For most of my life when I decided I wanted to get in better shape and lose weight, I would go the grocery store and grab whatever health & fitness magazine with eye-catching titles and images of amazingly beautiful and svelte women on the covers stuck out to me the most and decide that THIS was the last time I would start something new and THIS would finally be the “DIET” or workout that changed everything.
After all, it worked for the girl on the cover, right?!? 😉
I would get all excited and plan my attack.
What was typically my plan?
Well, I would usually decide that I needed to enjoy “just one last weekend” of partying and eating whatever I wanted and I would change my life starting on Monday.
Yeah, I was that girl.
I always needed to wait until Monday…..the 1st of a new month….after the New Year.
And, always with the mentality that I would enjoy one last hurrah and this was be the last time I started over.
Monday would roll around and by then I was tired and likely still somewhat hungover from the weekend and DEFINITELY feeling the effects of bad nutrition but I was still ready and still excited for a real change.
This excitement and determination would typically last until about Wednesday. Sometimes even until Thursday.
I would think I was doing everything right….for those few short days.
But, looking back, I was doing just about EVERYTHING wrong.
My first mistake was thinking I needed to throw caution to the wind for a weekend of drinking and eating.
My second mistake was approaching Monday as the beginning of….well, really a new beginning of my life…..YET again.
My third mistake was focusing on said DIET or workout.
My fourth mistake was focusing on the scale. I would step on that thing not once, not twice, but typically 3 times a day 🙁 I would weigh myself morning, noon and night praying for a drastic change to keep me motivated and going.
My fifth mistake was giving up at the first sign of resistance.
I probably made more than the 5 aforementioned mistakes lol.
But, hey, I’m only human, right?
I have SO much to be thankful for now.
Over the past 4 years, I learned that while I can absolutely still enjoy some weekend fun, a free-for-all does nothing but leave me feeling weak & defeated & honestly many times kinda physically sick. I now approach having some “treats” as just that. It’s not a CHEAT anymore. (Let’s STOP using the word “cheat” when in terms of nutrition and fitness mmmmmmmkay?!? Webster’s says to cheat is to “act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage, especially in a game or examination.” Or, IF “you’re” a cheater, it means “a person who behaves dishonestly in order to gain an advantage.” Seriously, is that what having pizza and a few beers on a Friday night means when you’re trying to lose weight or get in better shape? Um no. Let’s call it was it really is. Just living your life. Let’s take any negative connotation of it and just eat according to our goals in the season we’re in.
Over the past 4 years, I stopped waiting for a Monday….for the beginning of a new month….for the New Year. I finally realized there’s abso-frickin-lutely NOTHING magical about a Monday….the 1st…..or January 1st. You just have to make a freaking decision once and for all that this is a lifestyle change and while you can have as many day 1s and fresh starts as you want, there is no expiration date to what you’re going after. Stop waiting. There will always be an event or holiday or vacation coming up. Just START! It doesn’t have to be perfect. Just START!
Over the past 4 years, I stopped calling what I was doing a new DIET and I realized that EVERY fitness plan on the planet WILL in fact work IF (and ONLY IF) you do the freaking work. Stop calling it a diet. You are mentally telling yourself that this is just a short-term thing I’m doing to get to an arbitrary goal. Again, this is your LIFE. Change your lifestyle, change your life. Again, this doesn’t have to mean you NEVER eat pizza or donuts again. This means everything in moderation. 80/20!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AND, don’t get tooooo caught up in the exercise approach! It doesn’t have to crazy hard. You don’t HAVE to hate it. And, everything works! Just as long as you’re MOVING your body. As the saying goes, bodies in motion tend to…..stay in motion 🙂 We were designed to move! Find something you love or at least LIKE and just START!
Over the past 4 years, I worked really hard to break up with the scale. I honestly lived or died by that thing. It would determine my mood for the day. It would send me in a binge way too many times. And, honestly, it wouldn’t matter if it were up or down. Sometimes it would be down several lbs for the week and I would decide that was a license to TREAT YO’SELF. Or it would be up and I was say to myself why the heck am I even doing this…..I might as well go eat whatever the heck I want ‘cuz it doesn’t matter anyway. Such. A. Vicious. Cycle. It was actually self-sabotage at it’s finest. Because no matter if I won the day or the week or lost, I would lose sight of the long-term and revert back to behaviors that got me overweight, sad, depressed & tired in the first place. Now, keep reading because I have more to share on this mistake later. Let’s just say the part about me working really hard on this one means I didn’t completely overcome it. Remember, I’m only human.
And, over the past 4 years, I worked really hard to push through those barriers when they came. I won’t say I was always successful. But, once I did it the first time, and the second time, and the third….I started to realize how AH-FRICKIN-MAZING it felt to not give up! Instead of my typical feelings of defeat and weakness, I had feelings of empowerment and strength! I have first-hand experience that the saying “the miracle is often just on the other side of fear” is TRUE!! If you get nothing else out of this post, remember this ~ Don’t quit just before the miracle. It could be right around the corner waiting for you if you just push through.
Ok, so all that being said….ha, yes, it does take me a while to get to where I’m going!
I spent the last 30 days doing a kick-ass agility program with a super simple, super effective nutrition plan. I made a commitment to compete in a fitness competition and I’m busy planning out the next 300 days of how I’m gonna get there!
So, let’s just say, the thought of achieving a goal that far away and that huge was pretty daunting. I had been moving right along just going with the flow and rocking my workouts and nutrition and then I got a little stuck. I started questioning how I would know I’m on the best path. What was the best workout program I could do right now? How should I eat? Should I follow macros or our trusty containers? How would I know if I was losing body fat or muscle as my weight dropped. And, then add in some family stress to the mix and before I knew it I’d spent the last almost week of my program OBSESSED and kinda stuck. I wasn’t sleeping great. I was feeling overwhelmed and helpless. I did some emotional eating. AND, I started stepping on the dang scale EVERY DAY….even a few times a day.
Ultimately, I lost sight of why I’m really doing all this.
Yes, I’ll be the first to say I wanna rock a bikini! BUT, at the same time it’s not about the bikini!!!! Ha, I know it sounds ridiculous but it makes sense to me lol. The real reason I’m doing this is so that I can look back and say “I did a hard thing!” AND, so that I can be the fittest, healthiest and strongest version of myself that I can be!
But, this doesn’t have to be and look perfect! ANY program I do will work IF I do the dang work!!! The best nutrition approach for me is simply the one I can keep simple. And, that number on the scale isn’t going to be my BEST indicator of my success and progress along the way. Yes, I will be using it and it does have a place. HOWEVER, I refuse to fall back into the trap of it deciding for me how I’m really doing. The very day I recognized what I’d been doing, I stayed off it all day and I took my measurements and new pics instead….and guess what I found! I had lost 4.4 lbs. and 12 inches!!!!!!!! 12 inches?!?! I almost didn’t believe it myself and had to retake some of the measurements lol! BUT, while the scale can lie and doesn’t show you the full story, measurements and pics don’t lie. And, while the pics may not show as drastic of change as the measuring tape, I see a lot of progress and it gave me a lot of positive reinforcement that I’m on the right track!
AND HEY, if you’re curious about the program that I’m using first along my journey, you can check out a sneak peek group on Facebook one of my coaches and I are doing! It’s totally information ~ you’re not committing to anything but just joining this private group 🙂 You can just sit back and learn about why we love it and then decide for yourself! Click HERE to join or click the image below! The results from this program are nothing short of amazing across the board for so so many!!
So, in order to move on, I gave myself some grace. Old habits die really hard sometimes and that’s OK. You may have to fight and win many battles before you win the war 🙂 When I get stressed and overwhelmed, it’s my autopilot reaction to turn to food for comfort. I have to work really hard at doing something different. (If you want something different, you have to DO something different, right?!?) And, I also have to work really hard on remembering that I can’t control the people in my life and their choices. It can feel helpless but you HAVE to let go of the need to control anyone but yourself. I was stuck for YEARS trying to change and control and help people in my life. It took me getting really humble with myself and working with my life coach to realize that many things are not mine to change, control or help. That’s God’s job. #letgo&letGod The old me honestly would’ve let this derail me for weeks, months, even years. Thank God for the new me.
And, I loved the last few days on my inspiration board!! It was a really good reminder to myself that it’s not for my summer body
….not for my bikini body….but simply for MY BODY. And, both quotes fit perfectly with this blog post!
And, tell me, how do you keep yourself motivated and inspired? If you’ve never tried a vision or inspiration board, you totally should! I’ll be sharing my new one this weekend! I’m doing a new one every 21 to 30 days AND rewarding myself with little things long the way like a HOT STONE massage that I have scheduled for tomorrow morning. AND, although controversial, my next reward is a tattoo on my wrist that I’ve been wanting for like ever!!
Bye for now from me & my B!
2nd grade looks good on her 🙂
