Last fall, my 22 year old daughter asked us what our thoughts were about setting a family goal before our trip to Costa Rica in March (more details coming soon). It was the first time she asked about a family goal as we approached the new year and we thought “why not”. She told us that she had a couple of ideas and would follow up with us soon.
A few days later, she suggested ’75 Soft’. I had heard of ’75 Hard’ and knew that would take a lot of planning. I was curious about ’75 Soft’ so we chatted about it as a family and I read a few articles about it. I thought this was a great opportunity for us to work towards a common goal and support each other along the way.
Essentially, it is 75 days with the following guidelines: 1. One workout a day of 30 minutes. We updated this to 45 minutes of working out per day. 2. Drink more water 3. Follow a mostly healthy diet 4. Read 10 pages on nonfiction per day. 5. No drinking (unless it was a special occasion). We updated this to no drinking for 75 days.
We all agreed and set out to start our family goal on January 1, 2024. There were a few bumps along the way: eating the unhealthy treat or meal, not figuring out what you want to read, figuring out the best time of day for additional water, working out on days you want to rest (barely zone 1 workout days) and saying no to alcohol during special events or meals out.
The one guideline I thought would be tougher to give up was the drinking. I do not drink much, but my husband and I have a ‘sushi and sake’ Friday date night. We have made it our tradition for several years. We just pivoted to ‘sushi’ date nights and have not felt like anything was missing. It gave us motivation to try something different to eat at the restaurant.
It’s nice to know that we could hit reset and work towards something together. It was much easier to encourage, motivate and sometimes give each other a hard time to stay on track. I believe we all better understand the value of teamwork, goal setting and overcoming obstacles.
There are 34 days left and I am looking forward to what else we will learn.
Bonus…..look at these stats!
1. I am on my 3rd non-fiction book.
2. I have drank almost 3,000 oz. of water.
3. No alcohol for 41 days.
4. I have done a total of 218.3 miles of mostly run training.
5. I have walked an additional 180 miles this year.
6. I have exceeded my 45 minute exercise goal since January 1st.
7. I have completed 2-3 days of strength training (full body) per week.
8. I have eaten a mostly healthy diet and have not drank any alcohol. 🙂