2020: The Last 100 Days

As I sit here at my kitchen table, in a race against time (who knows how long Sienna will nap for?) putting the finishing touches to this post, there are still 100 days left of 2020.

There are two ways you can say this statement:

1 - with a dejected, weary, tired tone of voice; there are still 100 days left of 2020.....are you actually kidding me? I’m done with dealing with the crap 2020 has thrown my way. I don’t want to have to live through another 100 days of this crap.

2 - with excitement spilling over. THERE ARE STILL 100 DAYS LEFT OF 2020!!! 100 days to work on my goals. 100 days to get to a place I’m proud of by the end of the year. 100 days to grow and learn and meet people.

Which tone will you use?

So much can be done in 100 days if we focus on, and commit to, showing up for ourselves and our goals on each and every one of those 100 days.

But on the flip side, if we’re not careful and if we amble through each day with no focus, with no goals, aspirations or expectations to strive towards, with no conscious thoughts behind the actions we find ourselves taking, if we live on autopilot then we will do the same things we always do. And the result is that we will achieve the same things we always achieve. If we’re not careful and if we don’t take intentional, conscious actions, then the time will slip away without us noticing (how often do you find yourself saying “how is it 4 o’clock already? The day’s flown by!”), without us making the most of it. And before we know it, we’ll arrive at New Year’s Eve with no clue as to what we’ve done with the last 100 days and potentially (probably??) nothing to show for them.

It is so tempting to write the rest of 2020 off, to put your goals on hold (if you can even remember as far back as January when it was time to think big for 2020, when you swore that 2020 would be “your” year). It’s so tempting to use the script that 2020 has followed so far this year as a blueprint for what we can expect from the rest of the year. By doing this, by following the same path we’ve trodden since coronavirus hit, we are for sure lower our expectations of what’s possible for the next 100 days. Because if we continue to do for the rest of the year the same things we did for the first part of the year, and if we approach the rest of the year with the same outlook and attitude that we had for the first part of the year, guess what? We’ll get more of the same.

Although 2020 has had its bad points, so has every other year I’ve lived through. That doesn’t mean to say I’ve wanted to write off the rest of those years, too. I get that the level of “badness” in other years cannot compare in scale or effect as Coronavirus, and I’m not saying it can.

Coronavirus has taken so much away from us already. What I don’t want to happen is for it to take more than it absolutely has to.

Coronavirus took away my ability to visit my family.

It took away my chance of us taking our little girl on her first proper summer holiday as a family of three.

It took away my chance to throw Sienna a party to celebrate her 1st birthday.

It took away the chance for us to celebrate the 1st birthdays of our lovely Baby Steps babies.

It took away celebrating my step-mother-in-law’s 60th birthday.

It took away celebrating my brother-in-law and sister-in-law's 40th birthdays.

As sad as I am about not being able to do those things, they were all things that were outside of my control. There was literally nothing I could do about it.

But by me choosing option 1 above, by me choosing to not even try to make the rest of this year as good as it can be, by me taking a “ah what’s the point?” attitude, I’m admitting defeat. By throwing the towel in on 2020 one hundred days early, I’m handing over to Coronavirus all of the control that I still do have to make what remains of 2020 the best that it’s within my power to make it be.

Coronavirus has taken so much from me. I’m not handing it anything on a plate.

You’d be forgiven for thinking “We’re in the midst of a pandemic! Who on earth is working on their goals? Right now I’m in survival mode. My goal is to survive. Not just mentally survive but actually, physically survive”. But as quickly as that thought has come, I want you to bat it away.

Here’s the thing, if you don’t want to do something but you don’t want to admit that you don’t want to do it, then there will ALWAYS be a reason for you to not to do it; you’ll always be able to find an excuse why you can’t do the thing right now, why now isn’t the best time.

But instead of just thinking “now isn’t the right time” ask yourself why not. Why isn’t now the right time?

Then go one step further and challenge yourself to answer this question: Why is now absolutely the right time?

I’ll bet that, with a concerted effort and focus, if you ignore the peripheral “noise” that your brain can convince you you’re hearing, I’ll bet that you can come up with at least three reasons why now is a great time to do the thing you want to do. The thing which, a mere two minutes ago, you could have convinced me was the wrong time to start.

I don’t know about you but I am so keen to see what I can achieve in the final 100 days of 2020.

Now despite the fact that I absolutely love reading other people’s articles about the goals they’ve set for themselves and are working towards, and the mini-milestones they want to reach, I haven’t actually ever set myself any goals. Sure, I’ve set the obligatory New Year’s resolutions in the past of giving up chocolate and losing weight but nothing that would have enriched my life had I arrived at 31 December with a big tick in those boxes. I’ve never set any tangible, measurable, meaningful goals. Nothing that would elicit a feeling of pride or a sense of achievement. Nothing that had any real meaning attached to it.

So the goals that I want to work towards during the course of the next 100 days are:

I want to run 5k in less than 30 minutes. I have long since accepted that I am not a runner – I’m not good at it, I don’t get anything out of it and I don’t enjoy it. But then, during lockdown some of the girls in the area that I live decided to do some fitness challenges. One of the challenges involved running. Not having anything else to do during lockdown aside from work I said I’d take part, and for the first few times I went out running (distanced of course) with my friend Andrea. And I loved it! So much so that every other day, before the work-from-home day started, I would go out at 6/6:30 and run 5K. My time would range from anywhere between 28 and 34 minutes. I came to really look forward to my run days. But then working from home was over and it was back to the office and logistically it wasn’t possible to fit my runs in before work. So they have fallen by the wayside. And I am surprised by how much I miss it. So I am committed to making time between now and the end of the year for, say, 3 runs a week.

Another goal is that I want to spend more time than I currently do, reading. Why?? Because I love getting lost in the lives and stories of other people. Because reading is the ultimate way to unwind and the ultimate “self-care” gift I can give myself. I did set myself a book challenge at the beginning of the year to read 32 books. That quickly got reduced to 10, and the book I am currently reading will, when I’m finished it, take my tally for the year so far to 9. So I’m hopeful that I can make it to 10 before the end of the year.

I want to be better at prioritising my fitness and more disciplined at showing up for it. What does that look like for me? It means looking at my schedule each week ahead of time and figuring out, realistically, how many times a week can I get to the gym/go for a run/workout at home etc. based on whatever other commitments might already be planned. It means being realistic with what I want to achieve. It means not trying to go from what I’m doing now (which would be absolutely nothing) to saying I’ll work out three times a week and run three times a week. I know me, and I know that that just won’t happen. I don’t want to get too hung up on numbers; I just want to know that, come the end of the year, I’m better than I used to be.

My final goal is that want to show up for, and give 100% to the Last 100 Days course that I signed up for.

There are still 100 days left of 2020. What will you do with them?