Navel Gazing

I've been thinking about how I'm going to start blogging away that last 30 pounds. I have this fantasy where I start, and it all just melts away. I have had far too many fantasies about losing weight. The truth is that weight loss is connected to everything else in my life. I can will away that weight, but it won't stay away unless I work at the parts of my life that contribute to it.

I've been at war with my weight for what feels like forever. Actual time: about 25 years. Since I was 6 or so. 25 years. God, what a waste of time. It's exhausting, isn't it? Just think about the amount of time that you spend worrying about losing weight, or how good you'd look if you just lost a little weight, or how you'd get that job you wanted, or that guy you wanted. But in the end, thinking about it constantly does absolutely nothing. DOING something does something. So why is it so hard to do something? Anything, in fact. Just taking one small step towards making it happen.

I read somewhere that happiness is setting goals and achieving them. I don't really know if that's the whole truth, but it's a pretty accurate statement for where I am. Right now I'm at the setting goals stage. Committing to it. Once I make up my mind that I want something, I can usually get it. It's just deciding once and for all that this is what I want. Not that achieving it is a piece of cake, but I think we all know how to get what we want. It's just saying that THIS is the time, THIS is the moment that I'm going to make it happen. So I'm saying it - I'm going to lose the extra 30 pounds I carry around and I'm going to keep it off. I actually feel nervous writing that. It's a big statement because I know what it means. And I just realized that I'm sort of contradicting myself - I said that thinking about something doesn't make it happen. It doesn't, but it is a step in the process of getting there. Well, I've thought about it long enough, and I'm going to take steps to do it.