Oh how quickly motivation dies. I really was super excited about this whole contract thing and then my stupid laziness trumped everything. Exactly what I said shouldn't happen. I did not go to the gym on Saturday morning. Or Sunday. Or Monday. I didn't even exercise at all. Why? I have no real grasp on the answer to that question. I just didn't. I didn't feel ill. I wasn't depressed about anything. I didn't have something better to do. I just didn't exercise. I slept in on Saturday morning and spent the evening hanging out with friends. On Sunday I slept in and then spent the evening folding laundry and watching The Real World. And I worked both days.
This seems to be a recurring issue. My follow through, or lack thereof. I was even feeling really good because measurements happened on Thursday and I've lost a total of 40 lbs. But that joy is not as wonderful as it could be because I allowed myself to not care. And that is awful. Sure I can declare my intentions but when it comes to actually sticking with this thirty day challenge, I'm like a gun filled with blanks: all talk and no walk.
I'm awful, boo hoo, I think we all get the point. I do have to share my victory, however. Despite ignoring the articles in my own constitution about exercise, I crazy adhered to the ones about food. And it was incredibly challenging. I worked at Target on both Saturday and Sunday and Monday and each time was incredibly tempted to get pizza and breadsticks. Did the carbs win? No. I won. Instead I had salads and bananas and yogurt and a peach and an apple. And did I drink any soda? No sirs and madams. I drank nothing but water.
Ultimately, I'll call the weekend a victory, albeit a small one. Despite my failure in one area, I continued to succeed in another. My failure, which was large, didn't lead me to decide the whole weekend was a wash. I absolutely need to do better in the future, but or now, I'll skip beating myself up and look at what I can continue to do in the coming days.
Showing posts with label failure. Show all posts
Showing posts with label failure. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Reflections...
In less than four months I will have been trying to do this whole gym weight loss thing for a year. A full year. It's very momentous. I have never been able to stick with something for this long. It's also very easy to look at the past 8 months as time wasted. Not because I haven't made progress, because I have. But because I haven't made enough progress, in my opinion. So the following entry is a selfish one. It's a reminder to myself why I am doing this and it's helpful for me to write it down so I can occasionally check back in and remind myself of my reasons for doing this, however trivial they may seem to those of you who are reading.
Two weeks ago I visited my parents in Minnesota. It was an awesome time and I was really happy to be back, but on my inevitably uncomfortable three-hour plane rides, I had a lot of time to think. Thinking is a dangerous thing because it leads to ideas and for me, often leads to being self-critical. Let me just say that if you've never been fat, you have no idea how awful it is for a fat person to be on an airplane. No one wants to sit next to you. You enter the plane and as you walk past aisles of people who are already seated (I have never had the privilege of being the first person on an airplane) you can almost hear people thinking "please don't be seated next to me". Not that I blame them. Airplanes are already small and claustrophobic so who would want to sit next to the biggest person on the plane? I hope no one else has to be the cause of the look on someone's face when they realize that I am sharing their aisle on a plane. So that's reason number 1. I want to fly without being embarrassed.
I started this thing in the fall and continued it through the winter. Now as spring is almost over and summer is fast approaching, all I can think about is how I don't ever go to the beach. That sucks. The beach sounds like it would be fun, in theory, but it's scary to take off your shirt knowing that people will stare, comment behind your back, maybe even make fun of you to your face. Because people can be mean. I would love to play frisbee with my shirt off or heaven forbid get a tan! Reason number 2: beach activities.
I love roller coasters and I want to be able to wait in line and sit in the front row without the fear that the harness won't come down enough for me to safely ride. I don't want to be a headline in a newspaper reading 'fat person dies after being thrown from roller coaster'. May seem a little morbid, but I won't apologize for what I don't want. I want to be able to spend a day in a water park. I want to go to a backyard BBQ and sit in a chair without it sinking all the way into the ground. I want to be invited to play a pickup game of soccer or football (not that I like either, but I am in no physical shape to do so). I want to go boating and water skiing without stressing out a motor. I want go to family reunions without people commenting on how big I am. I want to fit comfortably in the back seat of a car (width wise, anyways). I want to be able to confidently ask for a phone number. I want to be able to go clothes shopping at a regular clothing store. I want to scuba dive. I want to skydive. I want to run a marathon (I really do). I want to compete on The Amazing Race. I want to compete on Wipeout. I want to be a platform diver. I want to be a hip hop dancer.
I can claim that it's because I want to be healthy and it is, but it's because I want to enjoy everything I possibly can and I don't think I can do that with my physical state being where it is. That is why I'm doing this. And that's why I woke up at 5:45am to go to the gym TWICE last week. That's why I continue to go. That's why I subject myself to awful (and yet awesome) half hour training sessions. That's why I've started jogging (and oh my gosh do I hate it). That's why I try to make good choices about what I eat, even though I often cave and eat bad things in massive quantities.
In my training sessions tonight, Justin told me I need to stop being afraid of success. I may have already written about him saying this (he does repeat it quite frequently) but he is right, to an extent. I can want all of the things that I listed, but there is an element of fear when it comes to success. I don't want to succeed only to fail at maintaining my weight. I don't want to succeed and have my ideas about what skinny is like to not be true. It's far easier to avoid disappointment if I never get to the my goal where those expectations have a chance of not being met. Maybe that's why I never actually finished a single book I started writing. It was far easier to think I had a great book buried somewhere in my brain but choose not to write it down than to write one and find out that in actuality it was quite awful.
Today is the day I stop being afraid of success. Who knows what I'll achieve as a result, but it will be spectacular, if to no one else but myself. Maybe I'll even become a motivational speaker or a personal trainer.
Two weeks ago I visited my parents in Minnesota. It was an awesome time and I was really happy to be back, but on my inevitably uncomfortable three-hour plane rides, I had a lot of time to think. Thinking is a dangerous thing because it leads to ideas and for me, often leads to being self-critical. Let me just say that if you've never been fat, you have no idea how awful it is for a fat person to be on an airplane. No one wants to sit next to you. You enter the plane and as you walk past aisles of people who are already seated (I have never had the privilege of being the first person on an airplane) you can almost hear people thinking "please don't be seated next to me". Not that I blame them. Airplanes are already small and claustrophobic so who would want to sit next to the biggest person on the plane? I hope no one else has to be the cause of the look on someone's face when they realize that I am sharing their aisle on a plane. So that's reason number 1. I want to fly without being embarrassed.
I started this thing in the fall and continued it through the winter. Now as spring is almost over and summer is fast approaching, all I can think about is how I don't ever go to the beach. That sucks. The beach sounds like it would be fun, in theory, but it's scary to take off your shirt knowing that people will stare, comment behind your back, maybe even make fun of you to your face. Because people can be mean. I would love to play frisbee with my shirt off or heaven forbid get a tan! Reason number 2: beach activities.
I love roller coasters and I want to be able to wait in line and sit in the front row without the fear that the harness won't come down enough for me to safely ride. I don't want to be a headline in a newspaper reading 'fat person dies after being thrown from roller coaster'. May seem a little morbid, but I won't apologize for what I don't want. I want to be able to spend a day in a water park. I want to go to a backyard BBQ and sit in a chair without it sinking all the way into the ground. I want to be invited to play a pickup game of soccer or football (not that I like either, but I am in no physical shape to do so). I want to go boating and water skiing without stressing out a motor. I want go to family reunions without people commenting on how big I am. I want to fit comfortably in the back seat of a car (width wise, anyways). I want to be able to confidently ask for a phone number. I want to be able to go clothes shopping at a regular clothing store. I want to scuba dive. I want to skydive. I want to run a marathon (I really do). I want to compete on The Amazing Race. I want to compete on Wipeout. I want to be a platform diver. I want to be a hip hop dancer.
I can claim that it's because I want to be healthy and it is, but it's because I want to enjoy everything I possibly can and I don't think I can do that with my physical state being where it is. That is why I'm doing this. And that's why I woke up at 5:45am to go to the gym TWICE last week. That's why I continue to go. That's why I subject myself to awful (and yet awesome) half hour training sessions. That's why I've started jogging (and oh my gosh do I hate it). That's why I try to make good choices about what I eat, even though I often cave and eat bad things in massive quantities.
In my training sessions tonight, Justin told me I need to stop being afraid of success. I may have already written about him saying this (he does repeat it quite frequently) but he is right, to an extent. I can want all of the things that I listed, but there is an element of fear when it comes to success. I don't want to succeed only to fail at maintaining my weight. I don't want to succeed and have my ideas about what skinny is like to not be true. It's far easier to avoid disappointment if I never get to the my goal where those expectations have a chance of not being met. Maybe that's why I never actually finished a single book I started writing. It was far easier to think I had a great book buried somewhere in my brain but choose not to write it down than to write one and find out that in actuality it was quite awful.
Today is the day I stop being afraid of success. Who knows what I'll achieve as a result, but it will be spectacular, if to no one else but myself. Maybe I'll even become a motivational speaker or a personal trainer.
Friday, March 29, 2013
Success...
There comes a time when you have to buck up and face your problems head on and that day is today. After my horrendous performance on Saturday, the last thing I want to do is walk in to the gym and have to suffer through the lecture that I'm expecting and completely deserve. Thank goodness Fit Andrew decides to go at the same time that I do and that I have someone to distract me on the drive over. Believe it or not, the five minute drive is plenty of time to psych myself out with thoughts of the horror of what tonight could bring.
The nice thing about under performing last time (if there could possibly be a silver lining to it) is that I am incredibly motivated to kick-butt. This means I go faster on the cross trainer. I lip-synch in an outrageously animated way to the new Fall Out Boy single. I become unnecessarily outraged over the design decisions being made on HGTV. This is SPARTA!
When I'm finished, Justin and I head in to the weight room and conveniently enter a state of denial, each refusing to reference the awful Saturday. I start by alternating single leg presses and push-ups; 60 presses on each leg, 20 push ups, 50 presses on each leg, 20 pushups, all the way down to 10 leg presses per leg. I only have to do five sets of push ups because I don't know the reason why. Maybe it's generosity, maybe the workout was always designed that way. Maybe my arms would fall off if I did any more.
I do take the down time while Justin is counting my leg presses as an opportunity to apologize to him for Saturday. He's receptive but claims it's unnecessary. I just want to make sure he knows that I value what he's doing for me and even though I know he's getting paid, he wants to see me succeed. I'm really quite eloquent and Justin get's slightly teary-eyed. Just kidding, I babble like an idiot and no crying happens. Except by my legs because 420 leg presses is a lot of leg presses.
Then we move on to the core exercises, which will need to be somewhat self motivated because my half hour is almost up. Justin shows me the two exercises and watches me do a set of each, all the while telling me to stop stalling and just keep going. Then he's gone and the challenge becomes forcing myself to keep up with the same pacing when the only person I have to answer to is my own inner coach. And my own inner coach seems to think it would be better to stop and rest for a while. But that coach is ignored by my own personal desire to succeed and I consider the remaining sets that I do to be an incredible victory. Am I back to where I was or where I should be? No. But I worked and pushed myself. Only good can come out of this.
It's taken me six, almost seven months to fully grasp the idea that I can push myself and survive. It's supposed to be a struggle. Similar to playing against an opponent who is better than you to really improve your game. People, it's possible to make a change in your life and most of us need to somewhere. For me, it's exercise. For you, it may be eating healthy or not stealing the punchline of someone else's joke.
The nice thing about under performing last time (if there could possibly be a silver lining to it) is that I am incredibly motivated to kick-butt. This means I go faster on the cross trainer. I lip-synch in an outrageously animated way to the new Fall Out Boy single. I become unnecessarily outraged over the design decisions being made on HGTV. This is SPARTA!
When I'm finished, Justin and I head in to the weight room and conveniently enter a state of denial, each refusing to reference the awful Saturday. I start by alternating single leg presses and push-ups; 60 presses on each leg, 20 push ups, 50 presses on each leg, 20 pushups, all the way down to 10 leg presses per leg. I only have to do five sets of push ups because I don't know the reason why. Maybe it's generosity, maybe the workout was always designed that way. Maybe my arms would fall off if I did any more.
I do take the down time while Justin is counting my leg presses as an opportunity to apologize to him for Saturday. He's receptive but claims it's unnecessary. I just want to make sure he knows that I value what he's doing for me and even though I know he's getting paid, he wants to see me succeed. I'm really quite eloquent and Justin get's slightly teary-eyed. Just kidding, I babble like an idiot and no crying happens. Except by my legs because 420 leg presses is a lot of leg presses.
Then we move on to the core exercises, which will need to be somewhat self motivated because my half hour is almost up. Justin shows me the two exercises and watches me do a set of each, all the while telling me to stop stalling and just keep going. Then he's gone and the challenge becomes forcing myself to keep up with the same pacing when the only person I have to answer to is my own inner coach. And my own inner coach seems to think it would be better to stop and rest for a while. But that coach is ignored by my own personal desire to succeed and I consider the remaining sets that I do to be an incredible victory. Am I back to where I was or where I should be? No. But I worked and pushed myself. Only good can come out of this.
It's taken me six, almost seven months to fully grasp the idea that I can push myself and survive. It's supposed to be a struggle. Similar to playing against an opponent who is better than you to really improve your game. People, it's possible to make a change in your life and most of us need to somewhere. For me, it's exercise. For you, it may be eating healthy or not stealing the punchline of someone else's joke.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)