For as long as I can remember I have been chubby.  I would diet and trim down, but I never really got to the point where I wasn’t overweight.  I spent summers avoiding ice cream and the buffet style cookouts only to regain the weight within a couple months of going back to school.

I wanted recognition from others for what I was trying to do and, when I didn’t get it, I just went back to the only lifestyle I remembered.  I gained the weight back before I knew it.  This cycle continued until my senior year in college, when I realized that I was tired of repeating the same cycle and chose to make this a permanent lifestyle change – for myself.

Losing over 60 pounds in 2007 is probably the greatest accomplishment I have done because it’s been a lasting impression.  It’s been almost 3 years and I have still kept my weight off.

Now, I do weigh heavier than I did in December 2007.  Getting heavier has made me feel somewhat insecure in myself.  Fact remains that the insecurity I have always had with my weight has never gone away.  It’s the only way I have known my body to be up until 3 years ago.  To me, that is how I naturally view myself and I look at every body change under a microscope.  We always find our own flaws in ourselves—flaws that nobody else even sees—because of how critical we are about what we want and where we are afraid we will wind up.

Technically I am gaining weight, but I’m actually putting on muscle…and transforming my body.  As critical as I can be about my body and worried about gaining back the weight I have been able to keep off for almost 3 years now, I have to remember that getting heavier does not mean that I am reverting to who I was before.  It’s weird because I eat normally again, which I wasn’t doing on my diet, but I can do that now because I understand how my body works.

It’s weird to me to think that I can eat how I used to before I lost all this weight and not worry about gaining it back.  It’s a thought that crosses my mind each time I have pizza or french fries.  Instead of worrying about becoming 265 again, I need to remember that I am currently wearing a size Medium shirt.

Self perceptions cannot be ignored, but we have to understand the biased way we view ourselves individually.  While they can keep us in check from gorging and reverting back to who we were, they can damage how we see ourselves, self-confidence and the confidence we have to take on the world.  I know that I pinpoint areas on my body and that I still have things I want to improve on, but I owe it to myself to feel great about what I have done and continue to do with keeping my weight off.  That is the utmost importance.  Fact is this December will mark 3 years of keeping my weight off, and I must be doing something right if that long after losing the weight I am sitting here typing this blog in a perfectly fitting Medium-sized t-shirt.

I came home from work and within 10 minutes my street, and no other street int he community, has a complete blackout.  At first I could see around the house, but by 6:45 the darkness was creeping in.  By 7 o'clock I had started dozing on the couch.  And yes, by 7:30 I peeled myself off the couch, grabbed a flash light, brushed my teeth and went to bed.

I woke up at my normal 5 AM time, but for the first time in as long as I can remember, I got more than 9 hours of sleep during the week.  Go figure, as a result I had one of my best workouts in ages and did not yawn at work until I was about to leave.

It's funny how there really is nothing you can do when darkness completely sets in with no power.  It was only 7:30, but it sure felt like 10:30 or 11 pm at night.  It made me feel more tired than I probably actually was, but as hard as I have been working I probably needed the extra hours sleep.

Luckily, the power came back at 8:30 PM that night.  My mom came in to tell me, but I was enjoying my early night's sleep.  Maybe I'll try it more often.  If only I weren't so busy...

Have you noticed how so many people act in a bi-polar type fashion?  Most things shift from one extreme to the other.  If people don’t love something, then they hate it.  Otherwise we are just apathetic about it.  It’s just weird to me.

I think the true reason that I noticed this “extreme” nature is because of my friends.  My two closest friends are Indian and, in Indian culture, family is pretty much everything.  My best friend Ajay more or less defines himself by his family and refrains from doing things because he doesn’t like to do them, but also because of how his actions would reflect on his family.  It’s a big deal that most people seem to take for granted.

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard people say they hate their family.  It’s horrible enough to hear, let alone say.  You hear people say that they hate their jobs, classes or people they have met routinely…but to say that about your family?  Again, if we don’t love something, we hate it.  It’s unbelievable to me that, with the amount of frustration in their voices, they can’t just say that they are frustrated with their family.

That’s, unfortunately, how American culture is. It is blunt and, to variant degrees, thoughtless.  WE are moving so fast and rushing through everything that we do not take time to appreciate key elements of our lives and, instead of working through the frustration, it builds to the point of becoming hate.  It’s sad, and even though I get frustrated with my family, I would never say that I hate them—NEVER!

There’s clearly a lot more that can be said on this, but I am so thankful to have the friends that I do have.  The way they innately embrace their families has broadened, and continues to mold, my once solely American perspective.  To see things beyond an American perspective is so refreshing and this small glimpse into it through my friendships continues to inspire me to travel the world.  Too many people are bitter, especially in DC, which is another reason I want to move to Colorado.  It’ll give me an independent start and, until I can get money together to leave the country and travel, why not have a fresh start in a friendlier place?

We always complain that something is too hard.  And because something is too hard, we decide to give up on doing it today and say that we will do it tomorrow.  However, when tomorrow comes around and we attempt it again AND it is still too hard, we –again—put it off until tomorrow.  At some point tomorrow needs to become today, but by continually pushing it off and making a daily cycle out of avoiding, you are making it so that you never gain at all.

Instead of building your confidence up gradually, you are doing just the opposite—creating more and more doubt with each passing day you push off until tomorrow.  Instead of trying to accomplish one daunting task in one single moment in time, you need to break up the goal and incrementally build towards it.  As your confidence builds with each additional success, you’ll be at your goal before you realize.

Diets work the same way.  There is always an excuse to push it off.  Someone’s birthday is coming up.  Someone brought in this or that to work.  Such and such holiday is only this far away.  Why should I start it today?  It’s just going to get ruined.  I’ll wait until after that day happens…except there is always another day in the near enough future.  Doing just a little bit consistently at a time will get you where you want to be, but that rarely happens because we are always pushing it off until after Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Valentine’s Day, Easter.  By the time we get through the summer treats and labor day cookouts we are back to Halloween!

At some point today needs to remain today, but that is an individual choice to make.  It’s up to you to stick to it.  If you do, however, you’ll be where you want to be before the endless, and fruitless, cycle would have otherwise ended.