Two Weeks.

Do any of you ladies (or gentlemen, what the heck) relate to this?

You have a certain number of pounds you want to lose. You’d think the desire to lose those pounds would be motivation to do something about it. But when you think about the number of pounds, and you have no idea how long it’s going to take to lose them, you just get discouraged. And you haven’t even gotten started yet!

That’s been my cycle. I’m weird when it comes to motivation. I hate getting started with something. I despise it. It’s the hardest part. Once I get started, though, and I start doing well and seeing results, then I take off like a shot! It’s just getting over that initial hump…

So needless to say I haven’t done much towards my new goal lately. Unless you can call sinking into a deep slump and moping around working towards a goal. Which I don’t think you can.

My genius husband, though, came up with a plan for me:

“Honey,” he said, “if you committed to going to Jazzercise three times a week for two weeks, could you do that?”

“Yes…” I replied hesitantly.

“And if you committed to controlling your portion sizes better and keep cutting back on sugar for two weeks, could you do that?”

“Yes…” again.

“And if you committed to not weigh yourself for those entire two weeks, but just see how you do at the end, could you do that?”

“Yes.”

So that’s what I’m doing. Two weeks. Jazzercise 3 times per week. Portion control. Very limited sugar. And no stepping on the scale. I can do that. That’s a bite I can chew.

And at the end of those two weeks, I’ll think about doing two more weeks. Another two weeks will be doable.

Now that I think about it, that’s how I swam the equivalent of what they swim in an Ironman in a swimming pool. *Yep, I once did an entire Ironman. I’ve got the t-shirt to prove it. It took FOREVER. But I did it one lap at a time. I’d cruise through a lap, pause at the end, and say to myself, “Yeah, I can do that again.” So I did it again. And again. And again. But the point is, I took it one lap at a time. And I finished. I didn’t get discouraged, I didn’t get exhausted. I just focused on one lap at a time. “I can do this lap. Hey, that went pretty well. I can do another lap.”

Some people tried to tell me “You should just power it all out at once!” but I didn’t give in to the pressure. Why would I do something I knew would overwhelm and exhaust me? Maybe there were those who didn’t agree with my one-lap-at-a-time method, but I don’t care. Because at the end of each lap, I was proud of myself for doing that lap as well as I could. And when I finished all my laps, I was even prouder of myself. And nobody can take that away from me.

It’s taken me a long time to talk about that experience as something I’m proud of. I’d always kind of go “Oh, it was a long time ago…” when people asked about it. But dangit, I did it, and I’m proud of myself. I’m owning the experience. I’ll probably never do it again (and please smack me if I ever contemplate it) but the point is, it really did happen, and I’m proud of my accomplishment.

Today was my first day back at Jazzercise in more than a month. I won’t lie, it was tough. I got thoroughly worked. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to use my legs tomorrow. But gosh was it fun! I can’t wait until Thursday to go again! And if I play my cards right I’ll go Saturday too while Daddy and Baby have some man-time. I like going Tuesdays and Thursdays because it’s way less crowded than Mon-Wed-Fri. The dance floor is less crowded, and the childcare room is less crowded. It works out better for all of us, especially if I can go on Saturday, because then I can leave the baby at home, which saves me a childcare dollar, and gives me some “me time”. I’m excited to get back into the routine.

I’ll post my progress in two weeks!