Determined To Succeed

Day eighty.

Hey there, my friends. For those of you old enough (or pop-culture savvy enough) to remember there are two references I’m going to drop on you today: the first is the movie “Around the World in 80 Days” and the second is the Fifth Dimension’s “Would You Like To Fly In My Beautiful Balloon.” I bring up both because both things reference travel via balloon.

Here I am at day eighty and I feel great. These past days have been a Godsend to me because, for the first time in my adult life, I am truly getting to the bottom of my addictive cycles so that I can, once and for all, get a handle on what made me self-medicate so I never EVER do it again. And how am I doing that? By getting into the figurative balloon in my head and taking a tour of my past so I can see where I never want to be again.

I told you guys yesterday how I had to get a handle on my chocolate and Coke Zero cravings, and that is true. But as I swim around my head on day eighty of my sobriety I now know at least I KNOW I have to do that and am not making excused for it. My old self used to do that. I know I need to workout, which I am doing later today with Sensei Doug. The old me would have given the gym a half-hearted attempt MAYBE and I wouldn’t have broken that much of a sweat. I know when I am being “triggered” to eat unnecessarily and do my best to stop that behavior. The old me would never have done that.

I have also rediscovered myself in all this. I used to spend so much time hiding things that I would almost binge on being me. My old path saw me do things that were unimaginable and horrible, among those was warping who I was to conform to what I thought others wanted of me. Ironically, I never did that in my weight loss. That I have always been truthful and honest about. I have my ups and downs and my struggles with food and my weight. But what is now so different is that, after taking my balloon trip in my head (and how fucked up does that sound – I sound like I’m crazy) I realized how much I didn’t like myself very much. Where food was concerned I just ate and ate to suppress and squash what I was feeling – toxic shame, anger, resentment, fear and low self-esteem. Food, at least for a while, kept all those down and let me run. Now, I like myself again and even bought me something that is huge for me – a Star Wars lunchbox.

Is it silly? Yes.

Is it necessary in my life? No.

Do I like it? Does it make me happy? Yes!

Should I give a shit what other people think about it? Hell no!

I have spent so much of my adult life doing things that, on the outside, seemed cool but I only did it for others. Now that I am working on me, by going to therapy and twelve-step meetings, I am truly liking myself again. More than that, I am embracing it and doing what I want to do, not what others prescribed for me.

In this wacky journey we call weight loss, yes, I have my ups and downs, but when I hover over that in my balloon and look over these past 80 days I see a guy who knows he will be OK. I know I will re-lose that weight and come out even stronger for it. Speaking of which I need to run and get ready so I can go kick some punching bag ass today with Sensei Doug.

Sometimes it is good to take a look at your own life from a different perspective, and rising above it, as if in a balloon, can do just the trick. Not only do you see where you’ve been clearly, you can see the road ahead of you…

…and, at least for me, you can do something that the Fifth Dimension also sings about – letting that sunshine in to help guide the way.

Let the sunshine…

Let the sunshine in.

The sun shine in…