Keeping your eye on the goal

It's funny how you find blog topics.  I was out for my walk today when I visually saw mine. 

I decided to take the return trip from my walk down an alley between two buildings.  It's a half-mile but from one end of the alley where I enter I can see, as if it is RIGHT in front of me, the building to which I am going.  It makes the walk seem SO much shorter.  Seeing this visual cue gives me a direct goal to reach for.  So it got me to thinking about my approaches to weight loss.

Whenever anyone has said that he/she wants to lose x-amount of pounds a week, I ALWAYS say - "That is ridiculous - you cannot command your body to do anything.  Just follow the program and your body will lose at its own rate."  I still believe that, but I realized today that this attitude has also kept me from obtaining goals because I have had none.  Yes, the immediate goal is to stay on a weight-loss program, but I never had a resultant goal.  If I lost weight that would be a bonus.  If I went down in size that would be a bonus.  If my blood-work numbers improved that would be a bonus.  But I never saw these as goals themselves, and that always kept my motivation rather weak and murky.  Sticking to a weight-loss program just never provided the end goal in and of itself that I need to see down that 1/2-mile alley to where I am going.

I don't want to over-analyze this - did I think these goals are not possible for me? that I am not worthy of them? that I have no faith in myself? etc.?  The point is that I never verbalized far goals.  I am seeing my doctor again in six months.  I want to be down 20 pounds from where I am this morning.  I want my blood sugar to be under 100.  I want my glucose ratio to be under 6.0.  I want my triglycerides to be under 150.  I want to be able to walk 2 miles without back pain. 

And through this all I am going to eat for health, not just for weight loss.  I was remembering back to a couple of years ago- I was never so sick in my life as when I was eating for weight loss and not health.  I ate so much processed garbage in the name of low points it took me months to straighten out my digestive system. I have enough problems right now, thank you, with my digestive system.  I am on a very strong anti-inflammatory that is making me so bloated I feel like I am going to explode.  I am taking counter-active measures (enzyme pills and digestive teas) but I don't know how much longer I can keep this up.  I was able to walk .2 of a mile today before my back started whispering to me, and .5 before it started really complaining, and .8 before it started yelling.  So I know the anti-inflammatory is working.  But, if I can't take the side effects I might have to consider the cortisone/lidacaine shots in my back. 

Anyhoo.... I am daring to have goals in this new year.  I spoke them aloud.  I put them here.  I can see the weight loss program as the alley - but the goals as the building all that way down in front of me.

Miriam