Teaser… there’s a link to a FREE habit tracker at the end of this post, so you better read it! 🙂
Over the years, I’ve had a pretty strong obsession with not being thin enough. Well, honestly, I’ve had a pretty strong obsession with not being enough. Period.
Sound familiar?
For years, I had a very charged relationship with the scale. And food. And calories. And exercise. The scale – a number – was a way to determine if I was succeeding or failing. Food was a way to numb – by either eating too much of it, or not eating enough. Calories – was another way to obsess. Exercise, was essentially a punishment for eating too much.
Over the years, I’ve healed my relationship with food, exercise, calories the scale, but I still struggle with feeling good in my body sometimes. As I age, I’ve put on some extra pounds that I hate. I want them gone. And I’ve been on this quest to get back to my 2015 body like it’s nobody’s business.
But I always seem to fall off the wagon. That number on the scale – which I tell myself I don’t really care about.. that it’s just a gauge to see where I’m at – just doesn’t seem to budge. And if it does, it seems the number just creeps back up at some point.
Today, it occurred to me why.
I have been telling myself I’m not good enough as-is. I’ve been relying on my willpower as a form of punishment to get back to a size that I might never get back to. I’m 46. It happens. Right?
My day job is in the beer industry – I’m a sales rep for a local brewery. I drink a fair amount of beer. And I drink a lot of wine. Lately, I’ve been really feeling the desire to not drink alcohol as much as I do. I’d like it to be more the exception than the rule.
My desire to cut back on the juice led me to start a “wine journal”. A little notebook that I keep by my corkscrew that I can record the date, time and any feelings, thoughts, emotions that I’m having when I’m ready to open said wine. I’m also recording the same when I come back for another glass. I have gotten curious about this habit of consuming too much wine. I’m noting how I’m feeling during and afterwards. I’m now connecting this habit to how I feel and how that compares to how I want to feel.
This little experiment I’m doing with wine led me to start thinking more about habits. I’m also finishing up my life coaching certification with an emphasis in health and wellness coaching. For one of our assignments, we were asked to set our own wellness goal 3 months from now. I struggled so much with the goal, because really, I just want to feel better in my body. I don’t want to feel self-conscious because I’m 20 pounds heavier than I want to be. I just want to be healthy. I don’t really care about the number, ultimately. I really don’t.
After many conversations with my teacher, peers, my sister (who is a dietician) and myself, I realized that I can set a “feel good” goal. And the way I can get to that “feel-good” goal is to think about how I want to feel when I have reached the goal as well as to think about things I need to do to get myself there.
I’m in phase 1. I don’t know what phase 2 is yet, but phase 1 for me is to set some habit goals and track them daily. To start to notice what comes up for me when I don’t do them. My desired habits are things like: 64+ oz water, 3-5 veggies daily, protein at every meal, 10k steps, daily workout, 7+ hours of sleep. I also have a few like: 15 minutes of decluttering, walk the dogs, no texting and driving.
It’s funny, now that I can see my progress, I am much more invested in trying to do better every day. Not in a perfectionist way… in an I can do this way.
I’m reading Atomic Habits by James Clear, and it is a fantastic book if you haven’t read it already. There are so many nuggets in the book, but one that really stuck out to me is “don’t ever miss two times”. For example, if you miss one day of working out, don’t let yourself miss a 2nd day. I am working toward never missing a habit twice in a row.
The other part of this work is being gentle on yourself when you don’t stick to the plan. You just get right back on the horse. It’s not a failure, you aren’t terrible with willpower. You just made a little detour and you can come back to your plan. No big deal, no judgment.
Working on your habits is really changing your life. And when you just work on changing your life, it is no longer about willpower. It’s no longer about not being good enough. It’s not about being uncomfortable in your own skin. It’s about loving yourself enough to take care of the body you have, the life you have. And that’s a beautiful thought, isn’t it?
