A Table Story Part 2: Help

 

    

 If you haven't read the post, A Table Story Part I, you may want to look at it simply because the following will make more sense. It'd be like watching Jedi without seeing Empire...but with less Ewoks. 

Okay, here we go.

     "I'm not telling you that you should lose weight because of how you look. It's not about that. I'm telling you that you should lose weight, because I don't want to see you suffer. I'm old. I know what it's like when you get on in years. Take a look around here. See all these people. You're as good and as smart as any man in this room, but you're paying for something that's not your fault. Someone has their foot on you. There's another person inside of you that I can see, and that person deserves to come out. Like I said, it's not about how you look. Do you understand?"

     The quote above was said to me out of the clear blue sky by a gentleman named Peter. A regular at a restaurant I worked at this past winter. In many ways, it was the catalyst for where I am now and where I'm hopefully headed. 

     I think that people who are thin have an idea about people who are overweight. I feel like that idea goes something like this; that person is heavy because they enjoy being heavy.

     Some folks will tell you that food can be an addiction. I believe process of overeating can certainly be an addictive behavior. To me it was always more of an escape. An escape from the pain of...something.

     If you're overdoing it on anything in life, no matter what it might be, it's usually because you're using that vice as a way to soothe yourself or numb yourself up a bit. A way to take your focus off some deeper issue that's often too much to deal with. Some of those problems may be current and close to the surface, while other may be something from the past. 

    This is why losing weight can be so difficult for so many people. Diet and exercise are hard enough, but if you can't take some time to examine where this awful behavior came from in the first place, they become even harder. Nearly impossible even or at least they feel like that.

     Drugs, booze, Pringles...none of these things are necessarily bad, but our overuse of any of them as a way to avoid dealing with a deeper issue can lead to disaster. That's why it drives me crazy when people are hurtful to others because they simply judge them on an assumption that if they're miserable, they must enjoy being miserable. That's just not the case. I don't know anyone who is extremely unhealthy in one way or another and at the same time are also happy about it. 

     Everyone is different. What's works for me is what works for me and not necessarily someone else. However, this is my blog so all I can do is tell you what works for me. It is still early in my romance with trying to be a better friend to myself. The 20lbs I've lost over the last few weeks are nothing compared to a lifetime. All I can do is take things a day at a time and do my best to stay the course. 

    Before I began the blog, before I began a lot of things lately, I needed to start looking at myself. Why was I letting myself pile misery on top of misery? I was mostly doing it because I wasn't satisfied with my life as it stands. I was focused on the negative. Like Jon Favreau in Swingers, I was focusing on what I don't have instead of what I do. Instead of taking action to make my life better, it was just easier to lie on the couch and stuff my face night after night. Thing is, that never made anything better. It only made it worse. It was a viscous, horrible cycle. 

   If you feel like you're overdoing on food or booze or anything because you're unhappy about work or family or something, you're putting out the fire with gasoline. I feel like a better idea is to take a few steps back, recognize the problem, and ask yourself honestly, "How do I fix this?" And if you don't know how and you need help, ask for it. You will be AMAZED by the amount of people who will be there to help. Once you can look at the problem, really look at it and say to yourself, "I'm better than this." things will fall in line. 

   I'd like to think that the progress I've made these last few weeks is because of me, but it's not. Not entirely anyway. I wrote the first few posts of this blog and all of a sudden I got texts, e-mail, and calls from tons of people saying, “What can I do to help?” I have to tell you reader friends, you're all fucking incredible. I love you and I thank you.

  If you're in the same boat I was in I hope you get out of it. Remember, you deserve to be happy. You deserve to enjoy every second of this life. If it feels like too much and you need some help, all you have to do is ask for it. 

Most of the shadows of this life are caused by standing in one's own sunshine. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love & affection. ~Buddha

Enjoy Wednesday Everyone.