somewhere, NEVER to live on an access road again.

18. “Will have several control journals created and in use, including emergency plan journal” - Still need to write out an Action Plan and update our emergency kits.Another Fall/Winter project.

19. “Weight down to 120 to stay there, with under 20% fat levels” - I have not been eating a daily salad, due to travel, and also, my fitness routines have been hit or miss. Long trips of several weeks really screws up schedules! Once again I have 12 pounds to lose. I did manage to stay on the low carb plan at least.

One Year Goals August Update

Here are my goals as I updated them on July 4th, 2008…and below, my news as of now, in August:

1. Art portfolio begun: As I have a full year to just get *started* on this, I feel no rush. I am thinking once it gets chilly out and I want to be indoors and moody again.

2. Credit Scores up to *good* level - the 600’s: Have to follow through with getting Dan’s scores even though he won’t pay his student loans no matter how I beg. This might be a lost cause. At least mine is coming along. I am doubting I will make this goal.

3. Jillflorio.com up to date with old online articles: The site is up and looking great. I am happy with the theme. I am not sure I can do ALL my older work within the year’s deadline I have set here.  I decided to work on getting my old articles from other media (floppies, zip drives, paper, etc) up next year. It’s too much for a one year goal and I want to set myself up to succeed.

4. All my stuff from AZ here: Had to shelve this for Fall as it’s way too hot to cross the desert right now. But I can’t wait for winter either as we will get snow here. So looking at Sept, Oct or Nov. We need an actual date.

5. One or two ebooks up in Cosmetics topic on BellaOnline: This will probably be a project I have the energy to tackle AFTER I move my old online work to Jillflorio. Also by then I will have enough articles up to consider using for an ebook.

6. Cosmetics site preloaded through end of year: See number 5. My energy is being sucked into some other tasks first.

7. Crestline Living up to date and number one hit for Crestline searches: Well, it’s looking good and getting nicely up to date. I have articles preloaded to go live every day for a bit ahead of time. I still don’t have any sort of pagerank and am not yet ranking with search engines. I am probably still in the Google Sandbox, as I know my SEO. I am also waiting on my person to make my logo and website design, but i don’t think she will have time until next week. It’s hard to be patient! I do have cards that I am passing out though and make plans to find advertisers. Anyway, this project is getting a big chunk of my attention right now.

8. Break 500,00 in amazon rank: Way ahead of that and need a new goal. Have almost 80 reviews up and rank is now 135,000-ish. I am using twitter to let people know when I have reviews up in case people want to rate them. I am hoping my next leap will take me under 100,000.

9. Earning 1K a month from projects: if my plans for my ads on CrestlineLiving.com are successful, I will get there easily! I have to be patient and wait for the pagerank machine to notice me first. At this point I am probably earning around $250.00 a month, which is at least a quarter of the way there.

10. Camping once a month alone or with Dan: this has been going well! We’ve been to Big Bear, the Beach and next month will head to the San Jacintos/Idyllwild. September will see us camping around Lake Mead and the Valley of Fire. Yay! That’s what is planned for so far but I have great ides for each month following (we have great deserts out here - probably to Joshua Tree for October, for example).

11. Accountant/Taxes person: we hired a friend and i made up a packet of things to send. Am nervous about this and have not sent it yet, inexplicably.

12. Intermediate level yoga - Okay, this is going great. I am at a beginning intermediate level and will truly consider myself a real intermediate when I can do a crow pose, a headstand away from the wall, and handstand with/without wall.

13. Office organized - haven’t touched yet. Maybe when the weather gets colder.

14. Kitchen/laundry rooms organized - same as above.

15. New flooring, painted walls, new fan - this is going slower than ever expected. We hired someone to do some things, expected it would be done last week, and now are told it MIGHT happen next week. Another exercise in patience.

16. Will have tried all local yoga classes - a few are now checked off but not halfway there yet.

17. Worked out getting packages - this is DONE! I did it! Wow this was frustrating, but a nice neighbor lets us use his house.

18. Control journals created and emergency plans laid - I will wait on the colder weather to finish the control journals. emergency plans are being made. We have some kits made up and have tons of gallons of water, wood and food stored in the build-up. We planned where we would meet and bot more first aid supplies, plus a grab and go documents case.

19. Weight to 120 to stay: I am still hovering between 126 and 122. My body seems to be comfy there. I am getting daily workouts and eating at least one meal with salad/veggies a day. Working on having tuna once a week and eggs once a week. I added fiber everywhere possible. I think I will have to ramp up the workouts.

What are these Old Posts?

I started a blog called Involvaholic.com back in the Fall of 2007. It was a good idea and a help to me in trying to organize my life. Right about then, however, we made plans to move out of the state, super quick. And from then on our lives became all about how to get out of Seattle…the blog was abandoned.

I am reposting those crazy messed-up-in-the-head posts here so people can see what a dark place I was in then. And so I can remember, too. Things are so much different now. Thank the gods!

Anyway, many more crazy frakked up posts to add, so I ain’t done yet.

Old Post - Nov 7, 07 - Ducks Still for the Year

This was year was all about cleaning up the messes left by my poor financial management in the past. At this point, here is the update on what’s been done and what’s left to do:

• Back Taxes - All handed to the tax lawyer we found at a discounted rate through Dan’s Xbox benefits. Cost so far - $1500 in attorney fees, around $5000 in back taxes (I need to check on that figure, plus there will be a payment plan for this with more interest tacked on).
• 2007 Taxes - Still need to find a CPA, pay $2k in student loan interest, correlate receipts. We did get a business checking account though. I need to find a CPA who knows about this kind of business and maybe find one with a discount through the EAP with Smilebox.
• Jill’s Student Loans - Under control, finally, with a $120 payment each month. I am very excited, since I actually received a credit card solicitation this week. Which must mean, at long last, that my credit score is rising.
• Dan’s Student Loans - We are paying $160 a month for the loan taken out in his mother’s name. Which does not help his credit at all. We have not yet TOUCHED the rest of his loans, which makes me terribly nervous. His credit I am sure still sucks sucks sucks. I would like to set up a payment program of some sort with his loans soon. His credit is my credit, so I feel a bit trapped by this situation.
• Jill’s Credit - I need to pull an update this month, since I have been paying student loans for three months now (1), and (2) some old bad marks should have fallen off last month. I am hoping for a high 500s to middle 600s score. I still have to check on what happened with Wells Fargo, and follow up with Scottrade.
• Dan’s Credit - It’s time to set up a MyFICO program for him ( I signed up for the affiliate program, so we can get a kickback). By this time some of his bad marks should have fallen off, plus there are some glaring errors to correct with odd names on them. I do not expect his credit to significantly increase until some time in the spring, when hopefully we will have been paying his student loans a bit. There are also a few small outstanding items I would like to get resolved with previous utility companies.
• My Car - I am so proud of myself for getting out of the house enough to bring my car in to the Ford Center for a free “check-up”. They are saying I need new front pads (300) and two new tires w/alignment (another 290, for TIRES - what, are they nuts?). When I called “Dan Fast” to price check, their price - $130 for each pad, will be cheaper than even Ford’s coupon discount of 10%. So it pays to shop around. I will also be shopping for tires. Retreads are fine. Right now my Escort is still being looked at by Ford for the transmission issue. I am pleased about the brake pads being a lot cheaper than I had feared. I may just fix them and keep the little beater after all.
• Sell Stuff - I have been bringing furniture to Far Fetched - go me. I still need to try Craigslisting and maybe eBaying some things, like books - while we have time before the big move to California in April. The goal is to declutter almost everything. Bring our possessions down to what’s really used and loved. Flylady is my guru in this.
• Career - I am pleased to say I actually know what I do for a living by now. It’s only taken decades to figure this out.
• 401 (k) - Still need to move my old AZ one and Dan’s Xbox one to IRAs. Dan’s current Smilebox one is going well enough with entered 15% pretax.
• Roths - Mine is set for 2007. Yay! Dan’s is close - still needs a grand. When this month’s ED CD comes available, I will finish his 07 Roth. We will be on track soon enough for 2008 Roths after the holidays, if all goes well.
• Emergency Fund -Slowly rising. It had a few bumps this year, when Dan was in his “100 Days” at Microsoft (the Evil Empire). We will need to seriously fund this before any thought of moving to CA.
• Estate Docs - I decided to move this off until 2008. We both have Powers of Health Attorney docs and a few others, but the whole “death book” isn’t set yet. Nor the Emergency Planning Kits or the Control Journal. But I did decide that this really is a Year of the Pig thing (next year). More explanation about that on another day.
• Health - That is also set aside for another year. However, there were strides in this area for us: I had my miserable wisdom teeth removed (bloody hell), I found a doctor to discuss medications last spring, and I have new doctor appointment to update things this week. I have a Dawn Lamp (some day I will perfect how to use it) and a sorta SAD-related task light. I set Dan up for a medical checkup and cholesterol test (he’s fine), a dental cleaning and checkup, and a PT session for his shoulder. I was supposed to continue this and find some accupuncture for him…but this slipped my mind. I also had some reflexology a few months back, which was very nice and I would like more of it. Anyway, our health will be handled more assertively after the Years of the Duck and Pig are complete.
• Exercise - This has been sliding for us both, which is rather shocking since we love working out. I have been concentrating on the Ducks so much, but feel a little unbalanced as a result. I need to discuss this with Dan during our accountability sessions.now.
• Spiritual Health - I need more outside adventure. We are getting very, very little of what I need for my spiritual maintenance. The wilderness is my temple. I want to start running again but I hate breaking up this habit every winter. Anyway, I am going to put aside thinking about this for another year or two.
• Mental and Emotional Health - I am so not ready to consider these things right now. Once old, pressing life issues (the Ducks and Pigs) are under control, then the softer side of life can be attended to.

Old Post - Nov 6, 07 - Dawn Simulator Attempts 2 and 3

I tried turning the light bulb closer to my head, but couldn’t quite make myself direct it right into my eyes. And thus I slept through it again.

So, the following night I directed the bulb dead on at me. It seemed to work better - I remember waking up at one point - but then went right back to sleep through the light. And slept until noon. I think I need to try extending the dawn period next. I will increase the dawn period from 35 minutes to one hour and report back.