Slow Going

I said I would be honest about my journey of transformation. I knew this would not be easy.

The last 2 days were really hard!

I can't believe how hard the last two days have been. I caught myself on numerous occasions thinking about all the things I am not doing right. Really I spend so much time thinking about what I am just not doing. I did practice redirecting my negative thoughts with something constructive. I found that it did take away some of the anxiety. This is not easy. My sister always reminds me that the brain takes the path of least resistance. For me it is to always beat myself up, or to find something to feel guilty about. In fact I believe this challenge may just be my biggest hurdle. If I had a nickel for every time I started a sentence with, "I feel so bad" I would be a millionaire. This is very sad. That is why I have started this journey, that is why I committed to making a change. I want to be free of these rules I have set for myself.

Learning a new trick!

I am preparing to leave on a trip home at the end of October. I have not visited my family and friends in over six years. I am so excited and yet feel a tremendous amount of anxiety over the journey. I realized that I have spent the last two weeks thinking of how much weight I can lose before I go. I guess old habits die hard. I still fall so quickly into the same routine of needing to feel perfect when I see people from my past. I believe at some point in my life I made the connection that if I look perfect than others will be believe that I am doing great. There is nobody that I am visiting on this trip who cares at all what I look like, and yet I still feel a desire to fix myself. I spent some alone time yesterday looking inward and thinking about this behavior and what it represents. It is the cycle of feeling like a failure, or feeling not good enough. This is exactly what this journey is all about. I am determined to break this wall down. I already feel so uncomfortable. So I decided I am going to go home looking the way I look and to accept that. I will spent the next three weeks acknowledging to myself everyday that I am beautiful. In essence I will fake it till I make it. I am going to look in the mirror and find one thing that I find beautiful in myself everyday. I will not turn away when I am undressed in front of the mirror. I am going to allow myself to feel uncomfortable so I can make it through this. This has already become harder than I thought.