Challenge yourself

We are officially IN 2011. It's February and there's no turning back now. Like many people, I spent the beginning of the year sorting out some goals, plans, hopes, and dreams. I took sometime to clear my mind, meditate on God, spend time in prayer and devotion, spend time with me.

I always talk about purging and cleaning things out. Well the first month of the year is like a mini version of that. It is a time to get re-focused and re-aligned with yourself while making plans for the upcoming days.

I've set a few different goals for myself for the year. The ones that I am really excited about concern my fitness. I spin about 3 days a week but I want more. The hum of the bikes keep me going, but it can get a little boring so I've decided to do some things in addition to spin to keep my workouts challening and exciting. Enter bikram yoga, chair dancing, and pole classes. After my experience with Bikram the other day, I really am excited to go back tonite. It was mind clearing time. 90 minutes of thinking about nothing but how to breathe and how far you can stretch yourself into another posture. Chair and Pole are fun ways to strengthen that core. I did one chair class and I was WORN OUT! I'm looking forward to the pole and hoping that it doesn't kick my butt too much. So what prompted all of this besides my need for change?

I've decided to do the TOUGHMUDDER in October. Toughmudder is a 7-12 mile obstacle course "race" which hit the scene last year and has taken off like crazy. One of my friends asked me if I'd do it. After looking at it and seeing that I'd have to run through dangling electrical wires, I kind of thought she might be crazy. But then I thought, why not. Why not challenge myself to go beyond what I "think" I'm capable of. And with that, I'm in. And I think we are managing to get quite the "team black girl" going on. I'm stoked. But that means that I've got a lot of training to do over the next 8 months. Anyone know of a good playground with some monkey bars in the DMV area? I think it is a great personal challenge and it benefits the wounded warrior project (a great cause to support).

So now that we are "in" what do you have planned for 2011?