In one of the earlier posts, I wrote about the friend who lost 46 kilos in a year. At the time my own weight was steadily going north. I am sorry to admit that there were times when I felt jealous. To me, it seemed like her fat was melting. I am not her and she is not me. I could not put myself through the strict regimen that she had gone through, which included nearly 3 hours of exercise every single day. Fortunately she had the time to spare to exercise and prepare separate meals for herself. It was amazing that she never experienced a weight loss plateau and also maintained her weight loss. She had extremely difficult personal challenges which she surmounted with faith and good humour. I thought of her challenges and I would remind myself of those factors that were different in my case every time I felt jealous of my friend and not only did I immediately feel better, I also felt proud of her. I made a conscious decision not to compare, instead I tried to be inspired and learn from her.
I think a crucial lesson in weight loss is to love your body with all its “imperfections”. Love the body you have in the here and the now. It is cliched to say that each one of us is unique, but it is true. Our weight loss process is also different. Sure, we can take help from others (and I take the help of other people all the time) but do not expect our bodies to lose weight in the exact same fashion as someone else. When we are so focused on comparison, very likely we also lose sight of looking carefully at our own selves. For instance, my body retains water and it shows up on the scale, so even if I have exercised and ate low-calorie foods, if I ate foods with high sodium content, the scale would not move even a bit. When I brought down the sodium intake, the scale “magically” moved. Had I been busy moaning and whining about someone else’s dramatic weight loss, I would not have examined the reasons why the scale did not move in my case.
These days, I see stories of amazing weight loss stories in the net (I love success stories and do watch out for them) and because I have consciously trained myself not to compare, my first reaction is that of good feeling for the “losers”. My body is different, my challenges are different and in the end it is what I take away from the success stories (jealousy or useful lessons) that matters. I am inspired by other’s success, learn tips on motivation, craving control, exercising etc and assess whether I can apply it and then use them if they fit within my plan. Ultimately, my competition is with myself, with the self that wants to lounge around and not exercise and eat unhealthy food.
Now comparison can work in the opposite direction also, to feel superior to other people. I knew this woman who was very health conscious. Of course, there is nothing wrong about that. She always made it a point to eat salad and clear soups when we all ate out. But she made derisive remarks behind people’s back about their weight, lack of exercise and food choices. I was certain that she made comments about me to other people! She once made a highly judgemental comment, “if someone has a tummy, it means they are lazy”. My first reaction was shock. We do not know what other people are going through. But looking back, I think it is easy to say that we should not sit in judgement over other people. But all of us judge others all the frigging time. In fact, by pointing out her superiority complex, I have just judged her! Perhaps what was wrong in her tummy comment was that there was no leeway or space for life’s complexity and the unforeseen challenges that we encounter that leads to weight gain, including that paunch. Her comment was a bit too black and white for my liking.
So quit comparison either way I say!
Today's journal
1 coffee w/o sugar
1 elayada, 1/2 cup poha, 1 plantain, 1 coffee w/o sugar
1 cup fruit and veg salad, 4 tbsp rice, 1/2 cup sambhar, 1 tbsp potato curry
1 coffee w/o sugar, 1 bread roll, 1/4 elayada
1 chapathi, 1 omlette, 1 marie biscuit with 1 tsp peanut butter
66 air cycling, 31crunches and 45 mins of Leslie Sansone
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