Determined To Succeed

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Day thirty-seven.

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the presentation of the 2010 Liberty Medal at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center. The medal was presented by former president Bill Clinton to Britain’s former prime minister, Tony Blair,  honoring his success resolving the conflict in Northern Ireland and his ongoing pursuit of peace in the Middle East and Africa. But even as I listened to the incredibly worth-while reasons to give such a distinguished honor to a bloke I liked when he was in office in the U.K., I was thinking about two other things – my recent weight gain and, of course, the motivation to take it off.

I know you must be saying, “what is this yahoo talking about weight loss for when he’s attending a ceremony honoring a world leader?” Well, my friends I will tell you. It had to do with one of the seven lessons of liberty learned by former prime minister Blair in his efforts to bring change to the world. In fact, it was the first one that struck me the most – “Every milestone on the road to liberty marks a struggle. . . . opposition, even defeat, and occasionally desperation along the way.”

That hit me like a ton of bricks because I could instantly equate it to weight loss. I even played with the words a bit just to see if it would fit and it did.

“Every milestone on the road to weight loss marks a struggle. . . . opposition, even defeat, and occasionally desperation along the way.”

I thought about the milestones on my own weight loss journey, including the struggles to just take the first ten pounds off. I thought about the current weight I need to re-lose. I also thought about all the pain and emotion in-between and it fit, incredibly and absolutely. However it also proves that not only is weight loss possible but that it is also not a clear, smooth road and that it can and will be difficult at times and those difficult times are to be expected.

Losing weight is a struggle, one that requires you to take care of the one person who needs you the most – you. But there will be times when you don’t feel like going on, and when you feel like giving up because it just ain’t worth it. Believe me, I’ve been there. But in what Mr. Blair said is the truth of it – there is hard work in achieving any goal worth achieving and it wouldn’t be noteworthy once you reach that goal unless you had to absolutely climb some mountain, miss some pothole or get over some bump to get there. That is what makes milestones milestones. Because of what you had to get through to get there, they are a marker of success. They are a marker of your success.

The other point Mr. Blair made about peace, the seventh, that could also be applied to weight loss was this: “Liberty needs optimism. . . . No one has ever achieved anything by being a cynic or a pessimist.” He added that peace ultimately came to Northern Ireland primarily “because the people felt it could happen. That optimism of the human spirit is what drives liberty.” So let’s switch out a word or two…

“Weight loss needs optimism. . . . No one has ever achieved true and sustained weight loss by being a cynic or a pessimist.” Losing weight ultimately happened to those committed to it primarily “because the people felt it could happen. That optimism of the human spirit is what drives us to our weight loss goals.”

See? Even at a very cool ceremony honoring peace we can also find a way to honor our struggles in our own battles of the bulge.

I guess I took this to heart so much because I am now back on my way down in my own weight loss. I am down a pound today and am feeling every ounce of it gone from my body (thank God). It’s a good feeling knowing I have not only recommitted to my life and my soul but also to my weight loss and am not using food to numb pain or shame. I love food but I should use it for more than just yummy fuel. It is not a drug and it is not to be used to numb away pain.

I may talk about more of Mr. Blair’s lessons tomorrow as several more could also be applied to our struggles as the large trying to become smaller and lighter. But for today this is a great start. Or should I say re-start. So thank you, Mr. Blair, wherever you are. Your words prove that there is commonality in this world if we just get past our own petty bullshit to find it. THAT, my friends, is what will eventually save this planet. And it’s that commonality that makes our fellowship in weight loss stronger and helps us to know none of us are alone.

Day Thirty-Six.

I am sitting at my computer today not really knowing how to write today’s blog. I had a great and very positive weekend this past weekend anchored by three(!) twelve-step meetings. While the one on Saturday morning was a bit different all of them grounded me in my reality now, especially knowing there are so many others who know what I’m going through (particularly with the food and eating aspect of things). However, as wonderful as the meetings were they were not the highlight of the weekend. That came yesterday morning when I awoke to the sound of softly falling rain. That moment, for me, was peace on earth.

But how do you describe peace? I don’t know, especially since we all have such varying definitions of it, but I will give it a try. Imagine you have just woken up from a wonderfully restful sleep, the kind of sleep where not only had eight hours sleep but you FEEL like you had eight hours sleep. Now, add to that rest the sound of silence, a silence that includes no street noise at all – no cars passing or horns honking. Just silence. Even the birds outside have taken a moment to take in the serenity of the moment. Now, add in the final element – the sound of rain. Not torrential rain, but a steady, moderate and softly falling rain hitting the trees and their leaves in such a way that you can almost see a rhythm to it, a pettern, as you envision each leaf as it welcomes a raindrop onto its surface.

For at least a good twenty minutes yesterday that was my world and it was the most beautiful the world has been in such a long time. If I could have recorded that to play back when I was feeling stressed I would have. The last time I felt that perfect communion with nature was when I spread my mother, JoAnn’s, ashes in the park I played in as a child. It was raining like that on that day, too, and I was instantly transported at that moment to when I was a kid just sharing a walk in the park with my mom. That was also the last time I felt whole and like a complete human being…that is, until now.

My weight is up again (I am at 240.9 today) and of course I am put off by that. Anyone would be, especially when they think, like me, they’ve been doing so well. But I know I will be O.K. and like I am always fond of saying today is the day I get back on the path of eating better, watching my portions and exercising. But the why of why I know I will be O.K. comes from being sober and comes from the fact that my mind, body and soul are all now in one place at one time and open to hearing sounds in their purest form like the sound of rain falling early on a Sunday morning.

I know there are so many of us going through tough times. I hear examples of those tough times each time I attend a meeting. But whether or not you attend meetings or not, and no matter if your struggles are only about weight loss or not, keep a hold of your peace – that one thing that brings you back to center, grounds you and makes you feel whole and calm again. It may be the briefest of moments, or it maybe stopping to enjoy a specific memory. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you have something to hold onto when you feel the noise of the world bearing down on you. For me, it happened the day I said a final good-bye to my mom in physical form and it happened again yesterday and it’s moments like that I realize what a true gift life is and how I intend to appreciate it from now on.

That is such a beautiful way to start a day and I wanted to share that serenity with you guys, especially if you have to go back to the hustle and bustle of the week. But take heart. If you are on a weight loss journey, like me, you will lose it. If your journeys are deeper, like mine, you will travel them well and bravely. How do I know this? Because I truly believe there is peace in this world and if we are open to receiving it, in whatever form it comes, it will bring us the breath we need to keep us going no matter what we have to handle in life.

Thanks for letting me share that with you this morning. I hope you have a great day no matter what you do. Just promise me you will take a moment today and listen for that peace. If you do, odds are, that peace, whatever it is for you, will find you, too.

Day Thirty-three.

Well, here we are again. We reached the end of another week and, as usual, my brain is toast.  Overall, it’s been a pretty good week except I am desperately trying to shed these remaining, stubborn-ass pounds. I don’t like being up in my weight but am looking forward to my martial arts workout today as I continue on my path toward better health (and a lighter weight).

There are a number of factors that have gone into my recent weight gain but ultimately what made me gain weight back was my eating, my soda drinking, my dessert eating, my snack binging and my non-portion controlling. That’s all it is, plain and simple, and I freely and willingly admit to it. I have always emotionally eaten and thanks to some good old-fashioned therapy I am finding out exactly why. Shame.

It’s amazing what we do to abuse ourselves out of shame. Some people lash out at the world while others, like me, try to hide it all and stuff it down to lock it away using things like food. Wow. I never realized how much I had packed away down there until I started opening up the boxes and seeing what there was inside.

I know I’ve told you guys about not having much money growing up, and because of that my mom and I frequently didn’t know where our next meal was coming from. But what I didn’t tell you about was the shame that caused. It caused shame because I could never have friends over to my place, and even if I did (which I would never have) I didn’t have what other homes had – video games, a VCR (yes, it was the 80’s after all) or even a color TV. I know my mom did the best for me she could and loved me very much but those things, combined with the almost constant verbal abuse spouted by kids (hey fatty, Buffalo Bill, etc.) made me just want to go hide. What it ended up doing, though, is creating someone who falsely depended on food to mask his pain and toxic shame.

Food was my solace. It was my way out and my drug of choice back then to make the world go away for a precious little while. And when it was Chinese food from my favorite place, Lung Wah Chop Suey on 53rd Street, I was in self-medicated heaven. Their egg rolls still have their taste etched onto the permanent memory of my taste buds, and the beef chop suey such a comfort that any place that serves a beef chop suey today has a special place in my heart.

That is what shame can do, and my over 400 pounds is what stuffing all that shame down with food can do.

Today is the start of the weekend and, as you regular readers know (and thank you for being out there) I worry about the weekends because I tend to let go a little more than I should. But I am so trying, especially now that I am better than I have ever been in my life, to purge the bad and dark energies and karma in my life to get to the real me again. And yes, it will be a me, in part, that is at or around 225 pounds.

I know I’ve told you all before that you can do it but I need to say today that you do need to get down to why you are really eating to do it. Are you sad, lonely, depressed, angry, upset, foolish, in denial, happy or tense? Dare I say there is an emotional reason deeply rooted in you that is causing you to act out and eat. This may all be conjecture on my part and certainly doesn’t take into account those of you out there who suffer from a medical condition that makes you gain and/or doesn’t allow you to lose weight, but I’d be willing to guess that for most of us we are masking something deep down that is the root cause of our eating.

My friends, it is time to be brave and address what is really going on inside. We spend so much of our lives trying to hide these things that we end up putting so much pressure on ourselves just to maintain the ruse. You are worth more than that, believe me, you are. And I am sure that whatever is causing you to feel shame, guilt, remorse, anger, fear, regret, all of it, once found can actually help you see why that cheeseburger doesn’t taste as good as you think it does.

In my life’s journey, and in my weight loss journey, I have discovered many things. But most of all, through trials and a helluva lot of errors, I’ve found that I am worth it as a person to be healthier and to live a long and happy life. We all need food to survive, and we should all enjoy the foods we eat because they are good and part of life’s most wonderful experiences. But food is not a drug and should never be used as one. We should not need it to be because, in the end, we must not let whatever feelings we truly have buried bury us for real.

Today is Friday, the sun is shining and it is a beautiful day. Go out and enjoy it and this amazing weekend. And if you have to work, have a multitude of errands to run or are going through something in your lives take heart. There is someone out here who understands and who understands the why and how of weight gain and loss. And who, like you, wants to truly get better about taking care of the one person we should always take care of first and foremost – ourselves.

Day Thirty-two.

I don’t know if you guys know about this or not, but NASA confirmed yesterday two small asteroids passed within the moon’s distance from the Earth about 12 hours apart. Yep, near-Earth asteroid 2010 RX30, which is estimated to be 32 to 65 feet in diameter, passed within 154,000 miles of Earth around 5:51 a.m. ET, while the second object, 2010 RF12, estimated to be 20 to 46 feet in diameter, passed within 49,088 miles of Earth close to 5:12 pm ET. This double encounter was unusual in the sense that NASA spotted the objects three days in advance and successfully plotted their orbits, demonstrating the need for closer monitoring of near space for Earth-threatening encounters.

According to Donald Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near Earth Program, which tracks potentially hazardous asteroids and comets within 28 million miles of Earth, the ability to track these asteroids days in advance of their “arrival” confirms that the process NASA has in place (whereby they find, observe and then quickly predict when such things pass Earth to get that info out) works pretty well.

I would say so, although my initial gut reaction was “holy crap, it’s ‘Armageddon’ and we need Bruce Willis to go up in a shuttle and yell ‘yippee-kay-a mother fucker’ before saying ‘we win, Gracie’ and blowing up the damn thing. My second reaction was to think back to a time when I was a kid working on his science fair project about space, specifically black holes.

According to the general theory of relativity, a black hole is a region of space from which nothing, not even light, can escape. Around a black hole there is an undetectable surface which marks the point of no return, called an event horizon and it is called “black” because it absorbs all the light that hits it, reflecting nothing, just like a perfect black body in thermodynamics.

All of that is a fancy way of saying ain’t nuthin’ gettin’ out of any black hole.

Thinking back over the past few decades I have come to realize how very close I actually got to that event horizon in my life, that point from which I could never have returned because of my behaviors and my fractured soul. And thinking about how close I got made me shudder but instantly thankful I was able to bottom out and escape the nothingness of true failure.

Last year I wrote a couple of pieces on failure. I wrote them after attending church one Sunday and hearing the pastor talk about a passage in the Bible that says how people will fall and rise seven times as we try to achieve success or victory over evil.

I’m human, and humans look for too many quick fixes, solutions, methods or excuses so there’s (or seems to be) less likelihood of failure, I wrote, and how we use these things to blame someone or something else for our failures. We say to ourselves: “Oh, well I ordered that thing and did what I was supposed to do to lose weight but it didn’t work.” My friends, I said it then and I will repeat it now, the highest peaks of our achievements and successes always go through the lowest valleys of failure. And humility, patience, the ability to learn and grow from mistakes and, most of all, appreciation for success comes from failure.

Having known what true failure is in life I truly appreciate the feelings I now have of sobriety and being a better human being each and every day. Not acting out (especially with food and eating – I was so much better yesterday) and appreciating life again and all its positive energies is what I will continue to do throughout the rest of my life – that is my focus. But there are forces out there in the universe like those asteroids and like those black holes that threaten our stability, even our very sanity, and we must do our best, like NASA, to see them coming and prepare for them so we can avoid the blackness and destruction they bring.

No journey worth taking is without risk, pitfalls, bumps and dangers. I know that. In my current weight loss journey, for example, I am still trying to re-lose this damn extra almost 14 pounds (grrrrrrr). But I will, especially now, succeed in all the aspects of my life especially when I can see asteroids or black holes coming my way. There are black holes out there in the universe, but it’s the stars and light that surround them that mark their path so we can avoid them along our journey. I came dangerously close to the event horizon once in my life and I will be damned if I ever again get that close no matter how the universe can sometimes conspire to want me to fail again. And you should hold onto that assurance, too, that you can and will achieve success in your life no matter how many times you stumble. We are all human and we will achieve success together.

Bruce Willis is a person and an actor. He’s not Harry Stamper, the character he portrayed in “Armageddon,” and he won’t be flying at 22,500 mph to land on that asteroid and blow it up before it hits earth. No, my success or failure in the end depends on one person, me, and I am holding firm at thirty-two days and counting that I will continue to grow, be positive, be a better man day by precious day and be my mother’s son again.

Day thirty-one.

I’ve talked about going to twelve-step meetings before but last night’s meeting was weird. It even started off weirdly. The leader of the group couldn’t make it so it was up to the rest of us to make do. That was fine, though. Someone even brought a copy of the booklet that tells us the order of things in the meeting. What made the meeting weird were the topics selected for discussion – PMS and forgiveness.

Now before you go thinking we discussed THAT PMS, the PMS we discussed stood for pain, misery and suffering. This topic was brought up by a guy in the group who has been going through his own bit of a tough time and I think he just wanted to let some of that out in group. O.K., I can roll with that, but it made everyone in the group tense and unsure because, while the subject of forgiveness is pretty straight forward, none of us could define pain, misery and suffering in the same ways.

The guy who brought it up talked about his own pain and suffering as well as the pain and suffering of someone with whom he recently shared a hospital room. Others brought up different specific occurrences of things that had happened, including acting out, that had made them each go through pain, misery and suffering. And more than one person talked about “self-medicating” some of that PMS away with food (and I could so totally relate to that with my own eating patterns as of late). When it became my turn to speak I thought about PMS in two different ways – my own general PMS and the PMS I have caused others.

You never really quite know what goes into the recipe for an addict. Oh sure there are the things you know will cause damage to a person but I was never abused by my mom. Not once ever, yet there are so many lingering things that happened, including how and where we lived, that did cause my own form of PMS, hence why I became an addict. Then I thought about the PMS I caused others with my actions, another reason I go to meetings. I know I have done wrong but I am trying to be a better man and do a better job of it every single day.

Then it came to the topic of forgiveness. I think the energy of the room, set by the guy with his suggestion of PMS, didn’t really let the positive energy of forgiveness in. In other words, people wanted to be in their pain last night and feel it. But does it make me wrong for not wanting to be in such a negative place? I don’t think so.

There comes a point in every situation in life when you come to a bridge. It connects the feelings, actions and thoughts of the past with the dreams, wishes and positive energies for the future. Sometimes, you don’t know how or when it’s appropriate to begin crossing that bridge due to guilt (like causing so many others PMS) but you know in your heart and mind it is time to do it and I did, because if I am to become that better man I always talk about I have to cross that bridge. And because it’s a bridge there is always a link to the past even though my feet are heading to that better future.

At the end of the meeting last night I did my best to leave that room as fast as I could. I wasn’t trying to be rude, and there are a couple of people who are cool in that group, but I wanted as much distance between myself and that PMS energy as possible last night. And there’s nothing wrong with that.  You know I think all the time about my eating patterns, and how lately I’ve been so bad because of various emotions – guilt, sadness, anger, happiness, nervousness – and I need to get a handle on that, too. That is part of forgiveness, and like I’ve always said in this weight loss journey (or any journey for that matter) you have to forgive yourself the past to be able to cross that bridge. If you don’t, and you keep using food to run away from what you are truly feeling, there is no way you can move across that bridge into a better future for yourself.

I ended the night last night watching the end of a beautiful movie called “City of Angels.” In it Nicolas Cage plays an angel who, after falling in love with a doctor played by Meg Ryan, decides to give up being an angel and fall to earth to be with her. It was romantic, ethereal and cool, but the true message of the movie was about embracing life. In that movie, angels cannot feel. They cannot taste, smell or touch (or be touched), and the sensations of water when you swim are completely lost on them because of it. I won’t give away the ending (and you should really watch this flick) but Cage’s angel finds a way at the end to leave the past behind and enjoy and embrace life. He goes for a swim, and he can finally experience what a pear tastes like and he knows that just one moment with Ryan was worth the journey he undertook. And its in the last moments of film we see that he will be OK in his new human life experiencing the beauty of his newly-found humanity.

That was a wonderful way to end my night and a beautiful way to start my day.

Day twenty-four.

Happy September, everyone. Man, yesterday I was both a mess and euphoric. I admit, when I’m sick, I’m a bit of a baby especially since I don’t get sick very often. And while it wasn’t the full-bore cold it could have been it was enough to sap my strength, make my head all poofy and have my throat all scratchy and in pain the whole day. On the other hand, I took care of myself, something I haven’t done really for a long, long time and part of that care involved two things: taking myself for a nice walk in the clean, hot air and going to a twelve-step meeting last night.

I was very torn about the walk. I had zero energy and motivation to get up from the couch and I sure as hell didn’t want to get ready and dressed to walk outside for an hour. But I had to clear my head. Not just physically because of the cold or because I felt like acting out or anything, but because I was mulling something over in my brain. I was thinking about everything and needed some time to commune with nature and my mom, JoAnn’s, spirit to help me be calm and relax. Later, I attended my twelve-step meeting which, I have to say is a wonderful way to re-juice the soul because it’s great knowing you have the fellowship and support of the people around you on any given night.

Whenever I sit in that room and listen to others I gain new perspectives on things. They help me turn things over in my brain and center me and last night’s meeting gave me a good idea of what pain is like from the perspective of someone experiencing it. I have to tell you how powerful that is, and how humbling. It strips away every piece of bullshit inside you and makes you feel something which, for many of us, is for the first time in years. Feeling the pain of others makes me realize and understand the pain I have put people through in my life. I may not be able to fully make amends to those people but I sure am trying the best way I know how – going to these meetings and getting the help I need.

I can only imagine that other addictions are the same at their core. You crave X and will do anything – lie, cheat, hurt people, shut yourself off – just to have X. That also goes for food. But with addiction, the more you spiral down into it the more shame you feel, therefore you withdraw more and more into your world, alone and broken not knowing how to get out.

After feeling the sun on my face yesterday and after going to my meeting I felt present. Yes, it does hurt to hear these things and yes, it does hurt facing them but any addict needs to if they are to get out of their own personal abyss. It needs to be felt because our emotions have been out of it for so long and it does cause others great pain. That goes for food, drugs, alcohol, whatever. If recovery were easy it wouldn’t work, plain and simple. Put another way, we addicts need to feel to know what it’s like to be a human being again, one that’s not driven by a drug but one that is driven by being a feeling being.

That is why I was euphoric. I felt that pain yesterday. I felt it. I wasn’t distracting myself and it felt good. That’s why I didn’t give in to the temptation to just be a slug on my couch. I got up and walked. I did that to take care of me in my recovery from being under the weather. And I went to my twelve-step meeting to take care of me in my recovery to heal as a human being to try to be a good and decent man.

I am starting to come back down in my weight, too. I am at 235 even today and that feels amazing. I can feel that excitement again. I have a measly ten pounds to go to re-achieving my goal weight and I will one day. I will because I recognize what it’s like to turn off and medicate and numb yourself to reality. However, now I am facing reality for the first time and it strengthens me, thank God. That goes for my weight loss journey, too. I was so worried about handling one addiction I was turning back to food as comfort. I just realized it and got a handle on both, that’s all. And I was able to do that because the pieces of my soul that had been gone for so long are now coming back and making me here and present and alive.

It’s amazing what a person can do when they have their soul back. It is. That will give me the strength to kick that bag today and that will give me the strength to carry on in weight loss and in recovery. And in the end, I won’t be a mess anymore. I will be healed in body, mind and, most of all, spirit so I never again fall into the dark abyss I was in for so long.

Day nineteen.

I woke up this morning and I cried. I cried because of the realization that I was finally becoming a whole person again. I cried because all those parts of me and my soul that had been scattered to the four winds (despair, shame, guilt and gluttony) have started coming back and are now a part of me again and for the first time in my recent memory I am here and present.

I can’t begin to tell you what it’s like having your soul, brain, heart and energy segmented like that.  Sad to say it is something you have to experience to know. To use a movie analogy it’s like being Voldemort from the Harry Potter books. In case you’ve been living under a rock, Voldemort uses physical objects to place parts of his soul so that, no matter what happens to his physical body, he can return. In that world it is the darkest, blackest magic there is. In this world, my world, it was the darkest and blackest my soul had ever been. It’s so bad that you put yourself aside for the drug. You do, and the motions you go through aren’t for you. They’re for the drug.

Being addicted to something – anything – means you not only get a high from it but you eventually start trading things, including pieces of your life and soul for it. If you know anyone who’s an addict they will tell you that. They will also tell you what withdrawl is like – that maddening craving for the drug when you ween yourself off of it. But what I am going through isn’t withdrawl, it’s reverse withdrawl.

I cried today because I really felt myself coming back together today. I felt the parts of my soul that had been gone for so long come back home. I watched the sun rise a bit this morning, listened to the birds sing their morning songs of hunger and felt myself take in such good, deep breaths that I felt almost overwhelmed. I felt heavier. Not just because I’ve been eating like a pig lately but because the best parts of me rejoined me. My mind wasn’t in one place while my soul was shoved away in a closet somewhere. I wasn’t spending my time being an addict and splitting my time, energies and self between so many different things. I was here again and I was at peace.

The last time I felt peace like that was when I sat with my mother, JoAnn Larson, as she lay dying from pancreatic cancer. I’ve said it before and I will say it again I know exactly how lucky a bastard I am because I was able to say to my mom “I love you, mama” and hear her say “I love you, too, son” back. Those were literally her last words to me. Those were literally her last words. After that she slipped further and further away until finally she became eternally free and healed from that terrible bitch disease. Those words brought me peace and they are what I held onto as her hand grew cold even as I held it watching her take her last breath on this earth.

Reclaiming what had been gone so long makes you heavier. I don’t know how but it does. They say when your spirit leaves your body you actually lose weight. Well, I now know what it’s like to breathe and live again. I was dying. Maybe not physically, but emotionally and spiritually. This morning, and these past few weeks, have all been part of a process I hope to and want to continue. I love this reverse withdrawl. It’s renewed my senses and it’s making me whole again.

I talk all the time about seeing the “promised land.” In the past I meant about weight loss and I still do. I lost the weight of a grown person and I will never, EVER regain it back because I knew I would be dead had I kept it. But I have also seen the “promised land” of what it’s like to crave something so much it takes over your life, and yes, that can be food, too. But I would try to save you that pain and have you learn from my experience to stay away from that rancid hell on earth.

No matter what your addiction you are worth so much more than that which drives you. Our souls must be one within ourselves to truly be alive and that cannot happen craving something else. Yesterday I made a kick-ass soup (the Delicious Bean Stew I listed the recipe for – it’s awesome, by the way). Today, Friday, and tomorrow, Saturday, I’m going to workout with my martial arts instructor, Doug Shaffer, and it’s going to feel great. I am going to see and talk with friends and I am gonna drive with the windows down to feel the warm air on my face. That is life, and I am embracing it again after such a long, long time.

If you are new to reading me, welcome. I truly appreciate you stopping by to check out this website to gain inspiration in your weight loss journey. I am still on that path and will forever be on that path with you. There are two parts of it, you know. Losing weight and keeping it off, the latter being the on-going, lifestyle-changing part. It may be rough, and I know it is, but there is a difference this time as there is now a difference in my life.

I am here and present, and when we can say that, and really and truly mean it, we can and will do anything because we have our lives back and finally back in our control. Have a great weekend.

Day sixteen.

Honesty. Funny how such a simple word and concept can have such a different meaning to different people, me included. There are even qualifiers attached to the word at times, words like total honesty, brutal honesty and radical honesty, which is the type of honesty I am trying my best to practice these days. But let’s break down each of these and what they mean knowing completely that this not only extends to addictions, but to weight loss, work, friends, school, family, you name it. It applies to all.

Let’s begin with the phrase total honesty. Its wording implies that simple honesty or honesty by itself wasn’t honest, and that a portion of the truth was hidden. You see it every single day, I bet. Now ask yourself, how many times has someone said to you “O.K., to be totally honest…” And yes, this is the one I am guilty of most of all.

Yesterday I mentioned how there was ever only one person to whom I told everything and that was my mama, JoAnn. After she said “nobody needs to know our business but us” I knew at once I had both a confidant as well as a co-secret keeper about things starting with the way we lived. A one-room, roach-infested apartment inside a hotel was certainly not the worst it ever could have been. I was never abused, verbally or physically, my life could have been in danger from neighbors or visitors to the building, etc., and my mom did the best she could to keep that roof over our heads with her meager wages especially after my father left. That wasn’t failure that was love, I just never opened up about it because, to a kid, that wasn’t what you saw on TV. It wasn’t what I saw when I went to other people’s houses. Yes, I was never totally honest until this part of my life.

Now let’s talk about brutal honesty, which is a phrase employed when you want or need justification for being truthful with someone when you may or may not have lied to them. It is also a way certain people in this world say mean-spirited things and get away with it because they shield themselves with the word “honesty” while brandishing the razor-sharp sword of “brutal” in their verbal attack on someone. I’ve heard so many people in my life say “to be brutally honest, this is terrible….” blah, blah but while they were hurting feelings they used that word honesty, as if they were such good people for saying it the way they did.

Now let’s talk about radical honesty, which is what I am practicing these days. This is a form of honesty where the doors are finally thrown wide-open and halls, closets and attic filled with boxes of lies and deceit are cleared out and lights brought in to finally see the spaces inside. In opening up to people as I have been lately I have been exploring the many parts of my brain and soul that have been locked away for so long I never thought anyone, not even me, would see them again. That’s how radical honesty works.

But what about poor and simple honesty, who, if it were followed, wouldn’t need to be total, brutal or radical at all. It would simply be the truth. Not the truth as you see it, not the truth that fits an agenda, not a truth that makes you more likable but plain and simple truth. No having to muscle up strength to offer the “total” or “brutal” truth to undo omissions or lies offered to spare feelings or get what you want. Just truth.

When the concepts of truth and honesty are employed it’s as if a weight is lifted, like me saying to you I ate like crap yesterday. I had a ton of pasta (O.K. maybe not a ton but a helping more than I should have) and it shows today in my weight. It doesn’t just make me know I have to do better in eating today, no. It lets me know I was honest with myself. I was honest with myself about what I did and that I have to make it up to myself because we all start the day looking at one person – ourselves – and we end our days the same way.

Honesty may have varying degrees of definition from one person to the next and from one situation to the next but it does help. It does. It may sting at times. It may hurt. It may not even make you very well liked. But it will mean you are respected, and always keep in mind in this weight loss journey (and in other areas of your lives) that the one person who needs to respect you the most is you, because when you have self-respect you will find the world is a far more accepting, kind and honest place to live.