Welcome 2020! (Blog Entry 1: An Introduction)

This is such a perfect gif for me, because I literally spent new year’s eve on a plane flying from New York to Lisbon. At 7pm NY time the captain came on the speaker telling us all that it was midnight in Lisbon, and wishing us a happy 2020, but of course where we were at the time – probably about 400 miles off the east coast over the Atlantic Ocean, it still would have been only about 8 or so, depending on when we crossed over the next time zone. So somewhere over the next couple of hours we flew into midnight, and 2020 hit me over the head at 35,000 feet.

A new blog is so exciting, don’t you think? Like a new notebook. All fresh, and clean, and still filled with anticipation of all the adventures and events you’re going to fill it with. Things need to be set up, settings fiddled with, themes chosen, and all of that can come in time, but for this, the first blog entry, there’s such a feeling of excitement. I’ve probably started over 100 blogs since I began in 2002. And each time I get a little frisson of excitement. Back then I blogged about my Single Girl Life in NYC, my pathetic shoe wardrobe, my crappy job, and my dismal dating life.

Now I am 43 years old. Twenty years ago I was 23, and I remember the ball dropping on the year 2000, a new century. On New Year’s Eve that year we went to Costco to load up on bottled water because everyone was freaking out about Y2K. Which turned out to be a giant nothing. And now here we are, twenty years later. I have a six year old daughter. I live in Spain.

And I’m in the process of transitioning from being an online entrepreneur – despite actually having some amazing success over the past five years – because I’m exhausted by it, and I’m moving back into my traditional career world as a consultant (I’ll definitely be writing about that. A lot. A cautionary tale for all those who want to ditch their day jobs and make a living online. It’s hard effing work. I’ll spill the beans. All the beans).

Some things never change, though. I still weigh too much. I still eat my emotions. I’ve been carrying around a dress for the past 20 years- literally – hoping that one day I will fit into it.

And my biggest regret in life is that time is moving too fast. Somedays become yesterdays faster than I can blink, and if I don’t do something soon, I’m going to still have these complaints in another 20 years. When I will be a matronly 63.

So this year I am going to blog every day, as a source of inspiration, and accountability. Like Alexander Hamilton I’ll write my way up – only without as much poetry as he did – and this year I will put the past decade or two behind, and embrace the new. And recognize that if I don’t do it now, I really am going to be carrying these complaints around until I die. Which is just boring.

The first area – and tied for the most important for me this year – I am working on is my health and fitness, which hasn’t been great for 20 years, and nosedived this past year.

And instead of putting out huge goals for myself like I always do (lose 60 pounds! Run a marathon!) I’m going to do it in small bits. This week I am not going to think about weight. I am going to think about logging my food daily, and exercising in new ways. For the next week I will do 5 modified burpees each day, and 10 squats each day. Should take a max of five minutes. I can commit to five minutes. Of course I can.

I’m also creating some goals around my career – more on that in the next few days as I flesh them out.

You can follow my journey in real time over on instagram as we go along too – @the.heatherproject

So for now – I’m jetlagged and exhausted, but I say I want to write every day, and it doesn’t work to skip out on the first day if that’s your goal. So here we gooooooo!