————————————————————————————–
 Starting weight:  285.2
 Weight Last Entry:  236.2    Weight Today:  240.0
Change today::  +3.8 lbs.         Loss-so-far:   -45.2 lbs.    
————————————————————————————–

Two forty?  Two FORTY?  What the hell is up with THAT?!?!?

I thought I’d said good bye to the 240’s FOREVER.  I thought I’d done that a month and a half ago.  A MONTH AND A HALF!!  I couldn’t help but think, Was all the work, all the careful eating for the past 45 days for NOTHING?!?!

So I had two choices here.  Two basic reactions to choose from.

     1.  Negative

     2.  Positive

To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

It all pretty much comes down to that, doesn’t it?  We all do it, every day.  We all react to stimuli.  Sometimes it feels like we have no choice in our reactions, that we are buffeted by winds created beyond our control and our reactions are simply instinctual - and also beyond our control.

But this is bullshit.

We have a choice.  We always have a choice.  We choose to react, either the way that we’ve always reacted, almost without thinking about it, or we can choose to react a certain way despite all of our conditioning, despite all of our knee-jerk impulses.  We always have a choice. 

I choose positive.  Positive response, positive emotions, positive action.

It didn’t take me all day to make this choice.  It was a choice that was demanding to be made right then, that moment, while I was still standing on the scale, my mouth open in disbelief.  In those few seconds, a whole buncha negative thoughts crowded in, jockeying for position, straining to be at the front.  Pick me!  Pick me!

Thoughts like:  Why do I even bother? 
Thoughts like:  If I’m gonna eat right and gain, then I might as well eat badly and gain.
Thoughts like:  I’m going to fail at this after all.

I pushed those thoughts away, and as I did, something else took their place.  Laughter.  Laughter!  Standing there on my scale in my underwear, looking down at that “240.0″ on the display, I started to laugh.  “No fucking way!” I said out loud to the bathroom at large.  No fucking way!

So I went on with my day and I stayed on plan and I did some thinking.  To gain almost four pounds in one day is nearly impossible, I know that.  But seeing the 240’s again, that was a helluva wake-up call.  Whether it’s water or muscle or atmospheric disturbance affecting the electronics in my scale, the fact of the matter is:  I saw 240.0 on the scale this morning.  I thought about it a lot.  And came to some conclusions.

Things aren’t moving along fast enough for me.  I like it when I weigh in and see a .2 or .4 loss every other day, I LIKE THAT A LOT!  And it hasn’t been happening lately.  I need to step up my game.  I need to take this weight-loss thing to the next level.  I need to add another layer of effort. 

I was lazy for so long.  Not walking.  Not exercising.  Not doing anything, really, just sitting on my ass in front of either the TV or the computer, snacking mindlessly while my ass grew and grew beneath me.  Doing 30 minutes of SOMETHING was, for me, a 100% improvement.  Didn’t matter whether it was 30 minutes of the exercise bike, 30 minutes of DDR, 30 minutes of Total Gym, 30 minutes on the elliptical - just getting up and MOVING was a layer of effort that I’d never expended on a regular basis before.  NEVER.  That 30 minutes, it’s now a regular part of my life. 

IT IS TIME TO ADD ANOTHER LAYER OF EFFORT!

So tonight I pushed on past 30 minutes on the elliptical - to 40 minutes - and THEN, I went for a 20-minute walk/jog outside.  Me!  I was so excited because the last few times I tried to run, it was so painfully hard on my knees that I thought they were gonna burst or something.  Tonight… I did it.  I didn’t exactly all-out-run-like-the-wind (like I would love to, omg I want to run like that!), but I did jog and it didn’t HURT.  I have no endurance so I got winded quickly but IT DIDN’T HURT!

I was so happy that I got all emotional, jogging and wiping tears away out there on the side of the road.  For the first time in I-have-no-idea-how-many-years, I RAN AND IT DIDN’T HURT!!!

Two forty?  Not for long!  No fucking way!  LOL!!  =D

8982