Weight Loss Prereq: Get Real With Yourself!
Weight Loss Prereq: Get Real With Yourself!
Weight Loss Prerequisite - Get real with yourself about where you are and take responsibility for how you got there. This creates the space to see and take the actions needed to heal and grow.
In my previous posts, I talked about how shifting your Mindset and doing the Emotional Work to heal the wounds that keep you stuck are the critical first steps to a successful weight loss journey.
There is actually one small but MONUMENTALLY critical prerequisite for starting this work.
You must get real with yourself about where you are at!
AND
You must take responsibility for YOUR actions and behaviors that got you there!
I did nearly three years of personal growth and healing work before I was finally willing to get real with myself and take responsibility for where I was at with my health and fitness.
During those three years, I made magnificent strides at healing the wounds I carried from the pain I endured at the hands of my Mom’s alcoholism. However, each time I came up against the truth about what was holding me back with my health and fitness - my addictive tendencies - I pushed it away.
I pushed it away because I didn’t want to FEEL the pain this truth revealed about me.
That there was a part of me that was like my mom’s addiction.
I avoided this pain by numbing it out with Netflix and pizza.
OR
I tried to make it go away by looking for a fix for what I perceived was wrong - I had a quest for the magic weight loss bullet.
Each time, whether I was numbing or fixing, I was looking for something outside of me to fix what I perceived was wrong - so that I didn’t have to experience the pain of the truth.
Only when I admitted the truth to myself - to the world - that I, like my mom, have my addictions was I able to finally shift my Mindset and begin the REAL Emotional Work of discovering that I didn’t need something outside myself to heal.
It was within me the whole time.
Looking back at my weight loss and healing journey, I can see four distinct realizations that lead to four specific actions that set me free:
Realization #1: Avoidance is a Coping Mechanism
Action: Get Honest & Get Started
Realization #2: Rejection of What is Creates Resistance
Action: Accept Where You Are At
Realization #3: Personal Responsibility Creates Personal Empowerment
Action: Take Ownership
Realization #4: Pain is the Gateway to Freedom
Action: Experience What You Are Afraid Of Feeling
Realization #1: Avoidance is a Coping Mechanism
Avoidance is a mental drug.
It allows you to bypass unwanted feelings by placing your awareness somewhere else.
The problem is that avoidance delays experiencing unwanted feelings. The result is that those feelings are ultimately amplified and get recycled over and over. A toxic cycle perpetuates.
Action to Take: Get Honest & Get Started
There are two critical actions to take when it comes to avoidance.
Get Honest - put into words what you are avoiding. Write it down in a journal and tell a trusted friend or accountability partner.
Get Started - once you have got honest about what it is you are avoiding, commit to getting into action. Be specific: I will take action X by time Y.
In my weight loss journey, I was avoiding being consistent with my nutrition and getting physically active. In April of 2022, I discovered I would have hip surgery in June. When faced with the surgery, I was forced to admit I was avoiding getting to the gym. I had to get into action and start working out to be ready for my surgery.
Where I stumbled was I was hesitant to fully commit to taking on a nutrition plan. It wasn’t until the end of July, after I regained the weight I lost in the months leading up to my surgery, that I was willing to finally be honest that I was avoiding taking on my nutrition.
Only after being completely honest about where I was did I create the space to start making real progress. This ultimately led to all the actions I have taken to be healthy - it led to real weight loss.
Realization #2: Rejection of What is Creates Resistance
There is a paradox in self-development and healing work.
You must accept yourself fully to change.
At first, this idea seemed confusing to me. Until one day early in my weight loss journey, while looking at my then 300-pound self in the mirror, I had a thought.
”…I could lose 100 or even 150 pounds, and if I don’t heal the parts of me that are triggered by the stress and emotions that drive me to eat - those triggers and behaviors will be waiting for me on the other side. And I will most likely gain the weight back...”
It was like a mic drop. This was the moment I chose to accept myself fully.
And that was the moment real healing began - weight loss began.
Seeing this truth allowed me to choose to accept everything about myself, my strengths and flaws alike. Even weighing over 300 pounds...
My world began to change when I started to accept rather than reject my reality.
I finally understood that rejecting what is creates internal resistance to change. It does this because rejection pushes the very thing you need to heal away from your presence - preventing you from healing it.
You have to feel it to heal it. When you reject what is, you are creating resistance to feeling what needs to be felt to heal. As a result, you can not heal.
When I finally accepted the truth about my addictive tendencies with food and dieting, I created the space to heal the wounds that got me over 300 pounds.
The pounds began to melt away as I tapped into the pain I was unknowingly clinging to.
A space was created for me to give myself the love I so desperately was craving from the world. When I started cultivating this love for myself, I no longer looked to the world and food to fill that void.
Action to Take: Accept What Where You Are At
You might ask yourself, “how do I accept what is? How do I accept where I am?”.
The answer is that you must become aware of the truth and see what you’re attached to that is creating resistance to that truth.
I have developed a personal journaling exercise to help me to get to acceptance of what is. This is a mantra of questions I came up with while reading "Awareness" by Anthony De Mello.
These questions help me see my ego and what I'm attached to. Working through them helps me let go and choose happiness in the current moment. I keep this posted on my vision board above my desk:
How fast can I recognize I'm triggered and start asking myself the following questions?
What is the underlying desire that's causing my suffering at the current moment? And can I follow that desire back to a more significant wound that needs to be healed?
Am I feeling what needs to be felt?
What do I need to let go of right now to be happy in the midst of being triggered?
What is the lesson this moment is trying to teach me?
When I work through these questions, I become clear on what is blocking me at the current moment.
*note: sometimes, when the trigger or block is really big, it is helpful to get on the phone with a friend and talk through it so they can mirror what I am avoiding and feeling.
Realization #3: Personal Responsibility Creates Personal Empowerment
One of my core protective behaviors that I learned in childhood is to defend myself at all costs - especially when I think my mistake results from something I perceived to be caused by an external source.
One of the things I love about my wife is that she expects me - and my kids - to own my actions, no matter the reason.
Before I started my personal growth work, this was the source of many of our conflicts, as I would defend myself to the death.
As I’ve done work on myself, I’ve come to see my wife’s core value of accountability as one of the greatest gifts in my life. It has led me to show up as the best man I can be.
And as I’ve shown up with integrity in my marriage, I’ve shown up with integrity for myself.
What I’ve learned is that personal responsibility creates personal empowerment.
No one can make me eat pizza.
No one can make me go to the gym.
And no one is coming to save me.
It’s all on me.
That may seem harsh to hear at first. However, this realization is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself.
Because when you take personal responsibility for everything you do, you have the power to bring about the change you desire.
You will no longer look to the world, someone else, or the future to change you.
You will become the change you seek.
Action to Take: Take Ownership of Your Past
The first action you need to take to take personal responsibility for where you are is to take inventory of what got you here in the first place.
Take some time to journal about what isn’t working
For example: “I am 150 pounds overweight. My obesity could lead to my early death. I got here because I haven’t been physically active, and I have been overeating. I haven’t dealt with the impact my mom’s alcoholism had on me. Instead of using healthy tools to manage my emotions, I turn to food”.
Once you have taken an honest inventory of where you are and what got you there.
Then take some time to see what actions make sense next.
For example: “I commit to walking for 30 minutes daily during my lunch hour. I will not eat after 8 pm and will cut out added sugar. When I feel stressed or emotional, I will pause and do five minutes of intentional breathing and journal my feelings. I will join a Men’s group and deal with the unhealed pain from my mom’s death”.
Realization #4: Pain is the Gateway to Freedom
Avoidance of pain is the cause of suffering.
Pain is just a messenger. It contains the information we need to point us in the direction that will lead to our growth and healing.
When we reject and resist feeling our pain, we push this message away and do not learn what we need to know to heal. As a result, we continue to experience this pain over and over. Every time I came up against the truth that I have additive tendencies with food and dieting, I was faced with the pain that I might be like my mom - an addict.
When I rejected the negative parts of me that I perceived to be like the negative parts of my mom, I also dismissed the positive parts of me that were like the positive parts of my mom.
I rejected the very attributes about myself that I needed to help me to heal my relationship with my addictive tendencies.
Thus I repeated the same pattern over and over.
Action to Take: Experience What You Are Afraid of Feeling
The key to getting through pain is to let yourself experience it. This may seem scary and counterintuitive, but on the other side of pain is freedom.
On the other side of my pain, I have found so much more than losing over 100 pounds ~ I have discovered who I am.
Closing Thoughts
I’ll close today by sharing one of my moments of clarity that I shared with my Brothers in the Mantalks Alliance. It was one of the moments where I paused to admit the truth and take responsibility for where I was at - It would still be two and half months after this moment before I would fully tap into the power of surrendering to the truth. But this was one of the many steps toward that moment.
What have I been avoiding?
May 12, 2022
What have I been avoiding? My physical fitness…
I left the National Guard five years ago, and when I did, I let myself go. Honestly, part of the reason I got out of the military is I had already let myself go - I didn’t want to face the humiliation of failing my body fat test.
Three years [2019] ago, I started my healing journey, and two years [2020] ago, I joined the Alliance.
During that time, I’ve worked on everything but my physical fitness…
I was avoiding it. Somewhere inside, thinking that by fixing what was wrong in my mind and soul, I would magically just become fit.
During each cycle of working on myself, I kept returning to my fitness and my shadow hiding in that place. Each time I rejected looking there and rejected feeling the deep wounds and emotions within its depths.
Until now…
This is my work now. I’m facing what I’ve been avoiding. This is where I must heal…
Four weeks strong going to the gym. I have been feeling the wounds and feelings that come up as I venture into this place. As I do, I’m feeling my strength come back and feeling a fire being lit that I’ve suppressed.