Filofax & Slimming World

I have created some new inserts for my Personal Original and my A5 Original to accompany me on my Slimming World journey and I have also created a new blog to help me achieve my goals, share hints and tips and anything else that I can find.  My new blog can be found here and it is all about finding myself and my style - I have an image in my head of how I want to be and this is the very start of my journey so if you are interested, check it out.

So here is my recipes section in my Personal:

And I have also started to create my A5 that will be coming with me to class and also be used for anything and everything related to weight loss - recipes, weight and measurement tracking, exercise routines, exercise logs and schedules, etc.

I cannot tell you how determined I am this time to get my act together!!  

It's also a great way to use my planners :) win win!

Until next time, take care xxx

Planners and moving onto the next chapter

New Year Resolutions.  We all make them even if we are adamant that we don't...secretly to ourselves we hope to achieve all the goals and ambitions that we have been thinking about for some time - or in my case years and years and years.  

So what is going to make this year any different?  That is the question I have also asked myself for years and years and years.

I came across this quote:

It has resonated with me quite strongly and after all the courses about Life Coaching and all the other things that I have read and researched and discovered over the last few months, it has made it all the more strong.  

I do NOT want to end 2015 in the same place I am now.

So it goes without saying that if I don't sort myself out and actually do something different, I am ALWAYS going to get the same result - by eating badly and not working out I am going to end up the same as I am now or WORSE!!!  If I don't study, I am not going to pass the exams and get qualified either!

I am arguing with myself over starting yet another gym membership...the last three never worked out for me or rather I never worked out - hence why I am still in the same situation!!

The reason for my choice of gym is that this one has a lovely yoga studio and the last time that I went to it (on a month's trial) I really, really enjoyed the yoga.  I came out of the class feeling...lighter in mind and spirit.  Not only that but being scared of water, the 4ft all the way pool is also a bonus :) They have a lot of good classes on - although to be fair I think that you have to be a little bit fit to even do the beginner ones as the aching for three days after a class does not make me want to return!

Over the last two years I have suffered at the evil hands of anxiety and as a result my head has felt jumbled, foggy, chaotic and really just a bit of a mess.  This is why I got into planners quite so heavily as I was trying every which way to make sense of everything but the fuzzy in my head never let me achieve the clarity.  I'm thinking to be honest that with hindsight it made things even worse as I went overboard...turned it into a bit of an obsession...

Who needs this many sticky notes??

Crazy...this wasn't even half the collection!

And it just got worse and worse and now I feel as though - just before I exploded with confusion and despair - I made a breakthrough.

It was all I needed to stop and take stock of everything, work out where I wanted to be and how I needed to get there, the planner world is constantly repeating this over and over and over again but yet we still get sucked in to the whole madness of it all and end up not just owning beautiful planners that we can adore and treasure but in a big stinking hole of despair as to which one to use, the guilt for buying yet another one, the guilt for using a different one, the frustration of the pages not working for us, the hell of needing to erase something that has changed - and then the dilemma of do we white it out, put washi over it, use a sticker?  Or maybe just write in pencil, or frixion or use nothing but washi....this is not the most relaxing, go with the flow lifestyle I was kinda hoping for!!

All it took was a planner that I adored, that worked, that was simplistic and useful and that came with the VDS Senior.  It tells me where and when and has room for thoughts, lists, photo's, motivational/inspirational and sentimental stuff that makes me smile.

  

This is all I need, there is enough crazy going on in the rest of my life so it's a breath of fresh air to look at my planner and see it all neatly organised and a lot less complicated than my mind makes it!!

This wasn't really meant to be a planner post and I am quite surprised at how 'stuck' it must have made me feel for a while there...it's the good thing about writing these posts is that sometimes when you least expect it you get a 'lightbulb moment' and it is like a real slap to the forehead...'why didn't I think of it like that before...." kind of thing!  I was trapping myself into a world of crazy instead of just letting it all go and starting again.

I feel that there will be a shift in the subject of my blogging in the future.  I feel as though I have planner peace in my VDS's now and I have bleated on about that for long enough as it is!  I don't decorate or do anything worth showing in my planner other than use it as above...not very exciting but totally functional.

It may be with sadness that I now feel I can leave the planner world and move on to the next chapter...and I am seriously hoping that it involves a lot of fitness, health and nutrition stuff with those magical hints and tips for successful studying!!

I will be back but I don't know what with at this stage.  

Until then, take care xxx

VDS is going to Manage Me!

It will soon be Christmas Day and I cannot wait to spend the whole day with my family.  Up until this year I have always felt very stressed out on the run up to Christmas, worrying whether my gifts will be liked and whether I have bought enough for everyone and whether there is going to be enough food and nibbles and….it just went on and on and on. 

Every year my fears were totally unjustified.  Everyone always got what they wanted, there was always enough presents and more than enough food and nibbles to last us through to the New Year and beyond!

This year is different.  This year I am learning to let go of the stress.  I just don’t need it in my life.  I have made sure that everyone has the one gift that they wanted; I haven’t gone overboard on the stocking fillers – mainly because I have actually misplaced the stockings!  The food is being dealt with by my hubby who traditionally always does the cooking (all year actually, I don’t like cooking at all) and it is going to be a much less stressful event all round.

I didn’t even need to put up the decorations this year, the boys did it all – and even more remarkable is that I haven’t had to re-do anything – my OCD is being taught a lesson, I cannot control everything and I don’t even want to anymore, it’s exhausting!

So I am spending the remaining few weeks of 2014 having a good long hard think about how I want to progress my future and the ways that I can make 2015 work better for me than the last few years have…I have goals and ambitions like everyone else but I think previously I have set that bar way too high to be SMART – and in particular, achievable. 

This has led to me feeling disheartened and disappointed with myself that resulted in me basically giving up, trying to reassess and then later down the line reigniting my initial goal and having wasted all that time trying to act ‘carefree’ when in actual fact I was just in denial.  It is true what they say ‘sometimes you are your own worst enemy’ – I absolutely am!

How am I going to do things different this time?  I have no idea but I am hoping that a little honesty with myself will go a long way to helping me achieve what I want, why I want it and how I’m going to get it! 

I am dedicating my VDS Manager - Vivacious Development System Manager – to actually manage me.  I need this soooo much!!  I have the Manager for home use, getting into the nitty gritty of it all and the Senior to act as my satellite where I write down all my urgent issues, thoughts, important musings, etc. Alone we are just that, alone but together we are a team and we can help, support and guide me through this transformation of MEH to WOW!

These two are going to help me sort myself out ONCE AND FOR ALL!!

I will be documenting my progress on my blog and I may use a separate smaller planner as my fitness log that lives in my gym bag and is dedicated solely to that...with a quick marker in my calendar of my VDS Manager just to keep an eye on progress...

Until then, take care xxx