“There is no challenge more challenging than the challenge to improve yourself” -Michael F. Staley
We have officially surpassed the two week mark into the New Year. And wow, the first two weeks of 2021 have already brought our Nation through a series of tumultuous waves. I think we’ll leave it at that for now.
Sometimes the start of a New Year brings pure excitement and fresh motivation, and other times it brings pressure and anxiety. For me, this New Year has been a combination of excitement with a touch of daunting. Daunting in the sense that, I know the goals I have set for myself are going to take work, hard work. The easy part for me is always setting the goals, and the hardest part is establishing the habits required in order to reach them. Often times, the first few weeks and months of each New Year yield the feeling of pressure to not “fail” when working towards new goals. While it is definitely important to start on the right foot, we sometimes forget to give ourselves grace when reaching for the stars. As you intentionally create new habits, give yourself an appropriate amount of forgiveness during the transistion. We all know you can’t just make things happen over night, they ususally take some time. So give yourself just that. Know that it will take time to make the changes and adjustments you are striving for. Weather it’s re-focusing your diet plan or working out 30 minutes everyday, it likely won’t be an “easy” change to make. Lean into the time it takes and give yourself grace for the days when you don’t quite get where you need to go, just don’t make the grace moments turn into the majority.
With that being said, I’ll share a few of the things I’m working on this year. For starters, each morning to get my day started, I am working on incorporating a series of quick stretches that help my body and mind naturally awaken themselves. It takes no more than 7 minutes. I then drink a full glass of water because 1)hydration is key and 2) I am part camel and drink more water than the average joe lol. I then sit down and spend 10-20 minutes writing in my “Go All In” journal and reading my bible/devotions. For a while I was incorporating a quick 15 minute morning walk to get some fresh-air to start my day…but then one morning it was 7 degrees and windy so I decided that’s just gonna be a perk of some work from home mornings. While these are rather small doings in the scheme of life, I, in just two weeks, have already felt a greater sense of calm and peace with my morning routine. On days when I have missed my routine, or skipped parts of it because of running late, I notice that my actions for the rest of the day are lacking the sense of calm and love that I feel grounded in when I DO carry out my routine.
Since our half-marathon training will get started during the first week of February, I am spending the month of January working on developing my muscle base again. It is something I had built up over the course of summer and fall, but lost all that I had gained once I lost routine in November. So, here’s to re-creating my foundation for training to get started in less than a month!!
In addition, both Bobby and I are slowly getting our diet-plan “back on track”. Does this mean we don’t eat carbs or sugar? Absolutely not. We just found ourselves consuming more refined sugars and junk food at the end of 2020 than we both prefer to. So, making subtle changes day by day and week by week will help us realistically get back “on the tracks”. One thing I struggle GREATLY with is consuming foods in moderation. I swear there’s some weird switch that goes off when I eat something yummy and my brain just wants to compulsively consume the entire batch of cookies or eat through the whole half-gallon of salted caramel ice cream…it’s a real problem!!! Things started out rather decent, I have been trying to put the foods I eat in containers rather than just grabbing the entire bag of potato chips-which has seemed to help. But, only on the days when I have a great sense of self-control. Other days, like Wednesday night this week, I sat down with a bag of dried mango and all of a sudden I was reaching my hand into an empty bag…like I said, I’m working on it haha.
Now my favorite part!!! We have tried some really great new recipes in the last week that are share worthy! The first is a winter salad with sweet potatoes and chickpeas and the second is a lemon-butter, cayenne chicken! Check them out below to add a little spice to your life this week hehe. You’ll catch that little joke in a bit.
We’ll call the first one the “Warm Winter Salad”. I’m someone who can’t just eat the same old salad over and over again or it creates an angry relationship between me and vegetables lol. So, I’ve been seeking ways to enhance the “salad” and get creative with it! I found a recipe I thought sounded interesting, but of course didn’t have all the ingredients in our pantry, so I’m sharing with you the version I created with what we had on hand!
Here’s how it happened:
- Slice two sweet potatoes, pretty thin..like 1/2 in thick or so. Toss them in olive oil, salt, pepper, and Cayenne pepper (to add a little spice to your life:)), bake them at 425 degrees on a baking sheet for 20-25 minutes.
- While the potatoes are sun-tanning, fill a large mixing bowl with kale. You could try it with spinach or lettuce, or whatever other greens you’re interested in…but I can only guarantee it’s greatness when you use kale! 🙂 Also, open a can of chick peas (aka garbanzo beans), drain and rinse.
- Also while the potatoes are catching a tan, I mixed up this super yummy salad dressing that doesn’t taste like any other pre-made dressing I’ve ever had!
- —-(I used a hand blender to mix it all together, but feel free to mix however you can!)— Combine: 1/4 cup of Olive Oil (make sure it’s the good stuff. DONT GO CHINSY ON OLIVE OIL PPL…I use what I shipped home from Italy last year but I suspect you might not have that luxury…so just be sure it’s at least a mid-class olive oil or you’ll have nothing but regrets…okay, rant over. Back to the COMBINE: in addition to the oil…2 Tblsp of lemon juice (I just squeezed our lemon juice container for a solid 10 seconds-I’m guessing about 2 Tablespoons), 2 Tbls spicy brown mustard (I use trader joe’s and love it), 2 heaping spoonfuls of greek yogurt (ours had honey in it too), 2 teaspoons of Worcestershire sauce, 1-2 minced garlic cloves, salt, pepper, and somewhere around 1/3 cup of grated parmesan cheese. Blend together for an amazing flavor burst!
- Now, assuming your oven timer has gone off, sprinkle the rinsed and drained chickpeas over the sweet potatoes on your baking sheet. Drizzle some additional olive oil, cayenne pepper, paprika, salt and pepper. Place them back in the oven for another 20-25 minutes or until slightly crispy.
- Now you just wait!
- Once potatoes and chickpeas are crunchy, mix them into your bowl of kale. Toss with salad dressing and sprinkle parmeasean cheese on top.
- ENJOY the GREATNESS!!
We’ll call the second recipe “Simple Chicken with a Kick”. If you haven’t figured out by now, Bobby and I both like our foods to have a bit of a “kick” or spiciness to them. Not a ton, but enough to get the tastebuds buzzing. This is a SUPER SIMPLE way to change up your plain old chicken breast entre.
Here’s how to get started:
- Season chicken breasts or tenders with salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper 20 minutes before you’re getting dinner started to soak up the flavor. (I cut chicken breasts in half for more reasonably sized chicken chunks)
- When ready, heat 2 Tbls of butter in a cast iron skillet. Once butter begins to melt, place chicken in the skillet.
- Let the chicken sizzle for 5-6 minutes on med-high heat.
- Add 2-3 minced garlic cloves and a tablespoon or two of lemon juice to the center of your sizzling chicken skillet. Let the aromas develop and spread throughout skillet.
- Flip chicken over. Let brown on opposite site.
- Once both sides have been seared, you can turn to medium heat for the remaining cook time until they are cooked thoroughly. In total, mine cooked on the stovetop for about 15 minutes.
- THAT’S IT!! ENJOY!
Thanks for tuning in, I love hearing about if you try my recipes, so HMU with your thoughts!
Wishing you the best wherever you are in your journey of the New Year and your new goals. Let’s make 2021 the best yet!!
xoxo
Jos
Josie's Journey 