Exhausted.

This past week has been a most trying one for me. Even though the month itself had been great leading up to it. Excluding work, course. I always have to exclude work, since it rarely goes as well as I'd like it to. But I've definitely started a very steep downward stumble. I look forward to the moment I hit rock bottom, so I can know for sure it's over and start back up. But if I manage to stop midway and start back up again, I'm okay with that too.

So, my thirty day challenges. It's very difficult to stick to the actual challenge plan. So my rest days are the days I work. So it will take me more than thirty days to do this. But I think the fact I'm doing it is enough. I enjoy these because I can do them anywhere for the most part, and it involves nothing complicated. However, I don't like doing them in my barracks room when my room mate is present. It's weird to me. So I'll go to the gym and do it there later. The biggest issue I have with the challenges is during the squat challenge, I get BORED. That is my downfall in all I do. When I go to the gym, I'll have to stop and leave because I get bored, I'll get bored of a project I'm working on, a book I started reading (not non-fiction, normally it's something I'm reading for education), school, homework, writing and so on. When I get bored of something, nothing can help me continue except sheer willpower, and depending on the day, I'll be low on that. So when I'm doing squats and I get past 80....I start to get REALLY bored now. I'm not looking forward to the last few weeks when I do close to 200+ squats a day.
But I will keep at it. I need to be able to do pull-ups by next year. That's my goal, the one thing I'm going for, after I can do my pull-ups for the PFT, my fitness goals will change to more accurately reflect what I REALLY want. Which is I smaller, toned body. I hate that I can't wear non-form fitting clothes without looking in a mirror or photos and all I see is a fat body underneath. I've never hated a part of myself so much as I hate my arms. I know I'm stronger, I feel it, but I don't see it. So I need to fix that.

I've also wandered astray from some other goals I set myself towards. I know this is normal, especially when things suddenly change and you're adjusting, or stressed. Which I've been experiencing both for some time now. I spend a lot of time feeling dazed and lost, almost as if I'm continuing on half asleep. When I'm at work I'm a different me. I've managed to start creating a self that is what I need to be at work, but its draining to be that person all the time. So I have a different me that I'll be when it's just me, by myself. I often wonder if either one is really me, or just aspects of a single individual. I recall as a teenager wondering about all this, and find it strange that years later I still have similar thoughts. But I was once told that you don't truly know who you are till after 25. And I'm not there yet, so it makes sense.
Life is about self-discovery. The most important things you learn are often about yourself. There are things about you that you may not even know, or be aware of. There are thoughts and decisions you've never had to make that you won't know how you'll be until that exact moment comes upon you.
We all have a thought of how we'd like to be, but how honest that is, is entirely up to debate. I find self-discovery confusing at times, because I have a nack for seeing both sides of things, I find it easy to try and picture myself thinking like another, to better understand them. Or I think a certain way because I'm supposed to, which is all part of being in the military.
I don't think that means I'm not me, I think that all helps make up who I am. But when I look at myself I have issues deciding on things because things that don't affect me, or my life directly, its difficult to have a stance on.

Maybe one day I'll figure it all out, probably won't be this lifetime though.

I have so much I should do, others want me to do, what I want to do, and in the end I tend to do what absolutely needs to get done. I'll never be able to fully have that marine mind-set, but when I put on my cammies I'll have it for that moment. When I'm working on my school work, for a moment, I'm a scholar. And so on, with everything else.

I have so much I want to dedicate myself to, but when it comes push-to-shove I'm exhausted and just bow out. I can't just pick one thing and that be it. I want to do everything, know tons of information, be physically fit, have my dreams come to life in front of me.
But the one thing I truly work towards everyday is to be with my husband again. When that happens maybe something will change inside me. I can't make those kind of predictions. But I need to find balance in my life. This is something I've just realized.

What I seek
is balance.

Dedicated.

Over the past few months I have started changing. Or trying to, physically. I started a gym regiment that for once in my short Marine Corps career I've somewhat managed to stick to. And I'm getting stronger, I can't see the results on myself, but improper dieting will hide a lot from you. And since I don't have a kitchen and most days of the week the chow hall isn't an option for me...I don't have many options.
But I made the decision I want to actually become fit. I want to look fit, feel fit, and be fit. I want my level of struggling to be beyond anything it's been before. I want to be able to hop on the pullup bar and bust out twenty like it's cool.
And I'm going to dedicate myself to that.
This is something I should have done years ago, but I didn't have the mindset for it. I was too unfocused on what needed to be done. I couldn't see the future, and my current path was clouded. Well luckily for me there was a break in the fog and I'm able to get myself on track.
So I'm going to do my best to keep up with this fitness thing, and try not to just stuff myself all the time on my days off. I still love to eat Japanese food and there's no way I'll cut that out, but when I eat meals, I'll try to make them healthier. I've already started incorporating spinach into a lot of what I eat, AND into my shakes I drink after the gym. Small steps, but it feels like a big leap. If only eating healthy wasn't SO EXPENSIVE!
but I digress.
To start out with my current challenge I'm embarking is the 30 day squat challenge. I'm on day three, and my legs and I aren't speaking currently. No joke.
Day 1, which was Sunday, I did 50 squats.
Day 2, 55 squats
Day 3, 60 squats.
Went to the gym to do legs today, couldn't do it. Anything involving the use of my thighs is not do-able currently. Thank the Gods tomorrow is a rest day for the squats. I need it.
Yes, I am still attending the gym on a regular basis. On days I work, since I can't leave the shop during the entire 24 hours I'm going to develop a Shift Workout Plan. That way I can still get some physical activity in during that time. The other days I will go to the gym and follow my workout plan, occasionally throwing in an extra exercise or two just to mix it up.
If anyone wants to know the plan I'm doing just comment and say so, I'll post it, if I don't discuss it in later posts.
This is my everything blog, I want to post so much on here, but I'm too busy doing stuff to do so. Which is a good thing. But it makes the blog dull.
Oh well.
Pull ups are more important.
And oddly enough the fact I'm going to the gym now is motivating, and it makes my peers and my superiors look at me in a different light. I'm not longer a lazy disgruntled complainer. I'm a motivated leader who is trying to improve themselves so I can inspire my juniors to the same. I may never be a good runner, but I won't give up trying.
And neither should anyone else. If you want it, go for it. Find that reason within that makes you want to succeed. We'll all experience failure at one point or another, but what separates us is that we'll pick ourselves up and keep trying.
Because that's what living is about. 

renewly inspired.

Yes, I realize I probably made a word up with the title of this. But that's how I feel currently. I have so much I want to do project wise. I just currently don't have any time to do it. Literally. Go figure.

Since it's been over 6 months since I've posted I don't think I should bother with all the details of what happened in my life. Especially since no one is currently keeping up on reading this.

I have been living in Japan since mid August. I love Japan. I do not love Marines getting in trouble in Japan. It messes with my off base libo. Which is super important to everyone, as far as I know. Nothing I personally can do about that though, except just keep looking out for my Marines and doing the right thing. Moral courage is one of the hardest things the Marine Corps teaches, but it is one of the most important lessons and person can ever learn.

Currently we're getting new furniture in our barracks. So my life is going to be dedicated this week to prepping my room for that, helping my roommate learn to organize her life, and getting ready for a trip to Thailand. I just googled "Cobra Gold 2013" just to see if mentioning it in an online blog would be an OPSEC issue. And....I don't believe so, because the exercise has their own FACEBOOK PAGE! Still, I'll watch my words. And hopefully have a good time while I'm there.

Meanwhile, while this blog was originally meant for me to vent about anything I wanted to. I'm considering revamping it to be more about my projects and things I'm working on. Maybe people will see it and can comment and help with things I'm stuck on (like the fact I share a tiny room with another person who owns too much stuff and won't condense her belongings or even organize them on occasion).

So be prepared for me to start updating again. I'll try to keep up this time!!

Ja ne!