
What is the daunting thing you’re afraid of to lose weight? When I looked closely at my thoughts, I found I list of things…
- I won’t get to eat pizza ever again
- My thin friends only eat healthy stuff BLAH
- I’ll lose some weight and gain it all back, fail again
- I won’t have the willpower to finish
- I can’t imagine how I’ll have to eat the rest of my life
- And when I do imagine, it looks miserable
There’s a running theme through these thoughts. Discomfort. I was afraid of feeling discomfort. I was avoiding discomfort like the plague.
But I was feeling discomfort, every single day, with all the excess weight. Here’s the kicker, I was comfortable with my current discomfort. I was used to it. It was the discomfort I knew. Some of my daily discomfort included
- Ashamed of how I looked
- Uncomfortable clothes
- Physically feeling crappy
- Always felt like the fat girl in the room, UGH
I realized I was afraid to trade by current discomfort for the discomfort I didn’t yet know. That new discomfort somehow seemed worse. Really? It was all in my mind. Perceived discomfort. Truly I was imaging what it would be without experiencing it.
The other day I had an epiphany about discomfort. I had debilitating pain in my knee, having trouble even walking. It was affecting my sleep. I went to the doctor and the first treatment was a cortisone injection. Wait! You’re going to stick a really long needle into the middle of my painful knee. FEAR raised its ugly head. Would I rather stay in excruciating pain or face my discomfort and try the cortisone? I chose the treatment. The IMAGINED fear I had about getting the injection was much worse than actually getting it. The cortisone helped. I still have discomfort, but it’s different and not nearly the discomfort I had before.
Which discomfort are you choosing? The discomfort you’re comfortable with? I encourage you to trade it for the discomfort you don’t yet know. It’s the only way to change.