Off In The Wrong Direction

Stepping on a scale early on in a diet can be an exercise in futility. In the two days since beginning this diet, I’ve expended about 3,300 more calories than I’ve ingested, which nutritionists will generalize to be near the benchmark one needs to accumulate in order to shed one pound.

Stepping on the scale yesterday morning, I was steady at where I’d started: 234.8 pounds. Going through that ritual again this morning, I disappointedly found that I’d gained two.

That’s OK, my rationalizing self tells me. You’ve made an abrupt change from long-established over-eating and under-exercising habits, scaring the heck out of your metabolism and physiology and basically turning them into hoarders with shields full up to protect it from the starvation all its sensors are saying is imminent.

Retain! Retain! Retain!

Trouble is the petulant and impatient side of me ever in need of immediate results, calls bullshit. It wants the loss and it wants it now!

Not gonna happen, says rational self.

“Go to hell,” says impatient self. “Gimme a donut. And a couch to eat it on.”

And there’s me somewhere in between, a veteran of these mental tug-o-wars, who despite the short-term disappointment ultimately knows that losing weight is always a marathon, never a sprint. An endurance test that one will never ace with haste.

 

 

 

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Will

Will Campbell arrived in town via the maternity ward at Good Sam Hospital way back in OneNineSixFour and has never stopped calling Los Angeles home. Presently he lives in Silver Lake with his wife Susan, their cat Rocky, dogs Terra and Hazel, and a red-eared slider turtle named Mater. Blogging since 2001, Will's web endeavors extend back to 1995 with laonstage.com, a comprehensive theater site that was well received but ever-short on capital (or a business model). The pinnacle of his online success (which speaks volumes) arrived in 1997, when much to his surprise, a hobby site he'd built called VisuaL.A. was named "best website" in Los Angeles magazine's annual "Best of L.A." issue. He enjoys experiencing (and writing about) pretty much anything creative, explorational and/or adventurous, loves his ebike, is a better tennis player than he is horr golfer, and a lover of all creatures great and small -- emphasis on "all."