A Willing Heart . . .

First off, THANK YOU for all the kind and encouraging responses to my first blog post last week. I was touched by how many of you sent a private message, texted, stopped me in person and even called to tell me what you thought about the post and how it spoke to you. I am overwhelmingly surprised by your response. And humbled. Second, I have to confess. This has been way more difficult than I thought it would be; trying to figure out exactly what I wanted to write about this week and then putting those thoughts on paper, so to speak.

I mentioned “things” last week. Lots and lots of “things” that I had lost. My intention is to write about those topics, one by one. I think, though, to do them any kind of justice, I need to be honest and say that while some of the things I lost were directly related to my weight gain, some were related to life events and struggles and traumas that I allowed to cause the weight gain in the first place. Understand, I am not delving into those things here. But also please understand I realize everyone has crap in their lives that they have to walk through. And while those events DO NOT define us, they do shape and mold and refine us. So, if I mention some feeling, or thought, or emotion, that may relate to something that has happened in your life or brings you to a place of remembrance of some “crap” you’ve had to walk through, I fully believe it is God using my story to directly help you know you’re not alone in it all. None of us are. Ever.

One of the first things I saw return to my life in the last year is “willingness” . . . For years, I have “wanted” to be in a smaller body, to have a healthier lifestyle, to be less at risk for diabetes, heart disease and stroke or heart attack. What I wasn’t was “willing”. I recently heard someone say that you can want with all your might, but if you’re not willing you’ll never get what you want or arrive where you want to be. I have books and articles and recipes and programs and videos that are geared toward people looking to “up their game” to a healthier lifestyle and lose weight and achieve their biggest and most noteworthy goals. I am telling you right now, some of those have NEVER even been unwrapped. I have workout videos that seemed simple and fun and they are still in the plastic wrap I bought them in. If intention and “want to” were what it took to succeed, I would weigh 130 pounds right now. It’s almost like I thought that somehow by just buying and owning those items I would suddenly be motivated or that the weight would just miraculously start to drop. But there truly has to be an “aha” moment that leads to an action. I wish I could say it came with lights and banners and a “peaceful, easy feeling” but it sure didn’t. What it did come with was a realization I think I knew a long time ago but it came to me now with a terrifying sense of reality . . . I was going to die an untimely death if I didn’t change. I was willing for the first time in my life to do whatever it was going to take to be here with my family for a very long time.

This new willingness I found encompassed more than just a willingness to do something about my weight. It came with being willing to admit that I really needed to make some major changes. I had to be willing to be completely honest with myself. That was really hard because for years I told myself that being a “big girl” really hadn’t bothered me. But, in truth, it had. (And, more so, it bothered me that it bothered other people . . . we will get to that some other time.) I had to be willing to admit that owning all the tools in the world that could help me move from fat to fit weren’t doing me a BIT of good because I hadn’t used any of them. I also had to be willing to step into a new way of life and even slightly uncomfortable new habits. Uncomfortable, only because I was developing more self-discipline and that is never fun. I also had to be willing to be patient with myself. And this one has been hard. I am not a patient person when it comes to things like this. I don’t know exactly what I thought when I first started losing weight. Maybe I thought it would come off so fast I’d be a new person in time for Christmas, 11 months after I began. Maybe I thought it would melt off as easily as I put it on. I know that while I still have a long way to go, I have come SO FAR. And that is what I need to focus on. Perhaps I need to be willing to just be proud of how hard I’ve worked to get to where I am.

Lastly, but I think most importantly, I had to be willing to see myself as my husband, sons, family, friends and GOD see me. Worthy. I have worth and I am enough simply because I am alive. And seeing myself in that light made me want to be the best version of myself I can possibly be. Worth . . . It’s directly related to something else I lost as I gained . . . my dignity. And THAT, my friends, has been one of the most remarkable things to come back into my life in the last year. But that “thing” can wait until next week . . .

#loveyourjourney #youreworthit #bettermewithNewYouCBD #Endo30 #itsuptoyou