A new year, a new..urg

Chicago in the winter, where I do even begin. Chicago, I am blaming you for most of my problems of late. Not writing regularly to the blog, your fault. Eating too much, your fault. Exercising half-ass-ly, your fault. Having a messy house, all you! So, in short, Chicago you are ruining my life!

I was planning on writing regularly with tips and/or ideas to keep in mind on the journey to a healthier lifestyle, but I feel like I have nothing but excuses lately (looking at you Chi-Town weather). This post unfortunately will not have any tips because honestly, I feel like I have lost sight of my path. Weather aside, I feel more lazy, sad, uninspired lately. Holidays are always tough and I definitely have the tendency to look back on my year and always feel failure. 2013 brought horrible events and actions, but it also brought redemption. Unfortunately, in to 2014 I still feel like am I falling short. I have not been exercising enough; I am not running very often and in place of running I just lift 5 lbs. weights for a few minutes (and that cannot possibly count for physical activity). I have been drinking a lot more and my food intake has not decreased. I know it depression that is affecting me lately, but it still doesn’t change the fact that I am having trouble with my goals. There is a quote on the internet (apparently from Jenny Larson), “depression lies” and it is the truth. However, what do you do about it? I am aware that most of my thoughts about myself are exaggerated, but how do you get pass all the negative thoughts and move forward? I get so suck on the “I am so fat, this isn’t going to do anything, so what is the point” that I won’t go out to exercise or see people. I have trouble pushing away those thoughts and then I start feeling guilty for not doing the things I feel I should (like exercising). My partner said you should acknowledge that you did wrong and move on to fixing the wrong, but I get so stuck on feeling guilty, ashamed, and sad because I did wrong in the first place. How do you stop succumbing to excuses? How do you fight when you are not a fighter? Why do thoughts leave me completely helpless? I wish I had the answers. Even now I find it hard to get pass missing my morning run and feeling like the cycle of inactivity has started. I am unable to be proud that I have not grubhub for food, that I have been cooking all my meals, that I have not ordered take out, I have not signed up for credit cards, and I have been spending within my budget (I have not been able to save, but I am not in the negative). It has been 2 months and while that is not a long amount of time I am still keeping those goals. Why is exercising and eating less such a huge problem? I found a recent post on The Bloggess that hit on the paralyzing nature of depression but I still have no answers (I highly recommend reading it though, http://thebloggess.com/2014/01/strange-and-beautiful/#comments). One commenter mentioned having “Bad Day Emergency Kit”, which sounds like a great idea and one that I need to have. So if anyone is reading, what is your Bad Day Emergency Kit? How do you get out of the funk?