Drop the weight of your own expectations

Another Manic Monday? Maybe you need to take a chill pill like I did!!

Feeling disheartened? Are you hard on yourself? Do you feel like giving up? Is it all just too damn hard?

…Maybe we need to retrain our minds to stop looking at things with a glass half empty mentality.

In my early 20’s I prided myself on my unquestionable, unshakable work ethic. My lack of self belief and legitimate lack of experience created an unbelievable drive in me to work harder than anyone around me. I would be ‘on’ from the moment I woke up until I fell into bed exhausted. My outlook and perspective changed when I read Tim Ferriss’ book – four hour work week.
It opened my eyes to analysing productivity and I then made it my mission to be fiercely productive. The person I became was decisive and direct. That young woman achieved a lot in the next few years – but also sacrificed a lot.

I ended up resenting the very things I had created for myself. In retrospect its because I was focused on ‘results’ and hadn’t considered how willing I actually was to continue living at such a pace. I feel that people do the same thing when it comes to weightloss. They become fixated on the end result and will do anything to get there – but don’t consider who they will be once they arrive at their desired result. They also don’t consider whether it is sustainable.

I am in the process of building two businesses at the moment. I am constantly having to slow myself down as I feel myself building too much momentum again. Growth and productivity are essential to ensuring the success of these businesses – but I need to remember that they ultimately come at a cost. The self imposed timelines and schedules I create are the cause of my unhappiness. Just two night ago I was feeling really down and when Steve asked me what was wrong I explained that I just felt overwhelmed and disheartened because I was behind on everything. He looked at me with confusion. I realised I was creating problems that didn’t even exist based on standards I was trying to maintain. The very same standards that lead to unhappiness in my past. Why was I doing it again?

Moments of clarity come in our darkest moments. I was allowing myself to get down for no real reason. We are happy and healthy and have a beautiful home. I have the life I was longing for with a man that adores me almost as much as I adore him. I don’t need to push myself so hard. Its ok to allow things to take longer than they possible could.

Are you pushing yourself to lose weight too quickly? Have you put a self imposed timeline on yourself that leads to you feeling disheartened? What is that about? Question the beliefs you have about how fast/slow weight loss should be. If you are fuelling your body with good food and moving every day …isn’t that a win? Weightloss will come. It is not a linear process. Its an ugly science but if you stay consistent – it will happen. It has to.

When you are feeling down, stop and ask yourself whether you really need to go down that road of self pity. Are things actually in fact fine just the way they are? If you are on your way to losing weight and feeling better about yourself from the inside out…you are exactly where you need to be.

Choose to see the good. Lets keep talking about our joys. Live in the light of your life.