Champagne and Socks

What you want is the dramatic – you want to flash from the before to the after photo with maybe a montage of yourself flipping back your fringe, wiping sweat off your brow, balancing a pencil on your thumb, laughing at a joke and sipping a bottle of water. You want to go from A to B, from being past you to future you without having to sojourn for long in the present or the between times. To get the A+ in the exam without actually having to put in all that hard work studying.

Would that that was how it worked.

And what a revelation that it’s not. Not.

Or maybe that’s the real reason that it’s taken me this long. I’m starting to wonder if maybe it’s that I’m inherently lazy. I know what you’re going to say to that, so let me stop you there and say, actually I *appear* productive because I *procrastinate*. A. Lot. You see publishing company. I see how that was supposed to be a masters degree, phd if I’d really dug deep, in environmental engineeering. Sure, I prefer the publishing company but is that really the point?

My transformation has been going on a lot longer than the 12 weeks that I’ve been doing the 12 week body transformation. It was part of the reason I signed up at all. But I think this program kicked me into top gear on addressing my physical transformation (still in progress) as well as teaching me how to think differently which has accelerated a lot of the mental one (also still in progress).

I’ve learned a lot in the last 3 months that I’ve been able to apply to other things I’m still grappling with. Number 1 is – no more excuses. It turns out for me, that excuses are my number 1 reason for not doing things and when you check yourself and become aware that something is an *excuse* and not a *reason*, it’s much harder to let that play out. When you start removing your ability to accept excuses from yourself in one area of life (like, I can’t exercise today because it is raining), you start to stop accepting them elsewhere.

Blocks. I’m learned to look through them, around them and vaporise them. So the above, I can’t exercise because it’s raining, becomes – well I know I don’t like to exercise in the rain, so here is a DVD I can do inside at home. Damn! Excuse identified, solution provided. Annoying! But then you start to look elsewhere at why you aren’t doing things – so in part I think it’s cause I’m lazy. (I should say, obviously I know I work hard and for long hours and that I want to read a book or knit for fun and I am *entitled* to do this, but I also have things I want to achieve, and if I want that, if I really want that, then I have to work harder. It would be simpler to just not want it, then this wouldn’t be an issue.) But ok. The other thing is, I get blockages when it’s something I don’t want to do or say – like, I struggle with keeping my inbox in shape because a lot of my emails will have to be telling people no for something or that I don’t want to do what they want me to, or asking for more postage or sending rejections etc. And I don’t want to do that, I don’t like how it makes me feel. But .. those are just excuses! And so it goes … ain’t nothing but to go forward, say no as best and kindly as I can, and move on.

I discovered that a plan, a realistic plan, works. I’m worried that was such a surprise to me. I make plans all the time and I achieve things. But a couple of weeks ago, I reached the goal weightloss I had set myself for these 12 weeks and we were looking at the goals I was setting for the next 12 weeks. And I looked at C with real incredulity as I said, “but … it really *works*, I mean, you say you want to lose X kg, you execute the plan, and… and … then you get the goal at the end?” and he was really puzzled by that. (I spose his day job revolves around such thinking.) But I’m not sure I’ve ever really done that before – set a plan, break it down into tiny steps of how you’re going to do it, and then follow it to the letter and then get where you wanted to go. And a lot of it has to do with the fact that I did set myself a realistic goal. And I know that. But it also makes me wonder if all I need is a more detailed plan for my life

But this has also reinforced something that I did know – it’s all about consistency. It’s about following the plan, keeping your eye on the prize in the distance and not letting the ebb and flow of individual days get in the way. It’s about chipping away at it every single day no matter what. But this is actually quite huge. I’ve discovered as long as I lose about 200g a day, I’m going to reach my weightloss goals. I don’t always lose 200g a day, oddly thurs through sat/sun I’m pretty light and then I’m not from then to weigh in on a weds. I know this now about my body and I don’t freak out if I bob around the goal of the week. Eye on the prize.

But consistency is unbelievably important for any large or long term goal. I always knew this about publishing. I work on TPP every single day. Every day I do something to move something along. My rule of thumb has always been to edit/proof something every day. If I do that, the book gets done by deadline. But now I include that – do something every day – to a bunch of others aspects about running the press. As long as you keep things ticking over, it will all get done. And make sure you do it with consistency (always give good customer service, always be prompt, be professional etc).

I’m starting to see how this applies to other things. Like big, seemingly insurmountable things – like the big house declutter and big craft projects. I’m learning to see things like these as dynamic, ongoing projects. That if I chip away at them every day, they will eventually get done. And I need to find the equivalent of the 200 g daily milestone rather than looking at the whole thing and getting upset I didn’t build Rome in a day. I often watch the Hoarders Buried  Alive show to reassure myself I’m not like that, and to kick myself into not being that. It’s the best way to get me to look at the last dregs of my house move stuff still to sort out. So much emotion wrapped up in this last declutter. But I’ve been starting to see progress finally and it’s from just continuing to chip away at things and also at finding ways to go around roadblocks. For example, I finally started addressing the book collection issue last week. If I have less books to shelve, then that will help in deciding how to shelve them. I started culling. And I started donating what I didn’t think I could sell and I started eBaying what I thought I could. I removed three shopping bags of books from my house last week and have sold 10 books so far online (I’ve made $7). I keep in mind the hoarders who successfully overcome their being buried alive – it’s a long process, it’s not won in a day – if they got their houses bulldozed away in one day, that would deal with the mess but not the issues that got them there. There is something really vital about actually working through the problem. By being in control – by setting a plan and carrying it out – by talking yourself through the excuses, the panic ,the roadbloacks and the emotions, you can not only achieve the goal but be freed when you finally reach/overcome it.

I also learned something so important and so freaking obvious it’s not funny that this is a revelation. You can’t undo hardwork. If I go off the nutrition plan and have something “bad for me” – I haven’t ruined my diet, I have eaten one thing with a bunch of calories. That *could* mean that I go on to exceed my calorie intake for the day, but it might not. One thing is for sure, eating more “bad things” is only going to *add* to the exceedance. It’s not like you restart the next day at a nil balance. And it’s not like you have a tick or a cross for your day performance and if you do 1 bad thing you go from a tick to a cross. And in fact, if you eat one thing that was off plan, most likely, you can wiggle around and accommodate it. You know, if the rest of the time you are consistently on the plan. One chocolate bar does not make you fat. I have no idea, now, how the logical course of action in my head to having one “treat” was to say “oh well, ruined it now, may as well tuck in and eat whatever the hell now, there’s no point.” Which of course means that now, having one treat is no longer associated with a feeling of “badness” or being naughty. It’s a choice. And it’s amazing how often, when given the choice, I don’t want what’s on offer.

It’s the getting used to most of the time saying no to things I normally said yes to so that I can say yes sometimes and it be ok. And the only way I don’t mind doing that is when I look at how many times I said yes to things I either didn’t care one way or the other about or didn’t even necessarily like. I said yes because it was there or because it was offered to me. Not good reasons to say yes about anything. And guess what? When you get used to say no in one aspect of your life … it gets easier to say it in others …

The transformation continues.