Wandering at the Shadows' Edge

Mapping a New Path

I always make my session with my personal trainer. I’m not so good at working out during the rest of the week. So I’m making progress, but very slowly.

It’s my own fault. I choose to turn off the alarm instead of getting up and taking a walk or going to the gym. I chose to do other things around the house instead of making use of the fitness equipment I have available.

It’s not the only thing I fall down on. I’m getting better about actually writing every day. getting that writing into the computer where it needs to be is another matter. I have several things that are half-done. It probably wouldn’t take much to finish them if I’d just dive in and start.

I have time to do these things. I’ve just been choosing not to. Telling myself I’ll do it tomorrow or on the weekend. And then I don’t follow through.

It’s starting to stress me out. Not that things aren’t getting done. Or at least not that so much as I’m making choices that aren’t aligned with who I want to be.

So I need to make some changes. I need to make the choices that align with the person I’m striving to be. Even if it means taking one baby step at a time.

I Love Teaching – Don’t I?

Teaching is something I’m very comfortable with. It’s something I really enjoy. I also enjoy mentoring people – new instructors, team mates, former students.

I’m teaching, or I will be, a class of our new hires for this coming tax season. Instead of having one co-instructor, I’m mentoring two new instructors. There are good aspects to this – the number of classes is split three ways instead of two. If one of us is out, there are still two instructors in the classroom. And the students get experience with three different and distinct teaching and coaching styles.

But there are some negatives too. I have to coordinate with two people instead of one. Neither instructor has taught a long course – like new hire, which is 3 months long. We have six weeks to prep for 3 months of teaching – and they haven’t ever prepped for anything longer than a day or two.

And then there’s the personality conflicts. They’ve already started with one of the instructors. I’m the senior instructor because I’ve done this five times, and because I teach the actual instructor certification class. Our lead instructor, who is coordinating all six new hire classes, asked me to take on two new instructors because of my experience and my planning. But one of the co-instructors insists on doing some things their own way, saying I need to trust them that everything will work out. They don’t, or won’t, understand the need to work as a team and within the same framework. They refuse to accept that my experience is valid.

It’s a discussion we had multiple times in the first two weeks of prep. I feel like this instructor is surrounded in a fog that absorbs everything that’s explained to them and doesn’t let it actually impact them. I don’t’ know how to get through to them, but I won’t let it hurt our students’ learning.

I need to figure this out, but this is unmapped territory for me. I’ve never had a co-instructor so resistant to suggestion and request. All I can do right now is keep trying.

Healthy Habits

I’m climbing up a long hill and as I get older it’s only going to get longer. It’s my own fault. I ignored the work I should have been doing over the past several years. There were reasons, but I could have done some of that work.

What am I talking about?

Health and fitness. Both what and how I eat and how active I am. Fitness was easier when I had a house with a yard, that was only three blocks from the grocery store and the book store. I was just more active on a regular basis. And I just stopped paying attention to what I was eating. And I got older – along with all the changes that brings.

I figured out how far down that hill I’d slid. I fumbled through the fog and shadows. And I stopped the slide. I’m watching what I eat – turning toward healthier choices. I got a gym membership and a weekly session with a personal trainer.

I’ve made a start, but only a few steps in. And it’s hard. My trainer is encouraging but pushes me. But I don’t make it into the gym as often as I should outside of our sessions. It’s a matter of choosing how to use my time and what my priorities are.

And then there’s the eating. Part of my problem has always been what I eat. But the bigger part of the problem has consistently been how much I eat. It’s not that I generally eat too much. It’s most often been that I don’t eat enough of the right kinds of calories and my body holds on to everything. Eating enough calories of the right stuff means eating a lot more food than I’m used to and I have trouble with it.

But I’m working on it. I’m starting to head up that hill. And I can see progress, even if it is just a few steps at a time. At least the fog is thinning.

It’s going to be a long trek.

Food

I like to cook – but I have trouble cooking for just myself. And I really like most vegetables, fruits, and grains. But I like meat, poultry, and seafood too. And getting enough calories from just vegetables and fruit is hard. The volume of food you have to eat is daunting, to say the least. It takes me forever to get through that much food!

I tend to eat too few calories and put my metabolism into starvation mode. Then it fights to hang on to everything and I end up gaining weight. So I need to eat more calories along with exercising and drinking lots of water. I’m working on all three.

I downloaded an app on my phone that should help. It lets me cut down recipes for one or two servings and create a grocery list from the recipes I want to use. We’ll see if I can remember to use it and if it actually makes things easier.

I’m leery, because the experience of the past tells me it will be less effective than I’d like. It may be a wonderful app. It was recommended. But I have a tendency to forget to use such things. They’re only effective if they’re being used and I’m already tracking my eating in two places. Adding another app I need to check on a regular basis may not be the best option. But we’ll see. I’ll give it some time and see if I can get in the habit of using it.

It’s pre-mapping something I’m almost familiar with, yet have never been successful at. I have hops, but no specific expectations. In this case, the destination is the point, but the journey matters too.