My Road to Self Improvement

I graduated in 2000 with a B.S. in Sociology and worked very briefly for Children's Protective Services as an investigator. The job was too emotionally draining for me (I am very grateful to those fine individuals that work that job) and so I quit and took time off to really reflect on what I'd like to do. In the back of my mind I always had this idea to teach, but I would have to go back to college for an additional year to get certified. My husband was a bit skeptical since my career as a social worker lasted a little less than a year. So, to prove I was serious I substitute taught for two years. And I told him that I still wanted to teach, so back to school I went. I was certified to teach high school English the following year. I taught at a small country high school for two years.

I enjoyed teaching and was good at it. But, I quit in order to start a family. I stayed at home with our little girl from the day she was born. We thought she was our miracle baby. It took 6 years and a medication to balance my hormones just to get pregnant with her. But, 10 months later, while still breastfeeding full time and not on the hormone therapy, we shockingly found ourselves pregnant again...that was our miracle baby. I had our little boy 7 weeks ago.

And...leaving out a lot of minor and some major details...that brings us to the present day. I'm out of shape and overweight from having 2 babies (and 2 cesareans) in less than 2 years' time. The house is a wreck, because I'm so unorganized.

It's a good day for me if I get to brush my teeth and it's a great day if I get to take a bath. That might sound totally crazy to someone who doesn't have 2 in diapers, but I'm always changing someone's diaper or breastfeeding the newborn or feeding the toddler or putting one or both of them down for a nap or giving someone a bath...etc. Also, doing things for myself (like brushing my teeth) is hard because the toddler is too young to leave unattended, but if I bring them both in the bathroom with me she will poke the baby's eyes or step on him, pinch him, etc. She is still so much of a baby herself she doesn't understand that she can hurt him.

So, my days are pretty hectic. Sometimes I'm so tired that I don't even know what day of the week it is. Sometimes I have a hard time remembering when I last fed the baby or when I last changed one of their diapers.

I can see now, as a new mom to 2, that I will have to have a plan and a schedule in order to get much of anything accomplished. Right now the only thing I feel like I'm doing right is tending to all of the needs of my babies. But myself, the house, and playtime is suffering.

So, now you can see the need for this lens...to get my positive statements out there in black and white and to get those statements in public view so I'm help accountable. If I wrote all of this in a traditional journal it would just get stuffed into a drawer somewhere. But, your reading this will make me feel like I have to do what I say. So, you reading this helps me, and I hope it helps you too.

As Oprah always says on her show, when the light bulb goes off over our heads it's our "Ah-ha" moment. Well, I had mine one day while surfing the internet. I came across the site iThinketh and read something super interesting. The author wrote about the importance of using positive statements in our lives because negative ones don't work.

How many times do we say to ourselves "I won't eat sweets" instead of "I will eat healthy food" or "I have to start going to the gym" instead of "I will take better care of myself and start exercising."

It's not enough to start thinking about the positive things we want in our lives (success, money, health, weight loss, etc) but if we truly want to obtain these things, we need to phrase the desire to ourselves in a positive way.

Is the concept still a little abstract to you? Don't worry; it was to me too at first. Here is what gave me my "Ah-ha" moment...

Don't think about elephants.

What did you think about? Elephants? Ah-ha! Negative statements don't work!

Wow, what a revelation this was for me! I now feel like I'm ready to apply the law of attraction to my own life. I just have to determine what it is I want and construct my positive statements.

First of all, I have to stop eating fast food and junk food. My diet is way out of control. I'm in love with Chick-fil-a, Jack in the Box, and Sonic. It's crazy how many times I go through a drive through (probably on average 3 times a week). I've told myself over and over that I'm going to stop eating fast food. But then I find myself hungry and tired and my toddler wanting out of the house, so I load up the kids and go through another drive through. This has been a bad habit of mine since I was pregnant with my first baby in 2006 and craved nothing but hamburgers. So, I've been addicted to fast food for nearly two years. But it has to stop.

Next, I'm going to stop being so sedentary. I'm so tired with caring for the two little ones and breastfeeding all night long that any chance I get I just sit down. Not only am I not getting any exercise, but when I sit down I tend to eat chocolate or drink a Pepsi to keep me going.

So, here is what I'm going to do. 1) I'm going to come up with a healthy meal plan. That way when I get hungry I don't just stare blindly into the fridge and then just give up and decide to go through a drive through because it's easy. 2) I'm going to walk on my elliptical machine while my toddler naps.

I'm going to leave my plan with just two steps for now. After I get these mastered and they become habit, then I will develop a more detailed plan. To help me stick with this plan, I am going to watch "The Secret" once a week and I will start off every morning by watching the "gift is me" visualization tool.

In order to get anything accomplished, I'm going to have to schedule house cleaning. For now I'm going to keep it very simple.
Monday - Vacuum
Tuesday - Clean the bathrooms
Wednesday - Dust
Thursday - This will be my day for errands.
Friday - Vacuum

I will keep the kitchen clean by cleaning up after myself and family every time we use it.

Since I quit working to stay at home with the kids, I need to do all that I can to help with the finances. These includes two major steps 1) making money and 2) saving money.

I will continue with my online endeavors. I currently contribute financially by making money online. I do GPT sites, paid surveys, PPC, and of course Squidoo. I will continue to put effort into these projects. You can see more about my money making ventures at my other lenses, How to be Successful with GPT Sites and The Simplest Online Money Making Info Ever.

In addition to bringing in some income, I will save my family money by bargain shopping and using coupons. I have learned a lot this past year that has saved us hundreds yearly. I'm thinking about organizing it and putting it into a lens about frugal living.