January crept along, as winter months often do, and we invested time pursuing the goals that God impressed upon us to set for this year. I wanted to give you an update.
To recap, our goals were to deepen our relationship with God, downsize our belongings, pay off our final debt and move fully into retirement savings mode, and improve our weight health.
In regards to our spiritual goals, we are over 30 days into our 40 Day Sugar Fast. We have learned so much from Wendy Speake’s book, and taking this challenge on with our church family has led to some great conversations on the weekends also. Learning to seek the Lord for our satisfaction instead of false fillers like sugar, shopping, social media, or other distractions has been transforming. My husband and I are continuing our nightly habit of having time for devotions and prayer before going to sleep as well as learning new ways to encourage, serve and pray for each other.
It is challenging to show a tangible success in this type of goal, but I know that I am changing and growing, and my husband is as well, so I am claiming success in this area.
The second goal was to downsize belongings. Huge success in this area! We donated five pieces of furniture and 15 boxes/totes of items. I don’t know how many pounds of recycling left the house, but it was a lot!
The third goal was improving our weight health. In January my husband lost 3.6 pounds and I lost 4.3 pounds. Success! I also took my measurements and will do that again in March.
We have been working out at the gym, and on days I could not get to the gym I walked the treadmill at home. My workouts are slow going as my feet are still recovering from surgery, but I am seeing improvement.
We have reduced coffee and pop consumption and added in more herbal tea and water. I am definitely feeling improvement from that alone. I’ve been trying some new healthy recipes and increasing the variety in our meal plan.
Our final goal was to make financial gains. God has helped us have success in this area also. We were able to pay 15% of the total of our debt. This was in part made possible by our no spend year challenge. In January we had 18 days where we spent no money at all, 10 days where we paid our regular bills, bought groceries or gas and three days where we made “allowable” expenses that we discussed prior to purchasing.
So, needless to say we are feeling good about our January progress. We are being realistic because we have 11 months to go and, well, life happens! But we keep moving forward mindfully one day at a time. We pray for direction from God and He is definitely guiding us!
God is there to guide you towards your goals too. He leads through His Word, through prayer, and the preaching of a truth-telling preacher. God cares about goals, and if you ask Him to show you His perfect plan for you, He will show you, and then lead you all the way to the finish line!
Seasons with Grace 