My biggest obstacle ... Was ME.

So I've been thinking for a few days now about what I would write as a guest blog spot. Something about an obstacle I have overcome in my weight loss journey. And I decided I needed to be honest with myself ... and if I was going to be honest with myself then I needed to admit that my biggest obstacle in starting my own weight loss journey was ME. Or more accurately, my attitude. For a lot of years I was angry and defensive about my body and the extra weight I was carrying around. It wasn't my FAULT. It was genetics. It was kids. It wasn't fair. I had a really stressful life. I was too tired. No one else had to work as hard as I did to lose weight. Why should I have to work so freaking hard? Why did I have to never eat my favorite foods?? Etc etc and on and on. And slowly, year after year the pounds kept coming on. It was so freaking UNFAIR. I had a friend who, when she decided she needed to lose some weight, she switched to Diet Soda over Regular Soda and immediately lost 15 pounds. ARG!!! I'm going assume we all know someone like that, yes? Well, guess what. LIFE ISN'T FAIR. It just isn't. I would change the way I ate, exercise every day for 6 weeks and GAIN 7 pounds. So I would give up entirely. Obviously it was going to be way too hard to change my life. And it WAS too hard. Let me be completely honest. It would have been way too hard to keep going if it never got easier. Then a friend of mine offered me a spot in her Beach Body Challenge Group right after my husband left for his 3rd combat deployment. I was a stressed out mess of a stay-at-home-single-mom who had three small kids and no support system. I didn't think Beach Body could offer me anything different than everything I had tried before. But I figured, "what do I have to lose." I doubted it would work. I didn't want to change my whole life. I didn't want to give up my favorite foods. I didn't want to count calories. I didn't want to workout every day. I didn't even want to WANT to work out every day. But, I committed to the Challenge Group because all I had to focus on was: 1) Exercise 6 days a week following a set workout schedule from my own home and 2) Replace one meal a day with Shakeology. I could do that. And then the Challenge Group started and once again I HATED how hard it was. I HATED working out every single day. The ShakeO was fine but that was the ONLY thing I changed about my diet. I REFUSED to change anything else. For two months I hated every day that I woke up and remembered "ah crap, I HAVE TO FREAKING WORKOUT TODAY!" (See how happy I was about it??) But one day ... out of no where, about two months into the Challenge Group ... I realized ... "holy crap, I don't hate this anymore." I still didn't love it. But I didn't hate it either. I finished my first 90 day Challenge Group and started my second. By the end of the second group I had become one of those crazy people who talks about how much they love to exercise. I HATED people like that!!!! I used to say to myself and to any of my friends that would listen to me complain ... "if only I was one of those people who loved exercise ... my whole life would be different. But I'm NOT. I'm just NOT one of those people. I never will be." Oh how I've eaten my own words. And I couldn't be more grateful. Ever. About anything. I LOVE MY NEW LIFE. And I LOVE my new attitude. I can do ANYTHING I set my mind to. Period.