Searching for Balance

I can't stand on one foot for very long.

At the end of RIPPED classes, during the cool-down, Peggy almost always runs us through a series of stretches that require me to stand on one foot to stretch quads, hips, glutes. I almost always have to "touch down" with the other foot to keep from falling over.

It makes me think my balance just isn't that good. Or my muscles are somehow sort of weak.

And I think it's an enormous metaphor for what's going on in my head right now.
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I took last week off from exercise. Almost completely and totally off. If you're friends with me via Fitbit, you can see that my step total sort of fell off the radar.

The burnout was real. Part of it was the training for the half marathon. But not all of it.

Part of it was Spring. As in spring wardrobe. As in, my clothes from last year were not all fitting so smurfy.

You know how that thinking sprials ... I've talked about it a million times before. I feel bad, so I get down on myself. I get down on myself and start making bad choices. A few bad choices lead to a few more bad choices and pretty soon you're stuck in a dark pit and it's hard to get out.

The choices I was making? Eating pretty much whatever I wanted to and trying to out-exercise it.

This, dear readers, does not work. It cannot work. It has never worked.

So I took a reset.

No running. Only one morning of RIPPED. No weights. No biking.

In addition, no feeling guilty about eating "bad." No beating myself up for gaining weight. No crappy self talk about getting fat or having no self control. No poor me. No whining.

I wanted to give myself some grace ... to prove that the world will not end if I just chilled out for a bit to get my head back on straight.

Guess what? The world didn't end.

I didn't exactly eat well, but I ate better. I made a conscious effort to not pummel myself, and that's easier said than done for me. I tried on some clothes that I was convinced wouldn't fit and the truth was they weren't as terrible as I'd feared. (Though, don't get me wrong ... there are plenty of others that don't button.)

I thought about waiting for the urge to come to me.

It did. I woke up Saturday morning itching to do my traditional 4 miles. So with a little fear, I hit the treadmill ... and everything was fine.

I waited again for the urge to eat better to arrive. It didn't happen on Mother's Day ... I was responsible for brunch, served at my house, and things got a little out of delicious control.

But, last night, the urge to eat better hit.

And today, I did.