So, I have talked recently about how I am changing my view of myself, trying not to think about weight, instead focusing on health and fitness, and how I am going to run a 5K. But it isn't a permanent shift to a better attitude. It probably never will be. Lately, I have been, for various reasons, feeling fat, feeling dumpy, feeling like I need to eat sugar and goodies (which really doesn't help the fat thing either). It is a constant struggle to remind myself to love my tree, to remember that my self worth does not depend on my jeans size, that a diet won't make me happy, that I am not in competition with anyone else - that what I can do is between me and my yoga mat (as my new yoga teacher is fond of saying in class), or between me and my treadmill. But it is a struggle worth having, because the alternative is to be unhappy forever, to hate myself, to hide away behind some false facade that is not me.
So, I begin again. As one of the meditation teachers I have been reading says, (and I am paraphrasing) Begin again, even if you have to do it over and over again. That is the practice. Breathe in, breathe out, begin again.
2 comments:
Exactly. And mathematically speaking, any effort, any increase, is infinitely greater than none at all. We are not linear creatures, but rather travel upward in a spiral -- Yeats' gyres, if I may allow my liberal-arts pretentious to show for a moment. Progress comes not despite the internal conflict, but because of it . . .
Way to begin again. I weigh less than I have at any time since I had mono in grad school, but I'm constantly irritated about my lack of energy, my inability to fit so much as a walk into my schedule, the deficiencies of my diet. I am totally impressed by your tennis, your training, your general commitment to health. Every week is a new week!
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