In life, work, fitness. Effort equals results. You can’t show up half assed for something and expect full assed results. Additionally, we have witnessed that other than having winning lottery numbers, nothing happens over night.
Being in the industry, I’ve tried it all. I’ve logged my food and I’ve counted macros. I’ve weighed my portions and eaten at certain times. I’ve cleansed. I’ve cut carbs. Been Keto gang and peed on test strips to ensure I was in ketosis. I’ve carb cycled. Only fruit until noon. Nearly a lifetime pescatarian, I’ve gone vegan, vegetarian & at one point introduced chicken and turkey to work on getting more and different protein to see how my body would react. I’ve done a raw diet. Cabbage soup. Part of these changes was to experience what I was learning while studying nutrition. Other times it was to chase my goals. If I thought I’d be fitter, faster, leaner or stronger I tried it.
Until I stopped. Stopped racing. Stopped being so consistent with training. Stopped counting every calorie. Well, we all know what happened.
Balance is challenging. True balance isn’t achievable as far as I’ve witnessed. Something has to give. Something is compromised at one point or another. Doesn’t mean that the balances don’t deviate or vacillate from one side to the other..I think that’s more realistic, truly. You can’t give 100% to more than one thing; it’s just not possible.
There was a meme I reposted on my GymGirlDana Instagram story: I don’t want to be 88 years old and look back on a life of counting almonds and being frightened of bananas. It really resonated with me. Because that’s where I’m now back to.
Tracking food and counting calories with My Fitness Pal. Daily weigh ins and on a mission to close my activity rings on my Apple Watch. (If you have one, you know!) And this is on top of diligently working on two challenging careers, running a household, meal prep, taking care of others and ensuring their needs are met and so on. That very well could be where this all starts to waver.
We put ourselves last.
Why?
If your cup isn’t full, you can’t fill others. Yet, we will deplete ourselves, empty our own cups and then act surprised that we’ve fallen short. Or, as we have seen, we excuse it away….yep, another excuse as to why we can’t achieve something. Sorry to tell you, but it’s baloney. (Fun fact, don’t recall ever eating baloney in my life. Never had a cheese puff, cheese doodle, cheese curl or any kind of orange dyed thing.)
After all we do in a course of the day, why then is so much of our self worth placed on our pants size? How did we get here? In knowing this as a society (I know it’s not just me), why do we not create new ways to change this perception? If I was a clothier, I’d create a new clothing line without sizes. Use tag lines. Just think how much more successful our days would start if we put on size Awesome pants or slipped into our Determined size dress! It certainly would be a game changer and maybe with some help in the self esteem department and a feeling of daily success, we would be motivated to try on size Incredible to see how that fit.
Is it just me?
Gym Girl Dana 