The weight loss journey can be a long and trying one. There are lots of ups and downs, emotional and physical battles to be fought. It can be hard on you and everyone around you. It can affect your relationships and change your lifestyle to something completely new and unexpected.
It can also be really hard to stay positive. Especially when you are particularly stressed/emotional/sick/tired/injured and just plain unmotivated. It could be that you're not doing as well as you like, or someone in your life is doing "better" than you. It could be that you have something come up, at work or in your personal life, which demands all of your attention.
The important thing is to stay positive. To think of the good, not the bad. To think of the future not the past.
I am probably the biggest girl at training, including boxing. Not necessarily the most unfit (or at least not that far behind) but probably one of the biggest.
Yes, that can make me feel bad. Especially when we run as a group and I come last. I am not a good runner. I hate it.
When they talk about how much weight they have lost, it can make me have negative thoughts.
When they talk about how dedicated and motivated they are I often wonder why I bother. I am clearly not on their level.
When they talk about their next challenge, to run 10km, to bench press 20kgs, to hold a plank for 2 minutes etc I think, I'm not even close to doing half of that!
And yet, when they talk about their journey, they talk about the 5kgs to go. The stomach or the arms they hate. The loose skin that they despise. The friends they have lost because they didn't understand. The calories they have eaten that day. The workout they are going to do to make up for having a bite of a piece of cake or a glass of wine. (I am not saying that they shouldn't work it off, just pointing out obsessed they can be.)
Do they talk about how happy they are? How great they feel? How far they have come? NO.
Do they not understand that there are hundreds of thousands of women that have never achieved what they have, and would be happy with just that.
Listening to them talk makes me feel like I'm not doing enough. I am not pushing myself hard enough, that maybe I should just give up now because I will never be like them.
But then I think, I am happy. I am happy with where I am, who I am and what I am doing. I am committed to what I am doing, I am continually improving and getting better. But most importantly I am positive and happy in my life and it shows in my relationships and work.
I do not want to get to my goal weight and have it not be "enough". I am not one of those people that thinks that once I get to my goal weight everything will fall into place. It doesn't work like that. I know because I've been there before and I yet I gained weight and ended up at the beginning again!
I don't want to be miserable for the next 9 months and then once I've reached my goal suddenly be happy and want to go out with the friends I've ignored and might have lost because I've been focusing so much on me and weight loss.
Because it does take a long a lot of energy and time and effort to lose weight. BUT it is so much easier when you are happy. I have found that since accepting myself and leting myself be happy, committing myself is so much less effort. Yes I believed for far too long that because I was fat, I shouldn't be happy. I didn't deserve it.
It is so much more positive to be happy. It is less emotional guilt tripping and stressing because I have not reached a goal by a certain date. It is about being happy with the successes and continually improving so that there is only more to come. It is about enjoying myself, enjoying exercise and enjoying healthy food.
It is not about comparing myself to others. It is not about being disappointed in myself or thinking I am not good enough. I am good enough.
For everyone out there that is struggling: stay positive, be strong and be happy with your successes. Think of all those women out there who haven't even taken the first step to lose weight. Who might never have the chance to. Remember that there is always one person out there that will look at you and wish they were like you. Yes there is always at least one!
Fellow weight loss peeps will probably think that I am being unrealistic in my approach. That I am not being rational by not setting goals and reaching them, weighing myself on the scales every day and counting my calories every day. That I am too relaxed, that I am not disciplined enough.
Only time will tell right?
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