It has occurred to me recently that my attitude towards life has pretty well sucked for most of mine. I lived by isms. Cynicism, Negativism, Defeatism, Escapism, Delayism. This was my life. Now I admit I am still a bit of a jaded cynic. That's not something you can change easily after a lifetime of practice. But I'm working on it.
I realized that it is a persons overall attitude toward life that steers and fuels that persons actions. If all the negative isms are normal, everyday thinking, then that affects the way a person lives life. You create your attitude and behavior by what you tell yourself. If your inner dialogue is negative like mine was for so long it reflects outward into the rest of the world.
I've read so many different things over the years about "dream it to achieve it", or "visualize" or any number of other catchy little phrases. They all sound like such a load of bovine residue. But, deep down, there is a lot of truth to these sayings. Probably not to the people trying to sell you the book, DVD or seminar, but certainly to those words.
The subconscious mind, that part of you that really is in control, believes what you tell it. It looks for YOUR reality. This is why a negative self image and lack of self esteem can be so devastating to a person. Your subconscious self is getting taught how to think and what to believe. And that comes out it your actions and your choices.
If your inner voice is a negative nancey then the rest of you will follow in kind. If you tell yourself over and over that you're fat, lazy, useless, that there's just no point, you eventually believe it. At some point, in order to change the outside, you must first change the inside.
I have had to make myself stop saying "I can't". I can't implies you have no choice. Instead, the proper verbiage should be "I choose not to". Because it is a choice. Being fat and out of shape is a choice. Being bitter and cynical is a choice. Living by all those isms, a choice.
There are terms that people like me love to use. Short little hidden excuses. I should. I can't. As Yoda said, there is no try, only do or do not. I "should" exercise. OK, so what's that say? I "should" do a lot of things, doesn't mean I'm going to. That would fall in the "do not" category. Perhaps what would work better is "I am exercising". No should, no will, no need to, but doing.
It requires self discipline. It requires becoming aware of your subconscious resistance to actions and then overcoming that resistance. Beating down that negative inner voice. Replacing try with do. Some people naturally have this ability. Others, like myself, struggle with it every single day.
Fear is the greatest obstruction to self discipline. It's amazing what we truly are afraid of if we are honest with ourselves. Fear of failure, of success, of rejection, of mediocrity, of risks. We fear so many things and often we aren't even aware of these fears. Fear creates anxiety, anxiety produces undesirable and often negative psychological conditions. So we avoid fear. Or pretend to ignore it.
But we need to remember, failure is a stepping stone, not a tombstone. Failure is something to learn from, not run from. I've failed at losing weight more times than I can count. Now I am learning from those failures, learning what works and what doesn't.
Learning and then applying self discipline is a huge help when overcoming failure. Self discipline requires making a decision to act on something. I made the decision to do something about my weight and my health. After making the decision to act a person must then prepare. Preparation can consist of many different things. For me a large part of the preparation was getting to a place where I cared enough about myself and my life to do something about it.
Visualization can be a key factor in this preparation. Positive self talk with little pictures of movies inside your head. You know, thinking about the things you will be able to do when you don't weigh over 500 pounds. Thinking about how different life will be when you're healthy and able to do the things you want to do.
And then, once you're ready, it's time for action. That's where I've always stalled out in the past. I'm a fantastic planner. Great at preparation. Ideas come easy. I can write lists of what I need to do for days. It's the next step, the action, that causes me grief. It makes me want to crawl back toward my isms and hide. It brings out the negative self talk, all the excuses why it can't or won't or isn't. So I've had to step back the the planning stage many many times. I'm finally getting into the action stage. Moving forward with things. Making some progress.
And that brings us to that stage I hope to reach some day. Completion and maintenance. To reach the goal. To get to that point I want to reach. And then stay there. Or improve things even more. I've reached this stage with my depression. I'm able to maintain at an acceptable level. Every once in a while I slip, but I don't stay their, I work my way back and maintain once again. And I hope one day to do the same with my weight.
Change is a choice. A choice between living in your comfort zone and achieving all those things you want. Just because it's a comfort zone doesn't mean it's a comfortable place to be. Sometimes it feels like the safe place to be and fear holds you there. Fear has kept me locked in a life of isms. But I'm bustin out.
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