I have three regular to-dos each week:

Do a daily planking routine for about 5 minutes. 

Lift weights three days a week.

Write one blog post.

How I judge the success of my week is partly based on accomplishing these three tasks.  Also, not dying.

On an average week, I do the planking once or, if I’m extra focused, twice.  I lift weights one-ish times.  My last blog post was back in July – more than 3 months ago. And I generally end each week alive. I think overall, one might call that a solid C- effort.

Recently, I read a better-than-I-expected (but still a little cheesy) self-help book called Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life.  It’s a series of short life lessons written by a retired admiral/Navy Seal and the lesson which serves as the title of the book talks about how starting your day off by not skipping an easy, but often ignored, task can lead to accomplishing greater things. 

What does this mean to me?  It means overcoming inertia, which, if it’s been more than 5 years since your last physics class, means “the resistance of any physical object to any change in its velocity.” (Thank you, Wikipedia). Basically, getting the ball rolling.

Want a better job?  Start updating the resume.

Ready to lose weight?  Start with a short walk.

Interested in your coworker and wondering if the flirtations are real?  I honestly have no idea what to do next as I’ve been away from the action too long, but I imagine you would ask the person to join you for a drink with mutual friends after work?

So, how will this all affect my goals? I guess we’ll find out.  It’s Monday. This blog post is now this far along. I did just pull myself off my floor after completing my planking. I have not done any lifting, but I’ll hit it tomorrow.

This isn’t perfection. 

We’re talking rolling balls.  Not falling dominoes.  Effort is still needed to keep the thing going.  But, as stated earlier, it does help overcome some of the inertia by just starting the ball rolling – even just a little.  To paraphrase Newton’s first law (and possibly take it out of context), “An object at rest remains at rest, and an object in motion remains in motion.” 

Begin moving – metaphorically or literally.  I can promise you it will continue to require some effort, but you’ll find it’s maybe a little less than before. Eventually, you may find that it takes more energy to stop than it takes to just keep on rolling. 

And now I’ve gotten this blog post completed.