It’s Q4 and I Have Some Plans

Tomorrow I’ll update the world (aka 4 regular readers) on my status of my New Year’s Resolutions, Mid-Year Resolutions, and Long-Term goals but today, as we start Q4, I’m adding some things to FINISH STRONG!

Why not?

It’s fun to see how much we can accomplish in 90-Days.

So here goes…

• Rehab My Knee: I have a bad habit. When my knee starts hurting, I just “power through”. This happened a couple years ago after my summer vacation where I love hiking in the deep woods. When I was in my mid-40s, I liked to “bound” through the forest. Now? At 53? When I “bound”, I guess you could say, “I’m bound to hurt myself.” And I did. Hopping from a rock to a log I slipped and hurt my knee. Did I relax? Take a day off? A week off? Hell no. And now I’m hurting. Sooooooo it’s back to heat and ice. Heat and ice. Ibuprofen. The other bad habit I have is sitting cross legged – and that’s very hard on the knees. I’ve got weight machines at work, so I’ll do the leg curls and presses. I’ll walk a little slower. I’ll stretch. Last time I did this … I got me knee back to 100%

• Listen to Music Daily: I’m way, way, way (way) too down the rabbit hole on Podcasts. Last week? My App said I listened to 26 hours of Podcasts. I read an article recently about how listening to music can calm the mind and make you smarter by something something connecting synapses or something. Good enough for me. And I’m going with Jazz and Classical to accelerate the benefits (my own theory)
• Really, Really (Really) Cut Back on Sugar: Recently I read a book about Alzheimer’s and dementia while simultaneously listening to an audio book on memory loss and while it didn’t actually say “brain fog” is the same as “dementia”, it did point out that a poor diet and lack of exercise can mimic Alzheimer’s and dementia. Things like eating sugar and drinking alcohol. And eating late at night. And not getting certain things in my diet (like vegetables … what????). I wasn’t really reading it to see if I had memory loss, but just kinda to educate myself because I have older loved ones in my life and what struck me is … hey …if your #1 goal in life is NOT to get Alzheimer’s or dementia, um, Don … shouldn’t you do everything you can to have a healthy brain? The answer is yes. So I’m on Day-5 of clean, sugarless (mostly sugarless … which for me means don’t grab a handful of M&Ms from my bosses office in the afternoon … and then grab another handful … and hey, someone brought donuts … I’ll have one of those, too) diet. And I went back to Garden of Life’s 50 & Wiser multivitamins (I’ve determined they’re the best) and started daily meditation (my version of meditation is a morning Rosary walk).
• Write and Read Daily Affirmations: I’d like to write 4 or 5 Affirmations and read them daily after my morning Rosary walk. Work in progress. But in reading Hal Elrod’s Miracle Mornings, these Affirmations are pretty powerful when written out and when a person puts lots and lots of thoughts into them. I’m going to have a marriage Affirmation. A personal Affirmation. Plus Affirmations for my Career, Health, and Dreams – knowing them might blend together.

Feelin’ good and hopefully end the year strong!