{ everyday push } by tracy echeverri
JUST DO IT Back in September I made one of the biggest moves of my life. My husband was offered an amazing opportunity in Long Island and we would have to relocate to the NYC area. Before this though he asked me if I was willing to move for his career and i agreed but never did I expect it to happen as fast as it did. So in a nut shell he was offered a position last September and we then immediately had to look for housing (going to NYC every weekend for a straight 3/4 weekends) and then packing up our house after signing on a lease to an apartment and finally moving in less than a months time. Driving down and traveling with our two dogs, my parents, two cars and a U-haul where we moved in on a late Friday night and by Monday morning my husband was at his new job and my parents were on a train heading back to Rochester New York. INTENSE, to say the least. I was able to keep my job due to working mostly remotely the past few years so work wise my job wouldn’t really change-but did our normal everyday lives did! Not to mention we had already planned a second wedding ceremony in Rochester, NY so we had to continue planning for the wedding as well as commute back and forth for the bridal shower and then the big day- back to Rochester. We also had my husband’s mother come from Colombia for the wedding and she also stayed with us for another two months following our wedding. Constant challenges right? So you can imagine the stress, the changes, the new lifestyle and just getting familiar with a new city and i haven’t even gone into our main challenge, which was staying healthy and fit and continuing our gym regiment. After moving to NYC we had issues with our Planet Fitness memberships. With the commute to the gym being too tedious and at the time of night we wanted to go, it was overcrowded. So we then tried to go super early and that was just exhausting and in the end switched to a different gym altogether and tried to start a regiment at a new location.
This move was nothing to joke about but ultimately more changes were lurking ahead. For a while I was unhappy at my job and was constantly contemplating looking for another career. I held off on job hunting for several months after we moved to NYC so we could settle in and adapt to this new life but i continued to grow more miserable. I knew there were so many more opportunities out there for me now that i was in NYC. A unlimited amount of jobs and possible career paths i could go on. But in the back of my head, i felt a sense of loyalty to my company, being there for almost 4 years and also knew my new job would hold even more changes to my life. At that moment I worked mostly from home, had a lot of freedom and really didn’t have to report to anyone and so on. On the hand i knew there was no room for growth, i felt no motivation and honestly my boss was nothing but negative and in no way helping the situation at hand. But it was scary and new and i was well aware that my life would drastically change. So i made the step, applied and honestly within a few weeks time was offered an amazing opportunity in Sports Advertising. I took the job and here i am. So you wonder what was the point to this? Change. With this new job our lives changed once again. I no longer worked from home and dinner wasn’t ready when my husband arrived and the shopping and laundry wasn’t already started. Things i was once able to do before where I had major flexibility with my schedule all came to an abrupt end. So a new job presented me with a better salary, a job that made me happy, and so much room for growth that I already started feeling taller my second week at the new job. But then the reality set in and questions started to arise. When would we work out? How can we go to the gym after being away all day from our dogs. Will I have time for anything? I have an hour commute each way every day, AHHHHHHHH. So my husband and I sat down and created
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a serious schedule. Continuing our healthy lifestyle would now be even harder than before but it was something super important that we could not let fall to the way side. We decided to work out at least 1-2 times during the week and always on Saturday and Sunday. The dogs would be walked every morning and night which is also great exercise for us! I would make our lunches at night so we always ate healthy and also so I didn’t have to worry about making the lunches in the morning. This then opened up free time to walk the two dogs before going to work myself. Instead of taking a bus to the subway station I would walk to get more exercise and I chose to take the stairs to the 10th floor everyday instead of the elevator. I also do stairs on my lunch for the last few minutes just to get my heart pumping. Every little change I could make that could be in my favor health wise, I am adding to my life. One small step at a time. Change is good, but it is not usually easy. Starting a new job or lifestyle can be scary but also immensely rewarding. Deciding to get healthy is a huge change and an immense step in life. Deciding to quit drinking, or smoking, is a monumental step that I would only applaud anyone on being able to do. I wanted to talk about my lifestyle change in the last year to show that although change is difficult, it is nothing to be afraid of. If you are unhappy in your job or not satisfied with your body image, do something about it. Don’t stay in a situation that makes you miserable daily. Don’t just settle on how your body looks when you would really like it to look different. Don’t be scared of change, ever. Just make the jump and do it!