Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

This video brought tears to my eyes. I just imagined myself in that same situation and all of a sudden, food didn’t matter. Exercise seemed important.

The next time you’re thinking of blowing off your workout or adding fries to your meal, remember this video. Our bodies are an accumulation of a million tiny decisions we make every day, week, month, year and decade. Make more right decisions and stop the cycle.

Video via: work sweat achieve

I read this saying on Lifehacker the other day:

It reads:

If you want guaranteed results, do nothing—you’ll be guaranteed nothing in return. But that’s no way to succeed. -Ben Nesvig

The truth is, I WANT guaranteed results. I want to be able to know that if I follow the exact eating regime and workout plan that I will be to goal at a specific time. It’s depressing to know that there are no guaranteed results, except in failure.

No diet or workout can promise that I will get to goal, especially if I’m not willing to work at it. As long as I am willing to get my butt off the couch and my face out of the fridge, however, I will be better than I was yesterday.

I really believe this:

You don’t have to love yourself to succeed. It helps, but it isn’t essential. What is essential? Eat well. Train hard. Do it every day.

I spent SO MUCH time trying to learn to love myself and never was able to feel it. I hold in disgust most of what I do, say and feel. I am constantly berating myself and feeling like I’m not a good person. I spent a better part of my life WASTING time trying to change that aspect of my personality until I realized:

I was told that if I didn’t love myself, I could never love someone else. WRONG! I have a beautiful and loving husband whom I adore and who adores me back.

I was told that if I didn’t love myself, that I couldn’t succeed in my career. WRONG! I have been a successful writer for the last eight years.

I was told that if I didn’t love myself, that I couldn’t lose weight. I’m beginning to believe that they are wrong about that one, too. Fat doesn’t care if I love myself or not. The only thing that affects the fat on my body is the food I eat and the exercise I do.

Would I like to love myself? Sure I would, but I’m not wasting one more second trying to make that happen. I don’t need to love myself to succeed. I just need to do the things that successful people do and I will succeed as well.

The next time you’re thinking that you need to do some self-love spreadsheet or make a collage of the things you love about yourself, STOP! Stop right there and get your butt on an exercise bike or go for a run. You don’t need to change your feelings about yourself. You just need to eat healthy and exercise EVERY DAY. THAT is what will help you succeed, far more than any self-love workshop can.

Update 07-24-12: I found a quote from Megan Fox that basically says what I was saying:

It reads:

I’m really insecure about everything. I never think I’m worthy of anything. I have a sick feeling about being mocked all the time. Self-loathing doesn’t keep me from being happy, but that doesn’t mean I don’t struggle. I am very vulnerable. I’m emotionally unpredictable.

Megan Fox

If a beautiful woman like Megan Fox can feel insecure and struggle with self-loathing, then it’s pretty clear that you don’t have to love yourself in order to be successful. It might help you along the way, but it’s possible to get to your goal weight without loving yourself. All you have to do is do the work.

Photos via:

• I CAN DO IT
• Curvy-skinny

FINALLY someone else is talking about how bad the advice to “be yourself” is.

Be myself? Right now, I’m overweight. I don’t exercise enough. I struggle with eating food that is poison to my body. I don’t want to be that self.

The advice I need is to be better than myself until I’m so used to being that person that it finally feels like myself.

Via: “Make Yours a Good Self”

The next time you think men only like skinny women, remember this song by Blind Boy Fuller.

“I got a big fat woman and don’t need little lean woman no mo’!”

I saw this on Hulu this morning:

Even though Demi Lovato looks lovely and PERFECT, some people were commenting on how she looked in a negative way. Demi was having NONE of it and turned to Twitter to answer:

I’ve gained weight. Get over it. That’s what happens when you get out of treatment for AN EATING DISORDER.

Guess what, I’m healthy and happy, and if you’re hating on my weight you obviously aren’t. 🙂 #UNBROKEN

The next time someone tells you that you are too fat, remember Demi Lovato. She looks absolutely lovely and some crackpots were calling HER fat. There is no pleasing some people and they will ALWAYS be jerks. As long as you are at a healthy weight, leave the haters behind, just like Demi did!

For my whole life, they told me that I needed to have self-confidence to succeed. All those teachers and leaders urged me to love myself in order to see progress. I never once loved myself. I never once had self-confidence. I have seen enough success in my life to realize that maybe self-confidence isn’t nearly as important as they say.

Then I read this article:

• Caroming the Combination: The Paradox of Self-Confidence

It’s about playing billiards and pool and truly has nothing to do with me, but the title attracted me, so I read it. The author suggests that most of us can calculate with a pretty high degree of probability how well we are going to do. We KNOW whether we suck or not, but when we are doing it, we delude ourselves for that briefest of moments.

This isn’t superstition or some vague positive psychology. I’m saying that it is a simple matter of not allowing distracting thoughts during the execution. “I might miss this shot,” is one of the worst thoughts that you could possibly have during a shot. If that enters the mind, you probably will miss the shot.

Using the delusion of self-confidence while we are trying to do great things is a method of clearing our minds of distractions. THAT is something that I do all the time. When I’m bowling, I know how poorly I’m doing, but when I throw that ball, I am pretending that I’m a pro-bowler on ESPN THE OCHO. When I’m logging my daily food intake, I know how likely I will be able to stay under my 20g of carbs, but when I’m choosing food, I pretend that I am a carnivore.

Self-Confidence is a delusion. The only people who truly have it are utterly insufferable. Those of us who use it as a method to avoid distractions, succeed far beyond our meager hopes for ourselves.

I may have left Weight Watchers, but I still get their magazine. As betrayed as I feel, I still find motivational things in every issue. Take this poster, for example.

It reads:

Not worrying about how I look is so liberating. I can finally walk on the beach and just appreciate the beauty of it.

• Lisa M., WWM Reader

I have never in my life not worried about how I look. I try to take the zen approach and assume that I look bad no matter what, so I shouldn’t worry about it, but that hasn’t worked very well for me. I wonder what it would feel like to just be so comfortable in my skin that I didn’t think about my tummy, legs or upper arms. I wonder if I will ever be able to do that, even when I am at my goal weight.

Maybe being comfortable with my appearance has more to do with my state of mind than my body.

This old video of Big Bird singing Everyone Makes Mistakes brought back so many memories for me.

Sometimes I find myself singing this song to myself and it really seems to help me, especially when I feel like I haven’t done my best when eating. The next time you are beating yourself up for something you ate or exercise you skipped, remember this song and give yourself a break. Get up, brush yourself off and get back on track!

I received a reminder from ROFLrazzi today. Back in June 2010, Lindsay Lohan blamed the alarm on her SCRAM bracelet on kombucha, causing it to be pulled from the market. Kombucha typically has no more alcohol than a glass of orange juice, so I was disgusted with her and her poor excuse for falling off the wagon.

Why can’t that girl get her act together?

Then I cringed in self-knowledge. Who was I to judge Lindsay Lohan? I couldn’t get my eating act together. I had continually fallen off the wagon. Suddenly, Lindsay Lohan became a beacon of inspiration to me.

Every time I considered bingeing on food, I thought of Lindsay Lohan. I didn’t want to be like her. I want to be strong and be able to say no to my addictions, so I step away from the fridge, cupboard or drive-thru. I haven’t been constantly food sober since June, but I have had far more progress than I ever had before I invoked the image of Lindsay every time I was tempted.

If I were followed around by paparazzi, taking photos of every time I put a bite of food in my mouth, I would live my life far differently. I imagine them there, watching me and waiting for me to screw up. Poor Lindsay has the real world version of that problem. Just thinking about her helps me make better eating decisions every day.

The next time you point a finger at someone who seems to have trouble with an addiction, remember yourself. Pay attention to your own addictions and they will be easier to conquer.