Penelope, I look at your results and I rejoice at your success! Having, well...boomeranged so many times, I am familiar with the difficulty we all have in maintaining. Being here is SUCH a good intervention in addition to the many things I am certain you are doing, to maintain your hard-earned victory.
Your post and that of Paris, gives me the impetus to quote "Lyn". Maybe some of you know who she is, on 3fc. Unfortunately I do not know her user name and if somebody does know it, I'd be grateful if you could tell me, so I can follow her posts.
When I returned to 3fc for the third time over these last 8 years I was reading posts non-stop as a way to motivate myself and to keep from binging. I found a post by a woman who kept a blog of her incredible weight loss journey. I am using her blog as a treat. I read about a month's worth of entries each day. Since she generously shared her touching story and invited us, 3fc members to read it, I am hoping she will not mind if I post the link to her blog:
http://escapefromobesity.blogspot.com/
The reason I mention this today, specifically, is because I was reading her thoughtful perspective on a topic that some of us, if not all, struggle with on occasion. If my posting her blog is inappropriate or against the rules, please let me know and I will remove it immediately. If I knew who she was I'd ask for permission.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
One Perfect Day
Have you ever wished you could be perfect in something? Maybe you have said to yourself, "if only I could eat EXACTLY the right things, and exercise, and drink enough water, and not eat junk, and follow my plan perfectly, then I would lose weight and I would be soooo happy." I often hear folks lamenting that they are always "screwing up" their "diets" and can't lose weight. It's like we are either "off" or "on." Black or white. No in-betweens. No grey areas.
It is so hard to keep on going when you feel like a failure. You get up and eat your healthy breakfast, with high aspirations and all the right intentions. But then that pizza calls to you. You eat a slice. And how do you feel? DEFEATED. Your brain yells, "I am a failure! I can't even stay on this diet for ONE DAY! What is wrong with me? I will never lose weight." Then you go and eat a ton of junk. Right?
You do not have to be perfect. Everyone makes mistakes. You can lose weight and have a good day even if you ate a piece of pizza, if you stop it right there. It's the not stopping... the rampage that follows... that keeps us fat.
None of us can do everything right, but every one of us can stop ourselves from rolling head over heels down the fat hill into the obesity abyss. It's hard, sometimes, not to just fall in and give up, sitting there in the muddy darkness, quietly inhaling Little Debbies cakes and Pringles. It's a lonely pit. You don't want to be there. So let's start by putting on the brakes right now, no matter where you are emotionally or how far you have already come with your weight loss... or how much you have regained. We have a long journey ahead, and it starts with a single step. You may have a hundred pounds to lose but it starts with a one-pound loss. That is how success begins: with one step, one pound, one day.
I challenge each of you to have one perfect day. A day in which you meet all of your weight-loss goals and do nothing that derails you from the plan. Maybe for you that means not going over 30 Weight Watcher points and doing a 15 minute aerobics tape. For someone else it might mean not eating any sugar, drinking 8 cups of water, and walking for 10 minutes. For me, it means eating less than 1500 calories, drinking 10 cups of water, riding my bike for 30 minutes, and lifting weights for 15 minutes. It's not that hard to have ONE perfect day. I know you can do it. Will you?
"But what good is ONE day?" you whine. "I won't lose any weight in ONE day! I am so fat it will take YEARS to get to a normal weight. Why should I even bother with ONE dumb perfect day when I know I will just mess up later?" Well let me tell you.
One perfect day, you can do. And if you can do it once, you can do it again. Don't think about the other days. It is ONE day. You only have to do it for ONE day. Then at the end of your perfect day, hug yourself, go to bed, and get back up in the morning committed to doing ONE perfect day. Again.
One day leads to another. Like the momentum of footsteps taking you to a goal, the days carry you forward. They are going to carry you, regardless. In a month you will be a month older. Will you be a month heavier? More miserable? Or will you be a month lighter and happier? Because believe me, the good days string together and create something more masterful and wonderful than weeks and months. They create joy. They become peace and clarity. They lead to a new you.
Let's do it. One perfect day. Let your path begin today.
Posted by Lyn at 8:44 PM 20 comments