February 20th

There are some people that I am fairly certain think I am a bit bonkers for wanting to hike the Appalachian Trail.  There are more, I think, that are envious.  They may or may not want to hike the trail themselves, but that I have a dream that I am trying to attain.  Miscellaneous conversations with people lately have me thinking about the priorities in life that we set for ourselves.  At least one person I know tends to put work as their priority.  Many people feel that God is their priority.  My priorities tend to change from day to day.  What I want to be my priority is my health.  This is not saying that I am a health nut, because I am not, but without my health what good is work?  I am a person who likes to help others.  It is difficult for me to say no to helping someone.  As I age, I am getting better at it, but giving of myself in a way that helps others tends to make me happy.  In order for me to help others, first I must be mostly healthy, physically and emotionally.  This is part of why overall health is what I feel should be my priority.

Taking care of my health should mean that I am exercising, eating right, getting enough sleep and taking a break when it is an important thing to do.  It is my physical as well as spiritual well being.  I am not good at ANY of these things.  Or at least I don't do them as regularly as I should.  For me, in order for the life balance to work my overall health should be the priority.  My life is way out of balance.  Work will come in and take the front seat and make getting enough sleep, the right foods or exercise extremely challenging.  In order to pay bills and eat I need to work.  That is just the way it is.  If I let myself get too rundown, work suffers.

Having a good relationship with friends and family is part of my spiritual or mental health.  Seeing people, giving and receiving hugs and having meaningful (or not) conversations is important.  I miss playing games with people.  Balancing all these things are what I need to work on.  I need to bring some control to my job so that I can be as healthy as I keep trying to be.

I just went down the YouTube rabbit hole to share this Helen Reddy song.    Enjoy and take care of yourself.  😉

Where does hiking the trail fit in?  It will be a life changing experience that when I finish I believe will be like hitting a reset button on my life and all these bad habits that I have built up for the last 52 years will ideally be gone and I will have new. better habits and routines.  I will have overcome things that I can't even imagine at this point and will come out stronger in mind and body.


Today my happy is that there is at least one new hire that will (finger's crossed) take some of the load off of me so that I can have a more normal schedule for a while and get things done at home.

 Snowbank in a parking lot in NH.

Snowbank in a parking lot in MA.