Just so you know...

 

Friday, July 28, 2017

I responded to a fellow Sparker's blog this morning. She was trying to figure out how to get herself jump started, and I gave a longish response, as no one had yet jumped in to offer anything.

Here's the deal, people: all the folks you view as "Spark Stars" did not start out that way. Sometimes we go on to levels where we have trouble remembering the baby steps we had to take to get to where we are. Sounds like a fine taper blog topic... but I have less than ten minutes, so, it's going to be short. This is my "start" story.

Over the years, I have established that I could not BEGIN with exercise. As much as I love being active, my eating habits at my worst made it almost impossible to start. I mean, it was PAINFUL to move even the minimum amounts that I considered to be exercise.

So I found I had to start with nutrition. After a week or two of solid nutrition, I was able to add in walking. Walking was a 30 minutes a day program for 30 days in a row before adding strength training. Walk/jog intervals were reserved for when I got down to a weight where I felt it was safe for my knees.

So what did that nutrition plan look like? I learned portions and exchanges back in 1989 - 1992 with Weight Watchers at Work. This has been the basis of my program ever since. Even though I strayed from it, regained, had to re-lose a couple of times significantly. But I figure it was a solid basis for "how to eat".

But this Sparker was asking about things like going straight to plain yogurt. Did I do that? Well, no, I didn't! I went to those little 100 calorie Nutrisweet sweetened ones, only going to plain later in the program.

Also, quitting carbonated beverages was something I took in stages... reducing the number of cans to 1 a day, tracking how many days I succeeded in limiting myself with a SparkPeople "other goals" streak. My goal was 6 days a week, at first.

So... the answer is... no, very few of us, I bet, started with the whole program all at once. Our programs have evolved over time... building a lifestyle that FITS us, as individuals. They may have elements in common, and we can certainly learn from one another... but the important lesson here is:

Do Not Be discouraged by where you are right now! This is YOUR journey. YOU are strong. YOU are beautiful. And YOU are worth it!

We each have our own mountains to climb in life. Embrace yourself. You are lovable. Remind yourself as often as you need to, to make it through one decision at a time!

Stepping off the soap/Spark box now. For today:

Now let's all get out there and live the very best Friday July 28, 2017 we can manage. Because we're worth it, and it's the only one we'll ever get.