Mind shift - ditch the scales

So I'm 7 weeks into a 10 week weight loss challenge that I thought I'd smash. I've lost somewhere between 1-2 kgs but officially with results at actual weigh in, only around 1. You'd think that I was eating crap or not exercising.... It's the opposite. While my workouts haven't been super crazy, I'm doing a variety of different things. I've mentioned before my change in eating as well. For whatever reason my body is deciding that right now, losing more weight is not essential. 

Has this bothered me? Well yes, about 3 weeks ago I was on the verge of an obsessive meltdown because I wasn't meeting my expectations. I was seeing unhealthy behaviours in myself, not wanting to eat or wanting to binge, stepping on the scale every day, beating myself up because the number wasn't changing. Feeling pressure rather than motivated, feeling bad because I was comparing myself to others who were achieving, and basically non stop guilt. It is crazy how easy it is to fall into these behaviours and get into negative self talk which snowballs. 

As someone who's had a turbulent relationship with food & weightloss in the past, it's even easier to fall back into old patterns....and to be honest it made me feel unstable (mentally). I'm a lot better than I used to be but I'm still not immune to having negative & unhealthy thoughts.
I didn't like how it made me feel. I'm not defined by a number on the scales. Why is it so easy to think you are?
Yes my whole journey has seemingly been about weight loss but actually it's been so much more than that. I'm not unhappy with how I look and I love what my body has done for me, yea I'd like to improve further and continue the journey, but I'm not going to go crazy in the process. I've changed my attitude to how I approach the rest of the challenge. The whole point of this is to encourage health, get moving and eat healthy... I'm doing my best every day to do that, so what more can I really ask for? 

Weight is just another measure in your toolbox to health, it's not the be all and end all. When my body is ready, it will get going again. In the meantime, I'll carry on & enjoy every day. Hope you do the same.

2016

2016. This will be my year.  I am signed up and ready to start the road to the Ironmaori triathlon for the second time. As you might be able to guess from the above, I've decided to do this with the amazing Change Fitness #whanaujourney group led by my amazing coach/trainer Nathan Martin. It's hard to put into words how much being part of this team (for the 4 months) meant to me last year, but all I can say is that it pulled me out of the deep dark hole that I had gotten into, and gave me purpose...and self belief.  I just love the quote above.

I am so full of excitement for what this year will bring, and full of energy to set and smash all of my goals. Reflecting on last year's journey, there is plenty to improve on:

• Doing proper strength training to actually prevent injuries this time, 
• Checking in with myself more often in terms of my mental wellbeing and handling stress better (regular yoga/meditation etc),
• More bike time. 4 months last year, while it was enough to get me through, was just that.. enough to get me through. I had a number of falls and scary moments, so this year is about conquering the beast, getting comfortable riding in traffic and just overall getting stronger in this area.
• Running. I ran about 3km of the 21.1km in December. I'd lost alot of running fitness with my July injury and chose not to focus too much on it last year. Well the goal this year is to run the whole 21.1km.

I would also love for my overall fitness to improve. Endurance is all good, and I think that is because mentally I am strong enough to push through, but I want to and need to be fitter with the non-endurance stuff. Yesterday I started a 4 week circuit training group with Nathan and did the fitness test... great benchmark, but seeing my heart rate at only 8BPM below my max after a short time trial run was not pleasant.

I did end up surprising myself a little bit though when I managed to do 16 full press ups within 1 min. I could do about 20-25 of them this time last year, and after not doing any for almost a year..I was convinced that I'd only be able to do a couple now. But guess what, I didn't actually try it, or test myself, just labelled it as something I couldn't do, and didn't even attempt it. Terrible attitude!! Then I go and smash out 16.
Tonight's experience has taught me yet again just how much we limit ourselves and how the negative self talk can affect us and what we do (or don't do). It's easy to fall into the trap of constantly comparing yourself to other people, always striving for that elusive 'more', fear of failure, never quite being happy with what you have right now.
This will be a big focus point for me this year..finding the balance and learning to love myself as I am, being me, being present... but aspiring to be better and doing my best every day. Take up the challenge with me!

On that note, I'll leave on this thought: