Mixed Bag

Well, as with life, my workouts have been hit or miss. As with life, you get used to it.

I know that I can't push myself 100% every workout, so my goal is to do 2 workouts a week that are past my comfort level. This is the new plan. If I think I can do 10 miles on the bike, I'm now pushing myself to do 15 miles. I did the same thing with the treadmill. If 2 miles is comfortable then I need to do 3. I'm not doing it everyday, but I am trying to raise the bar a bit.

I had a productive weekend. I pushed myself that little extra, and Monday I did a regular workout with out any extras. Then yesterday: nada. I walked, but didn't even bother going a full half mile.

Oh well, one of the things I've learned over the years of doing this is that you can't fix the past, only the future. Beating myself up for something that I did (or in this case didn't do) doesn't help me get motivated. Shake it off and work towards today's goal, not obsess over the yesterdays.

This is easier said and done. I still carry a lot of guilt over the weight gain. First, because it was a re-gain. I knew how hard this was going to be, as I had already gone thru one major weight loss process. So even now I beat myself up for allowing myself to get to be 90 lbs overweight. I still have days of resentment towards myself for having to lose weigh that had already been lost. This isn't healthy and I try to stay positive about how far I've come and motivate myself to keep going.

Saying that, I've learned a lot about myself and what I need to do to keep a healthy lifestyle. I can't stay sedatary and I can't eat what ever I want. I didn't learn that the first time. I think that I'm losing the weight so slowly definitely has a lot of positives. Positives that I forget about when I get frustrated. The fact is that if I lost the weight as quickly as I did the first time, I would've gotten complacent again and chances of it coming back on were high. By doing this slowly over years of making the changes, the changes are sticking. Do I expect some minor flucuaions? yes, just as the weight loss hasn't been a straight arrow down, but rather a jagged line of loss with the occassional set back, I expect that once I hit a healthy weight I'm going to have to work hard to keep that weight within a 3-5 lb range.

So I've learned to brush off bad days better than I used to. So, I guess that means I need to get up and move. Key number one for me: just move!