Monday, November 11, 2013

Number 31b: Be Better October - The Recap, Part One

It's 5 pm on the first Friday, October 11. I'm insanely exhausted.
But I'm not complaining. Not bitching. Not moaning.
I'm just busy. Which makes happy. Dare I say, satisfied?

Let's recap. Over a month ago I pledged to Be Better during the month of October. With the insanity of the Government Shutdown, and all of the negativity I read daily on the internet, I made the decision to not spread any more negativity last month.

I set six goals for the month of October. Here's how I fared in tackling the first three.

Be Better At Saving. The Challenge: I will not buy any new clothes during the month of October. I will put aside an extra $25 each week into my savings account.
The Halfway Point: I was SO TEMPTED to buy clothes all month. The transition of season just made me crave the purchase of fuzzy sweaters and earmuffs and that new pair of boots. (I mean come on, who doesn't love a fuzzy sweater?) I caved on one item, and that was a new long sleeve for running, which replaced my well-worn (and somewhat pungent) running jacket. So I'll say everyone is better off due to that purchase. (Plus it helped towards my mileage goal -- have I justified this enough to the world yet?)
The Results: I DID IT!! Last week I allowed myself a new fuzzy sweater and a (sale) necklace. Other than that though, I've done pretty well at breaking myself of my spending habit. And the extra $100 I put away this month? Keeping it in my savings account for a rainy day. 

Be Better To My Liver.  The Challenge: Avoid alcohol for an entire week.
The Halfway Point: I cut down on my alcohol intake during the first weeks of the month, but I still found it insanely hard to socialize without drinking. So I compromised with myself, I did not drink within my apartment during the week.
The Results: I definitely could have tried harder to stick to this challenge... but fortunately last week's cold kept me without alcohol for a full six days. So thanks, body, for yelling at me so my mom doesn't have to. Maybe we'll try this guy again after Thanksgiving.

Be Better About Increasing My Mileage.  
The Challenge: Run 60 miles during the month of October.
The Halfway Point: 26 miles (I was only four miles off at halfway!)
The Results: 43.74 miles. I was off my goal by about 3 runs' worth of miles. What I didn't factor in this month? I was in rehearsal and simultaneously finishing writing a play. So while I didn't hit my goal, it wasn't because I was lazy.

The silver lining? In the past three months I've run 131.47 miles. I'm going to cut myself a little slack.

Fun fact? I finished the Hot Chocolate last weekend in a little over 26 minutes. Even though I didn't hit my goal, I'm still pretty proud of myself, folks! Plus, look how much I'm enjoying that chocolate post-race.

All of the challenges actually went much smoother than I was expecting. While this blog in general is about tackling a ridiculous "to do list", I thought I would hold myself more accountable but tracking the goals on the blog itself. But it turns out I was able to stick to my goals with publicly publishing. Maybe I should have also added, Be Better at Blogging About Stuff to the list, but oh well.

Tackling goals is not easy and sometimes it's hard to see progress. I think it really helped to have a set of tangible things I could monitor with numbers - things like amount of money saved and number of miles run with less tangible things like counting to ten before I whine about my life. Do I feel like a better person? Sure. Can I do better? Always. Stay tuned for my recap of the second set of challenges and my next set of silly encounters in the city.

As always, thanks for reading.
xoxo, E.