Early Days

I think it’s fairly normal when we make big plans or set goals for ourselves that we start off with a real BANG! Right? Being an all or nothing personality type, this is at least what I do, but I do want to change and be that person that succeeds more or less at their goals. I can’t tell you how many times (because I simply can not count that high) I have started out with a bang and then petered out after a few days.

It’s different now. I don’t want to just talk about it. I want to DO it.

I think you get to a certain point in your life where you just say “enough is enough! I’m going to have the best possible life that I can!” Maybe it’s an age thing. Maybe it’s a one-too-many-negative-experiences thing. Maybe it’s a realization that you’ve wasted so much precious time that you can never, ever get back. Never.

I was talking to a colleague yesterday – he wants to lose 10 pounds before going back to the US on holiday (he’s also an American living in the Netherlands) and we were discussing different ways of losing weight, things to do, “things to don’t” (as Hubs would say) and it came down to this: “Being overweight is not a problem, it’s a symptom of something else”. Oh my God, how true is this?!

How many of us have lost weight only to gain it again? How many have been on some form or another of diet since we were teenagers or younger? And WHY is that? Moreover, WHY does it take so long to sink in that we have to change the CORE before we can actually change the outside?

I’ve talked about it before; my issues with my body started when I was 10. Someone made the sick decision to choose to molest me (and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one) which changed my life forever. Forever, people! Because guess what, there was nothing wrong with me then! I was a young girl, not fat, not ugly, not disgusting. None of those things that I saw in the mirror after that happened. None of those things that I have repeated back to myself for the last 30 years.

I watched my mother berate herself. Abuse herself with food and then turn around and go on a diet. Oh, so this is how it works? I’m supposed to hate my body? Well, ok!

My friends as well. We think that we are affecting the teenagers nowadays with all of our dieting and “perfect body” messages nowadays? Trust me; we were already becoming fucked up in our own way 25 years ago! I don’t recall any one of my friends growing up who didn’t have some sort of issue with their body. Too fat. Too thin. On a diet. Secretly throwing up. Secret eating. Yeah. I don’t need their confirmation to be almost 100% certain we were all affected in some way.

So what am I going to do now? I’m not going for just the outside. I’m not going to just cure the symptom. I’m going for the whole disease. I’m going to change the core. I’m not going to be negative about my body. Not ONE MORE DAY.

What I AM is beautiful, strong, funny, smart, sexy.

What I AM is successful, talented, creative, and a great friend.

What I AM is someone who DOES what she SAYS.

I am a believer. In myself!

All of my goals for the day, the week, the month, the year – there are no doubts that I can accomplish these things.

The core has to be changed. The symptoms will then go away. There will be no more struggling. There will be awareness. There will be no excuses.

It’s early days as far as my monthly goals go, but I have to say I feel so positive, so empowered. Day 5 of my goals, Day 11 of the 30-day No Scale Challenge and there is no feeling of failure. There is no “need” to ask the scale to tell me how to feel today. I’m doing this. It’s early days, but this is the CORE work now.