When I was younger and back living on the farm with my family, my three cousins and I used to do quite a bit together. They were older, so I was always fascinated with the things they could that I couldn't do. My oldest cousin was very much into cars and in his room he had a shelf with lots of car models that he put together. These models were awesome. Every piece fit perfectly, they were very clean, there was no glue showing, and they had paint jobs that looked pretty professional (for being 15 years old).
I really wanted to get into building car models like him. I came home one night and asked my parents if I could go to the toy store and pick up a couple of models to get started with my new hobby. At the store there were hundreds of model car kits to choose from setup for various different levels of experience. Of course, I never went for the starter kits, I always went for the advanced models with more pieces, smaller pieces, harder pieces to glue together. I also had to paint the car, every bit of it, instead of using stickers like most of the basic model kits had. Needless to say, I dived deep into model car building head first, a typical reaction for me when I "get into something."
I brought home those models and the glue and the paints and laid them all out on a table in my basement, ready for me to start my new life as an expert model car builder. The first couple of days, I spent all of my free time doing it. For never doing it before I think I got pretty far. My new life as a model car building was going exactly the way I envisioned it. However, after a couple of days, it started to get harder. The smaller pieces needed to be put together, there was more detailing, and there was more time needed to dry between putting pieces together. It was very frustrating. The kits were really too hard for me. After all, I was 10, not 15 like my cousin. This stuff was way over my head.
After just a few days and few too many frustrations, my model kits, glue, and paints were left on the table in the basement and never picked up again (until my Mom eventually threw them in the garbage).
Starting out of the gate, I have been incredibly excited to use this journal process as an outlet to assist me with my journey of controlling my poor eating habits and reducing my weight. I have considered lots of examples and experiences that directly relate to my habits with food and position on health in general and I am eager to share them all.
Friday night after work I was sharing this new "hobby" with my wife and expressing to her how jazzed I was to be doing this and how I had all of these crazy ideas related to this process when she gently reminded me of something very important: She has seen this in me before. It was true. Here I was with another new idea and I was going all out on it, letting it consume my entire thought process. Going "all out" is a typical behavior for me, perhaps a bit compulsive and perhaps something that tributes itself to the way I approach food and eating at times.
For once, her warning was clear and I knew that it was not healthy for me to get into this so much that I quickly burn out. She was right. I was in it head first again, going nuts over the blogging or journal process because I was so excited about it and believed that it may be my answer to something I have failed to do so many times before.
What we have to realize is that taking on a behavioral change like compulsive eating is something that no matter how intense you get about it, requires time to happen. And, how you approach making a behavioral change is key to its success.
Life Lesson #3: Behavioral Change is a Marathon, not a Sprint
When we start a new season with the marching band program, the initial excitement by the members is infectious. Looking back on their previous experience, they know that they can't wait to get started on working towards learning their show and having their first performance. But the season is long. They have spring rehearsals, summer vacation, band camp, a month of summer rehearsals, and then, at the start of a new school year they finally get their first performance. Two months after that, they are still performing and closing in on their championships. It can be a long and grueling process.
I have to remind the students many times throughout the year that it is a long season and they need to be able to focus on improving their performance each and every week within that long period of time. As instructors, we always see a dip in their focus and attention throughout, but no more so than towards the end of the season, when they have had quite enough marching band and are ready for something else. It is then when we have to remind them that if the activity was a race, the performances may be sprints, but the season is a marathon.
For me, this process in changing my eating behavior is going to take a long period of time. My losing weight is also going to take a long period of time if I want to be healthy about it. After all, as my wife reminds me, it took a long time to put it on in the first place. So with that in mind, I have tempered the intensity and focus on pacing myself a bit to ensure that I can sustain this process for the long haul. Preparing to run a marathon is an entirely different process than preparing to run the 100m dash and the quicker we realize it, the sooner we can train ourselves with that goal in mind.
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