Mantras, Motivation, Moving Ahead...

Today, I was filling some time between work and picking up my husband by going through the inbox on my Gmail account. One of the things that I love about Gmail is the nearly unlimited space. I never have to throw out any emails, which works quite nicely with the "Search" feature. I have quite a few e-zines that I subscribe to. I get them, read them, keep them and then, when I'm looking for information on a particular topic, I just type in what I'm looking for and voila! All of the emails and articles that relate to that topic pop up! I love this feature so much that I've opened up a second Gmail account just for my recipes. If I come across a recipe that I like, I just send it to this account. I also include other important information that I may search by (kinda like tags)... slow cooker, breakfast, Christmas, low-calorie, etc. Then, say I have chicken, carrots, and rice that I want to use up and I know that it's going to be a long, busy day, so a crockpot dinner would be ideal. I just type "chicken carrots rice crockpot" in the search box and Voila! It brings up all the recipes that fit this criteria! But, I digress... that's not what I really came on here to write about. I just love Gmail so much that I can't help gushing!

So, what I really came to write about was something that I read in an old email that came across during this foray into ancient email-land. I had written to a diet buddy from Sparkpeople several years ago regarding my mantra about making changes in my life: "Improvement is improvement!" It's kind of a twist on something that Flylady says: "Housework done incorrectly still blesses your family". Things don't have to be perfect for them to be an improvement or a blessing. It also comes from working with the students that I do (kids on the autism spectrum) For them, even little bits of progress are improvement. If I looked at the "big picture" and didn't see them achieve it, I think I would get totally burnt out in this job. But, I can look at where they were and where they are now and celebrate the little successes. In our classroom, we celebrate the small things a lot! In fact, one of my biggest joys in this job has been from something that is so simple, we take for granted that our "normal" kids will do it with in the first year of their life. I had a set of twins, both with autism, that I had been working with for at least 3 years. After working with them for 3+ years, they finally called me by name! I tell you, when I heard them say my name, my heart melted and they could have just about anything they asked for! It just made me so happy because I am a person to them now. Before I was just a tool they could use to get what they wanted, but now I am a person, and that is a huge breakthrough for them!
Another mantra or philosophy that I have adopted is: "Life's too short to waste calories on eating things that I don't like!" (unless it's something good for me and I'm setting an example for my kids). I've decided that it's not worth it if I don't enjoy it...like pie crust...I don't usually care for it, but I used to always eat it because it was part of the pie. Now, if I don't feel like it, I don't eat it because, what's the point? I'll admit, it took a while to be able to "waste food"! Afterall, we were brought up to be members of the clean-plate-club! But, then I got to wondering, "why?" So, I quit.

I guess the point of all of this is that we don't have to do it all at once. As the song says, "little things mean a lot". They can add up to big changes... big improvements..."Babysteps" as FlyLady and Dave Ramsey call them. I think that it is important to still enjoy the things that we like, just in moderation. I know if I deprive myself, I will not stick with a diet! But if I can make small changes- like fat free cool whip instead of regular, or half a piece of pie instead of a whole piece, then I am likely to follow through and keep moving ahead. And that's what this is all about... moving ahead and keeping moving.