New Year's in July!

New Year's always brings resolutions or new goals.  But we all know breaking down our goals to smaller pieces typically results in greater success.  Around New Year's I was still working on my two prior physical goals which was to run a half marathon and lose 25 pounds.  When I set these goals I was a little concerned that they might not be attainable, but I established a plan and just did the best I could each day.

As I've shared before I fell into the trap of allowing fitness to become my idol and had to reevaluate my priorities and make sure that God was first in ALL aspects of my life.  I'm currently going through Beth Moore's bible study 'David,' which I'm really enjoying (more on this journey at a later time)!  This has really helped bring my priorities back in line and draw me closer to Him.

After spending a lot of time in prayer, I've been able to refocus my priorities and establish some goals for the second half of 2013, which I'm really excited about.  First and foremost, my time in prayer in God's word is my first priority.  Time on the computer (or any other device at home) will not take place until my kids are in bed, ensuring that they don't feel like they have to compete with my time!  Keeping these areas, as well as my marriage balanced, will allow me to establish some new physical goals.

And without further ado, here's the new fitness goals!

1.  Run 1,000 Miles in 2013 (I've already run 503 thus far).  This will be a challenge, but I've got a plan and am just going to take one run at a time!  I use Daily Mile to log my workouts, which helps track my progress.

2.  Be able to plank for 7 minutes by the end of the year!  My plan is to begin with 1 minute planks and increase 15 seconds each week.  This will also be a challenge, but I'm hoping the increased focus on my core will help with reaching my first goal!

3.  I will also be using Turbo Fire as cross training on the days that I'm not running.  I needed something to change up my fitness routine to ensure that I'm working different muscles and ensure that I don't get bored!

One crucial lesson that I have learned over the last year is establishing a plan is crucial to success.  When I set up my plan to train for my first half marathon, I put every single workout on my digital calendar.  This ensured that I completed the workout and it also took a lot of thinking and planning out from day-to-day.  So, I set up the goals above, broke out the goals by weeks and then by day.  I'm still working on what the reward will be to myself when I reach these goals but I will get that figured out soon, which is half the fun of setting goals!  Here's a sample of my calendar for the next 6 months.  Having every workout established also helps me move workouts around if necessary when 'life' happens.

I'll admit, this process took me a considerable amount of time to put together, but I'm excited to have a plan in place!  I'll also be posting my weekly workouts on my blog for a couple reasons.  First of all to help hold myself accountable.  

The other reason is because I simply love running buddies.  If any of my girlfriends close by want to run with me on a day I'm scheduled to run, drop me a message and we'll set up a time and location (with a slight disclaimer that I usually run pretty early in the morning)!  I would absolutely love for you to join me for a warm up together, an entire run, or just whatever you have on your training calendar.  We're not on this journey alone and I ALWAYS welcome a running pal!  What goal are you setting for the second half of 2013?  Make it count!!!

Blessings to you on your journey,

Krystal 

Fitness became my idol!

If you've been following my blog, you probably already know that I used to suffer a lot from migraines.    My mother has suffered from them for quite some time as well, so I'm sure it's partially hereditary.  Most of my migraines would come right after a stressful period.  I remember back when we went on our first flight with both of the kids a few years ago.  I was so stressed about getting everything caught up and ready at work, getting the packing done, anticipating what the kids would need on the trip, and the list goes on and on.  We finally got everything packed and arrived at the hotel close to the airport and I was FINALLY able to relax and then the dreaded happened, I got a migraine.  It was horrible as I wasn't at home, didn't have any medication with me, started to panic over the worries of recovering before our flight the next morning, it was just awful.  I did recover and we were able to continue our trip, but it was definitely a rough start.

I was so excited when after running for several months, I realized I was no longer getting migraines.  The balance between improving my health and a way to manage the stress of life, was eliminating them completely.  Over the course of this last year God has taught me a lot about priorities, making rest and sleep a priority, improving my eating habits (and that of my families), scheduling my workouts and not skipping them, and most importantly to seek Him during the difficult times.

Running has definitely become a huge part of managing my stress.  It's an incredible way for me to clear my head, stay fit, spend time in prayer and challenge myself.  Some of you may remember me posting about having a really bad run a few weeks ago.  I had given blood the day before and my body had not recovered before trying to run eight miles.  I was so discouraged and began panicking about running my first half marathon race.  After a good friend saw my post she wanted to do something to encourage and support me on this journey.  There's nothing that supports a runner more than prayer and a run!  It was so kind and encouraging and was just what I needed.  We invited other running/walking pals and got together early Wednesday morning before my big race.  I also asked my husband if it would be okay to invite my little girl to join us and let me just say this little girl was SO excited!!!

I can't thank all of these ladies enough for running with me!  It was a beautiful morning and I was so touched by how God was using each and every one of these ladies to touch my heart!  A great support system is so incredibly valuable for any goal we set in life!  Thank you Lori for putting this together and thank you ladies for inspiring and encouraging me!  I pray that I can be the same encouragement to someone else!

I experienced a great amount of encouragement and peace immediately after this run.  I was FINALLY to the point of not feeling nervous or stressed about the half marathon.  I had been over thinking and stressing about this big day for weeks.  I was ready to just relax and enjoy the experience.  Kylee and I then headed home so that I could shower and get ready for work.  Right after I got out of the shower the dreaded happened... I started seeing spots.  I couldn't believe it, I was getting a migraine.  I had been so excited to be done with migraines and couldn't believe I was getting one.  I immediately took the medication I have to decrease the symptoms, laid down for about 15 minutes and then tried to go to work.  I quickly realized that it wasn't a good idea to try and work and the symptoms were getting much worse.  I headed home and went through the painful motions of getting through a migraine.  That evening I finally felt better.  After eating with my family, my dear husband wanted to talk about my stressed induced migraine.  He reminded me that running had been a way for me to deal with stress and as the race began approaching it BECAME my stress.  Clearly this was a dangerous combination and one I have to learn how to manage or I won't be able to continue racing.

Just a few weeks ago I was chatting with a dear friend about how working out, fitness, losing weight, etc. can become our idol.  I praise God for that precious conversation as it helped put things in perspective for me.  God definitely used this migraine to convict me of this very issue.  I don't regret signing up for the half marathon, or improving my health and fitness, but I do know that I need to be more aware of the necessity for balance and not to let it become an idol as it did in these last couple weeks.  I found myself focusing much more on this big day than other important areas in my life, including time in God's word, valuable time with my husband and kids, and just not taking the time to praise God for what He's done in my life.  As you all know the first two big goals I set for myself on this journey was to run my first half marathon and to lose 25 pounds... my next goal, for the next 6 months I will spend as much time in prayer and in God's word as I do working out.  That's actually a pretty big order as I'm hoping to run another half marathon in the fall and you all know some of my long runs take a good amount of time.  My prayer is that it will help me keep my priorities in order, manage my stress level, develop a new perspective for my journey and simply draw me closer to God!  God has been so incredibly faithful through this journey and I'm excited to see what He has in store for this next year!

Stay tuned for my race recap from the big day!!!

Blessings,

Krystal