Temptation

In the efforts I am undertaking in order to wrestle my finances into something resembling beneficial, I am still tackling my goals set at New Year. I've taken to ignoring my spreadsheet, not because it doesn't work but simply because I forget to use it. Some of the goals I know enough to attempt automatically, such as drinking 64 ounces of water a day, or stretching for ten minutes. Some of them have become less important, like crafting every day or writing. Some goals have suddenly become more important, and need extra tending to. So, somehow I got the idea of going back to my "box".

The box is a simple square with each side labeled for an aspect of my life: Emotional, things like self expression and relationships; Mental, for things like career and money matters; Physical, for all the stuff pertaining to my corporeal form; and Spiritual, pertaining to my personal paradigm and growth therein. On the piece of paper with this box at the top, I write the day's ate, and in a descending list, the initials for each side. It looks a bit silly, with the date and then "PEMS" listed down the page, but it's important. Next to each initial, I rank myself in that area from one to ten, ten being the best I know how to be and one being the worst I've ever felt. Then, I assess the ranking I've given myself, and write three little goals for the day in each area (simple and easy things, like "take a hot bath" or "go for a walk") that might boost that rank a bit.

See, I've discovered that lofty goals are great and all, but it gets really easy to get bogged down in the process. Day-to-day life becomes consumed by the larger goals and the attaining becomes almost more hazardous to the health than the benefit at the end is worth. So the smaller, easy-to-attain goals for the day give me the daily lift I need to keep going. So far it's been highly beneficial. I drink my water, take my medication, make the bed, get up and move around instead of slumping for hours on end at my desk, and so on.

But one little nagging thing keeps coming back to me. The little temptations are almost as easy to give into as the little goals are to attain.

For example, I want to be healthier. But those little candies on my co-worker's desk are too easy to access, too easy to say "I'll just have ONE more" to. The biggest challenge lately is soda, which I KNOW isn't a good idea, but the addiction I once had has reared its ugly head again and I'll allow myself one... to end up quenching my thirst on that and not finishing my water intake goal. The little distractions are too easy to give in to, and it makes the process terribly challenging. For just as a large goal can be supplemented by a host of smaller ones, it can be waylaid rather substantially by a horde of little vices each taking its own bite like a school of piranha taking down a cow.

So here I am, taking baby steps and trying to swat away the tiny gnats of detraction.

Lead me not into temptation, I'm already finding it everywhere anyway.