So tomorrow I'm turning 40. No big parties. No extravagant trip. Just dinner with my family and a friend. And a few outings with my girl friends here and there. Which is so lovely.
But nothing anyone is doing for me is as exhilarating as what I've done for myself. Three months ago I changed my life. I started exercising at least five days a week and changed the way I ate - vegetables, fruit, lean proteins mostly but a little of the other stuff too. I do six days of super healthy eating and one day of having some treats. It sounds pretty simple but every single day was hard. Every day I had to make a thousand good choices, a lot of which I struggled with and still do. Most girls nights out, I drank water instead of indulging, on date nights we chose fun non-food events (movies, theatre, comedy shows etc. which we loved), BBQs, dinner parties, every special occasion you can think of...I chose the right thing instead of saying "but it's a special occasion, how can I really have a good time if I don't eat/drink this or that?" The truth is that you can and if you look around you'll see that a lot of people are making the right choices at those events too. Every morning, even when I was dead tiered, sore, or just cranky, I said "no excuses" when I walked out the door to work out - gym, running, walking, crunches, planks, push ups etc.
After 13 weeks, I've transformed my body, health and mind in many ways and have lost 22 pounds. Three months ago if you told me that I had 13 weeks to lose 22 pounds I would have said that it was impossible and that I couldn't do it even if you promised me a million dollars (Ok, maybe not a million dollars).
I started with the hope of just getting back to my "regular" weight which was about 8 pounds less. But something changed when I started the journey. The more I got into it, the more I cared about my health and my body. I started researching healthy eating and the benefits of exercise and became interested in expanding my life and health.
Don't get me wrong, I have no illusions of an easy road from here. I know how easily I can slip back into bad habits and self-delusional justifications that we all use sometimes to make wrong choices for our life. I know those are just around the corner. But I'm taking this journey one day at a time and each day I'm going to make the choices it takes to be healthy and strong.
One day at a time. That's my motto. Just do the best you can today and worry about tomorrow when it comes.
I hope you are all having a fantastic day and are winning your own battles, whatever they might be. :)
