original photo: © littleny – Fotolia.com
My Trim the Fat Challenge found here, here, and here has been very underwhelming I’m sad to say. I had great plans to focus on getting involved in a diet and instead I got distracted by left-over weariness from when I was sick before Christmas. Then it turned out my thyroid was out of sync and I’ve been trying to get some medical funkiness straightened out.
The good news? I have actually lost some weight! I was 171 pounds when I returned from our trip to St. Louis, MO 1/16. Today, I weigh 165. It’s not much, but 6 lbs. is not something to ignore either. I just don’t feel I have a good handle on what I’m doing to feel I will consistently lose.
It seems we have so many things going on at once that my focus isn’t really there. I also need to start a consistent plan to clear out our things so that IF we end up moving to a smaller place, it won’t catch me unprepared.
Other areas where we are cutting the fat
We sat down today to go over the things we will do to cut expenses and made a plan for a few of the things we will do short term. It was actually very encouraging! Moving to a smaller place is a probability as well but the other things we are doing may be enough.
For those of you trying to trim expenses, take a look at what you are spending and see what you can cut out. One thing we can do is go on a family plan for our phones with our local family here. Another is that we can stop our cable and use netflix instead. We had a landline phone through our cable company but use it so rarely that we will discontinue that as well. That will save us over $100 a month!
Getting rid of stuff? Go through one room at a time. Even if you only have 15 minutes a day to work on it. Set a timer for 15 minutes and take boxes marked give away, sell, and toss. The toss one can be a garbage bag. Work your way around the room including each drawer and closet. When the 15 minutes is up, stop and go on to your other work. Eventually, you will get it done and will have a box to give away, sell/garage sale, and throw away.
Each day you can throw out what you have and give away as you go. For sure, when you are done, be sure to give away everything in that pile. Then plan the date of the garage sale and price the items. Notify friends and neighbors in case they want to get in the sale with you…and attract their friends to the sale! Have the sale on 1 or 2 days…no more. Whatever is left over, take to Salvation Army or some other organization and get it all out of your house! Then the fat will truly be trimmed!
Enjoy the space and lack of clutter. Ways to lessen the clutter? Whenever you buy something, get rid of something before bringing it in. That way, your closets won’t get jammed up! I’m telling you this as someone who didn’t do it…and has closets to clean out!
Where are you on the gamut of change?
Is the process going smoothly for you? Are there roadblocks piling up in your way? Are you seemingly stuck in the middle of a pause that won’t seem to stop? Or are you in a bit of a fog as you attempt to change but the details aren’t seeming to fall into place?
Wherever you are, pay attention to it…and keep moving, even if it is slowly at times.
