When it comes to knowledge of nutrition, expertise and mental wellbeing, I'm no newbie - I started watching my weight even before I went to senior school, and have had a love-hate relationship with the scales since then :) The problem is, applying that knowledge consistently, overcoming the fear of failure that often holds me back or brings me down when things go slightly off track. But most of all, it's an unwillingness to let go of my current lifestyle that is keeping me stuck. It's something I find hard to admit even to myself, and I know I have to face out to it and work with it.
If im honest, I hated sport at school and even now I don't love excercise, in fact Idon't really like it! (Though I do enjoy the buzz afterwards). I like sedentary activities and most of my hobbies involve food of some sort. When I'm happy, sad, celebrating or commiserating, getting together with family and friends, enjoying great food, several glasses of wine and sitting together chatting is what I enjoy most. I realise now that there I have a (well-hidden but deep) resistencia to letting go of all the lifestyle I love, a hope that somehow I can find a way to have it all!
Its to easy for me to come up with excuses as to why I can't walk rather than drive to work, have to miss that exercise class, or couldn't stop myself from comfort eating when arriving home from a stressful day. All really plausible reasons, underneath them all I'm situck in single-loop learning... Try harder, try different. The thing is, it doesn't get to the root of the problem.. My Jessie day was lifechangng, or at least I thought it was. The problem is, I was treating it like another single-loop - try something different, this time it will be the thing that works. Jessie's principles are is well-founded, and definitely much better than many of the diets, programs and gadgets, chsrity challenges and other things that I've turned to in the past to try to find the one thing that's going to work for me. But it's still more of the same, unless I change myself. And that's only going to happen if I stop for a minute and really accept me as I am, right now.
There's nothing wrong with me - yes, I'm overweight, but I'm in pretty good health, I'm a good person and at the end of the day only have one life to live. It's time to love who I am right now and really challenge myself as to how much I want to change. I think I do, but if I mean it, I've got to be prepared to let go of some the things I love but which are keeping me stuck.
Hobbies today: reading, cooking and baking, cake decorating, watching TV, spending time with friends... (There are a few healthy ones: Zumba and functional training, but only 3-4 hours a week and only because I know I have to exercise and these are the least bad :-) DIY (when I have the energy) and skiing (but that's only one week of the year!)
My first challenge is to really start noticing and owning the things that are keeping me stuck, so that I can make conscious choices, and gradually to try to shift these patterns just a little bit.
No no time like the present... I have to start living it, not reading or writing about it :) Real change is coming - watch this space!