One full week complete

Introduction
As I wrote the title I realized that although I have completed one week of the challenge, we're really a few weeks in. I had a delayed start, but I did start. I think that's important. No matter what happened for you this past few weeks, it's never to late to start working to improve yourself. That mirrored my experience at Peet's coffee this morning, which I think is worth sharing.

Lessons from a latte...
This morning, like I do many Saturday or Sunday mornings, I delayed my breakfast and took myself out for a casual brunch. Many times that means a walk down to Andy's Diner, but today I decided to hop the 77 bus down to Harvard Square. Last night's snow was still covering many of the sidewalks, and there were still a few flakes meandering down from the skies. The air, however, felt a bit warm and it was a great morning for wandering. After enjoying a breakfast of ham, eggs and toast at Leo's Place, I decided to stop by Peet's for a beverage before starting to make my way back home. The outside benches were still covered with snow, so rather than enjoy the park, I stayed indoors and found myself a chair by the counter that looked out to the street. While sipping my latte, I watched as the trickle of people and cars passed by. The snow was still coming down, but not quickly enough to do more than keep the pavement wet at this point. It seemed like a great opportunity to pull out my journal so that I could reflect on the week and plan my day.

Upon reading my journal entries, I noticed that one of my proposed activities had been fully ignored. Not by malice, or by oversight, but rather as I was waiting for the weekend to have time to focus on it. This task that I had proposed was to do something artistic each week. Each day I had told myself that I would take some time during the weekend and do some sketching. Well, now it was the weekend and I had paper, pen and free time. I found a blank page in my journal, clicked my pen, and began to look around at the scenes from the window. And then, finally... nothing. I saw great images... artistic... that I could capture, but... didn't. I just sat there, looking. I knew what I wanted to do, but I felt frozen looking at that blank slate. I just didn't know where to start. This went on for nearly ten minutes. I would look at the scene, feel inspired, and then look at the paper, and freeze. Finally, I drew one line. From there, I knew where to draw the second line. A moment later I had drawn the sign on the back of the pole. I kept going. It was not my best work, and I didn't stay with it long, but I was past the hurdle. In natural studies I've heard it called the wall of green. Where people are so intimidated by figuring out where to start, that they don't start at all. But, if they picked one thing a day... a leaf, or a flower, or a squirrel... and just studied that, they would already be one step closer to their goal.

I'm sure that many of you can relate to this story. The point that I want to drive home is simple. If you haven't started yet, don't worry. You don't have to have perfect goals today. Just pick one thing... anything... and start there. You can pick another tomorrow, or fix this one if it's not working out. Just start... you won't believe how good it will make you feel.

Update on Goals
Body Tasks:

• Prepare dinners at home at least 4 times per week
  Success: I was able to prepare 5 meals at home this week.
  
• Brown bag lunch at least 3 times per week
  Fail: I only had lunch at home once, partially due to planned group lunches.
  
• Exercise for at least 20 minutes, at least 4 times per week
  Fail: On Monday I slipped on ice and hit my back on the cement steps. I finally got back to exercising today.
  
• Do pushups everyday, each week doing at least two more per day than the week before
  Fail: As above. I was able to move to 14 pushups today in a single set.
  

There was obviously not a lot of progress made here. Now that my back has mostly healed, and I don't have any training sessions or holiday parties, I expect to have much better results. I was able to lose a half a pound though, and those four extra pushups are a good start.

Mind Tasks:

• Read a chapter in a book at least 5 times per week
  Success: I read almost every day from the book, The Way of the Craftsman.
  
• Write a short journal entry at least 5 times per week
  Success: I have five new journal entries in my notebook. I found as the week went on that the entries got longer.
  
• Do something artistic every week (sketch, play guitar, etc.)
  Success: I spent time today sketching the street signs near Peet's coffee.
  

I feel really good about my progress on my Mind tasks. In addition to the above, I played Bookworm a bit to try to help push my word skills.

Spirit Tasks:

• Actively meditate (short or long form), conducting work, at least 2 times per week
  Tentative: I only have done one mediation this week, so I am planning on doing a second tonight.
  
• Identify and attend a local church at least once a month
  Pending: I have identified a church, but have not yet attended.

Although the tasks do not reflect much progress, I did have a much more spiritual focus this week than last. I would certainly count my activities at Lodge on Thursday, and at Grand Lodge on Saturday, as well as my time at Peet's today.

Final Thoughts
Well, this has been a very long update, but I appreciate your sticking through it. Although I did not achieve all the goals that I might have hoped for this week, I feel that it was a very successful week. Most importantly, I started. That may not sound like much, but if you read this whole post then I think you will appreciate what an achievement that can be. My other main achievement was that for every facet that I focused on, I improved myself, whether or not I actually did it in the way that I had planned on. The bottom line is that I am closer to meeting my goals than I was a week ago, and I am proud of that.