You ever watch those goofy shows on television–the weight loss shows where the people are crying because they have had their “breakthrough”? They realized and learned what it was that caused them to be fat in the first place…  and it was life changing–well, or changing for at least as long as they were on the show.

I always thought that was so ridiculous.  You don’t need a “breakthrough” to lose weight.  The recipe is VERY simple.  Burn more calories than you consume.  That’s it.  End of.  There are lots of ways you can get there, but there’s no other story.

Or that’s what I thought until the breakthrough happened.

Over and over on my Facebook posts, I refer to the Voltaire saying “Perfect is the Enemy of the Good”  There are so many variations of this  (The grass is always greener, second place is the first loser, etc.).  But to me it meant that nothing would ever be good enough, so why bother.

I was never going to be good enough…

This couldn’t have been more obvious to me than when I reached my target weight in 2005.  Well, I KIND of reached my target weight….  I had lost 170 pounds in 7 months… busting my butt EVERY day.  I was only eating 800 calories and I was working out for 60-180 minutes a day.  It was all done medically…  and I lost it all.

Now according to scales I still had another 25 pounds to go, but according to the plastic surgeon I saw, I had 40 pounds of skin that would take four surgeries to remove.  I HAD to remove the skin for my accomplishment to count.  In my eyes, I kept telling myself that nothing had really changed… that it wasn’t worth the time and effort I had put in.  Why bother trying if I had to get this surgery I couldn’t afford?   Again, perfect was the enemy of good.  I missed seeing how my health had improved, how my appearance had improved.  I was so busy thinking about what was next and how to get there that I became very depressed by “now.”

Still, I kept pushing myself as hard as I possibly could at every workout class.  I would do three classes a day.  Every time I heard some trainer say, “You can do better than that!   You have one more in you!”  my feeling was not motivation–instead, I was discouraged.

What I was doing wasn’t good enough.

I didn’t have one more in me.  I had given everything I had.  It wasn’t there, and I felt like what was the point in even trying if all I’m going to do is disappoint?

“Boot camp” was the WORST.  I paid $175 to go to Pflugerville High School in the heat of the afternoon and have high school coaches abuse me.  They would chase up and down bleachers, push people down from their shoulders as they were doing lunges… They would run beside on the track and demand that we pick up the pace.  In the end, they’d tell us what a great job we did and how proud of ourselves we should be.  I’d get in the car crying because clearly what I had been doing WASN’T good enough… they wouldn’t have been yelling at me to try harder if it was.  I had already pushed myself to my limit.  All they did was make me feel bad.

So, eventually I quit.  Not only did I quit that, however, I quit caring about any of it.  I mean if I was never going to have the beach body… if I was never going to be the elite athlete… Why even try?   I couldn’t reach these goals that other people had set for me, and I found myself getting more depressed.  I was not good enough for them, so how could I possibly be good enough for me?

So, let’s fast forward 12 years.  FINALLY, my brain kicked in and figured out why I would want to be healthy.  And I’m doing the whole thing VERY differently this time.  I pay attention to what I eat every day… and some weeks I lose weight.  Some weeks I don’t.  I have no clue how many calories I’m eating.  I just try to make good choices.  I try to workout some every day… sometimes it’s 80 minutes… sometimes it’s 15.  It depends on what fits into my day that day.

I have no goal… I’m just doing what I should be doing.  I’m not trying to achieve something better and better and better.  I’m listening to my body and doing what needs to happen for it.

Then, yesterday, my stupid weight watchers app suggested that I should try harder, and it made me want to crumble.

I know it’s a nameless, faceless device…  but it was so disheartening.  I had just finished a 70 minute workout… and here it was, telling me that I should push harder and do more.  I had just pushed myself to the limit… and again, it wasn’t enough.

Like the last weight loss, like boot camp…..  I still wasn’t enough.  No matter how good of a job I felt like I was doing… it wasn’t enough.

But luckily, whatever changed in my head this time stuck with me.  The voice who told me I wanted to make the change spoke up again and told me to close that prompt on the app.   Nope,  I don’t want to increase my fitness goals.  I’m good with what I’m doing, thank you very much.

I’m going to have eggs Benedict and mimosa for breakfast this morning… and I’m good with that, too.  That means I’ll only eat vegetables for the rest of the day…  but I’m okay with that.

Is it the PERFECT way to eat and exercise?  No, it is not…

But it’s better… and it’s good.

And I’m happy with good.