GLASS HALF FULL CHALLENGE

“Aiming for a glass half full mentality, and reality.”

- Betsy Clark

A few weeks ago on a Monday night after work, my roommate Betsy and I were hanging around the apartment. We were chatting about this season’s upcoming events and how busy we were going to be. After realizing we had a few things we wanted to work on that would help to better us overall and maybe even allow us to enjoy ourselves more, we decided to create a mini challenge for ourselves.

We chose 7 categories to target that we thought would be most important or useful and listed goals for each. Since some of them are more personal, I won’t be telling you whose goals are whose but if you know us well I’m sure you’ll be able to figure out a few of them. Certain categories also have things we might both be working on.

The challenge expires on December 31st and we set a check-in date to evaluate our progress at the halfway point for November 12th. We also taped the list to our refrigerator so it would frequently be in our faces. While we are serious about our challenge, we chose not to pick any consequences for failure and figured the mental guilt and occasional vocal harassment from the opponent would suffice.

The categories and goals have been listed below:

(1) DRINKING

• No Shots

• No Solo Drinking in the Apartment

(2) FOOD

• No Eating After 9pm

• Only 1 Trigger Food per Week

• Cook a New Meal Every 2 Weeks

(3) FRIENDSHIPS

• Plan an Outing With a Distant Friend

• Branch Outside Usual Circle Once per Month

(4) LIFESTYLE

• Sleep 7-8 Hours per Night

(5) MONEY

• Eating Out a Maximum of 2x per Week

• Redo Budget by the End of the Year

(6) MEN

• Make the Effort to Talk to More People While Out

• Have a More Open State of Mind

(7) EXERCISE

• Gym 3 Mornings per Week

• Exercise 5x a Week & Try 1 New Class per Month

Creating challenges like this are fun and usually yield positive results. Last year Betsy decided to refrain from alcohol for an entire month and saw it through. (MAJOR props for that girlfriend.) I also find it’s more enjoyable and motivating to work on improvements with a partner.

I’ll be sure to give a summary of our progress after our check in date and a second summary once the challenge wraps up.

Betsy, may the odds be ever in your favor.