It’s the first day of the month, and I want to do a few things differently for the next 31 days. You know me and how much I love restarting/refocusing on the first day of the month. My goals for May are to eat a clean, Paleo diet, not consume any alcohol or sweets, spend less money (ie – not spend any money on anything apart from food and basic necessities) and begin my work out routine. Can I do it?

First of all, I signed up for another round of Fed and Fit’s 28-day plan. I’ll be doing a modified version of her meal plans from the book, mostly because we don’t have all of the ingredients here in the UK, and I’m cooking for one person. Not to mention, I have a small fridge that I share with my roommate and so I can’t cook a lot of food, as I have nowhere to store it. Essentially, it will be a matter of me choosing a few recipes to make from the list in the book, and eating them on repeat, as well as improvising with some of my own recipes, that fit the nutritional requirements.

Of course, Paleo is all about variety, but a lot of times, circumstances dictate how much variety we can have. Living in England, we usually have plenty to choose from, but a lot of these ingredients are not always available all year, or they are American ingredients. I’ve done this before this last January, and I felt great and was very manageable. For me, the struggle was afterwards, when I was off the plan, and was allowed to reintroduce different foods/indulgences once in a while. I managed to get very carried away.

Anyway, here are a few of my goals, going into this month:

1. Lose a few pounds, because, why not?
2. Have better self-control around food, not just when I’m on the plan.
3. Sleep 8-9 hours per day. I just keep coming back to the fact that I am usually so tired. I have mental fog, and I just don’t function at my best.
4. Stick with my food journal. I found that journaling actually helped me reach my goals faster than when I am not. It also forces me to be accountable with myself.
5. Keep to a regular work out routine. I did very well at the beginning of the year, but now, after lots of travel and my battle with the flu, I am routine-less.
6. Run a 10k in under an hour! The Hull 10k is next month, and I have to start training hard! Last year, I did it in 57 min… Let’s see what I can do this year!