1 goal down, 57 to go

Thanks for your feedback from my last post, it's SO good to break the mini blogging drought that I didn't realise I was having!  It feels good. :)

So I mentioned that I'd tell you about the first goal for 2016 that I had ticked off.  As regular readers will know, "Goal" is my middle name - I love them.  I of course have weight loss and exercise goals, but what I also have are goals that I set each calendar year.  They're in essence, new year resolutions - I just think the term goals more accurately describe them.

I haven't worked very hard for the last couple of years on my annual goals, but this year I feel more in a position to make them happen.

I have 58 goals for this year.  It's a little on the high side, I know.  But I want to at least attempt to do it all.  Some are huge and some are simple.  Some are places I want to go, some are behaviours I want to change, some are things I want to do.  Some are health and weight loss related (eg. "Get to goal weight" is one), but many aren't.  I've been working on them daily and I'll just keep trying.  Ideally, of course, I would love to tick all 58 off this year, but even if I get 30 done ---- well, that's 30 amazing things that I wouldn't have achieved if I hadn't tried...

One of my 58 goals was "Do dance classes."  This is one goal I carried over from 2015...and I actually think that was carried over from 2014.

I've done a few dance classes over the years, mainly Jazz, but nothing that I actually stuck with.  I thought though, if I did dancing regularly, it might help me become a better dancer (to assist my theatre work), it could give me some style and coordination, and as a bonus, it would burn some extra cals!

I only make goals that I'm actually excited about, and that I genuinely want to do.  If I don't feel a little excited rush when thinking about it, well, it speaks volumes, and I cross it off my list.  

I asked myself at the very start of the year, why this was still on my list.  Surely, if I wanted it that much, I would have made it happen already?  I wasn't too excited about it - but for some reason, I still wanted to do it.  I couldn't cross it off my list.  There was something about it.  

I think part of it is a little subconscious quirk that I have had my whole life: My Mum told me that when I was 4, she took me to ballet lessons.  Just kiddie - fun - extracurricular - jump

around and exercise type lessons for little kids: not formalised training at the Australian

Me aged around 4-6

Ballet or anything remotely serious.  We turned up on the first day, and the dance teacher said that I was too large / fat / big for ballet.  I don't know the exact word she used, but it all meant the same thing, and my mum, a very non-stage mum who just wanted to give her 4 year old a little weekly exercise, was so shocked that she marched me straight out of there.  

I'm not even going to go there, and discuss how all kinds of wrong this is.  But I think ever since I heard this, I've harboured a sad longing to be one of those little girls who goes to ballet classes.  Age wise, I've moved on from being a tutu'd little girl!  But I guess I thought I could do the next best thing, and do classes now.  Nothing serious, just a casual class for adults where the instructor's not going to tell me I'm too fat to be there.

I think that's why, every few years, I attend some sort of dance training, with the intention of it being this "thing that I do".  But I inevitably always stop going.  This time though, I really wanted to do it regularly!  Sort of...

The great thing about our goals, is that they're personally ours, so we have the absolute right to change them at any given moment.  So I compromised with myself.  I changed the goal from "Do dance classes", to "Try dance classes".  I thought if I'm really not sure, then just try them.  Then there's no annoying commitment where I feel I have to do it all year if it's just not for me, but I could finally realise if I actually wanted to do this.  Just try it.

So, I ticked my mini goals off in the lead up: I researched dance schools in Brisbane, I narrowed the search down, I found one that I liked: it was run by two former ballerinas, the dance studio was quite close to home, they ran Contemporary adult classes for beginners, and you could pay casually and no bookings were required.  It was exactly what I was after!  I made contact, and I wrote the details of the first class of the year in my calendar, as a commitment to myself.

The day before, I started teasing myself with the thought that I could pull out.  I haven't been feeling overly confident about being out and about lately (more on that in an upcoming post), and I started feeling slightly anxious.  I also had a stack of other things I wanted to do that day.  I considered putting it off to the following week.  But I kicked myself - no.  I keep putting this off - I have to do this.  It was also the first class of the year, and I thought it would be better to start then, and then I could be a casual attendee after that.

I went out for breaky with one of my best friends before the class, and we rushed the catch up so that I could get to the studio on time.  I wanted to stay and chat to her - it was such a nice catch up - I wasn't even excited about the class - but I had committed myself to try it out.

I drove a few streets away to the studio and parked out the front.  I reached into my bag to get my socks out, and my mind wandered.  I was nervous and apprehensive, but when I work on my goals, it gives me this super human strength where I can (usually) put those feelings to one side in order to achieve.  So anxiety wasn't a huge issue.

I went to put one of my socks on, as I looked out of the car to see other women walking inside the studio.  I internally groaned, and said to myself not to worry, it'll be over soon, and I wished that it was only a 30min. lesson instead of an hour, so that it would be over quicker so that I could get on with my day.

Setting of my moment of truth

Ummm...

I stared at the other women filtering in as I stopped, and mindlessly held my sock in my hand.

I was wishing it to be over, and I hadn't even walked inside the class yet?

It doesn't take Einstein to read this story and realise where I was at.  In a moment of ultimate truth, I realised the reason I had been procrastinating this particular goal for 2 years.  I didn't want to do it!  I sat there for a couple of minutes, still considering it - I felt like I should go inside because I'd had a shortened breakfast with my friend - but I knew she would be more happy that I'd come to this realisation and not care about a rushed breaky.  I felt like I should go inside because, well, I was here now!  I was literally sitting in the carpark, sock in hand.  I may as well go in, I'd made all the effort of turning up.  Why don't I just go in there to 'formally' know that I don't want to do it (?)

But that, and the realisation that if I just couldn't wait for it to be over before I'd even walked inside, and I was wishing it was a shorter lesson, then that was my answer right there, smacking me in the face.

I knew that this wasn't anxiety stopping me, it was sheer honesty with myself about what I truly want.

I started my car and hesitated one last time - what if I regretted it?  I had, after all turned up, after 2 years of putting this off.  Still second guessing myself, I drove past the open door, it was about 5min after it had started - and I slowed down and peered inside.  I saw a girl stretching, obviously doing a warm up.  I almost crinkled up my face in pure relief that it wasn't me in there - how "blah".

That was all I needed to seal the deal, and I drove off, smiling and so happy with myself for making the decision.

I very happily ticked that off my list that day, last Sunday.  "Try dance classes"?  I did.  I tried to do it...I just realised it wasn't for me a little earlier than most who probably would make it a little further than the car park.

It was a good reminder to myself that goals are adjustable, flexible and all ours.  We can change them whenever, and however we want.  We need to listen to what we truly want - and if we make a goal that we're not in love with, or if we don't know if it's for us, and it takes us driving 10min to a car park to smack us in the face and realise that it's no, then that too, is ok.

1 goal down, 57 to go. :)