All I have ever wanted to do in life is make a difference in someone’s (anyone’s) life, but I never stopped for a moment to think about the difference I was making in my own life. I, over indulged myself a few weekend ago. In alcohol, in food, in slothness. Normally, I would beat myself up over it, but I just asked myself this: WHY DID I MAKE THE CHOICE TO DO IT?
Alcohol: My dad drank when I was little. He said he quit cold turkey when my mom threatened to take me and my sister back to her homeland and when he drank our Christmas present money away. Maybe I was too little to remember this, but I remember a pretty idyllic childhood. Summers playing with my cousins in the cornfields or dirt fields of the neighbors, winter Fridays with the entire family at my grandparents, spring nights camping in the backyard, fall afternoons raking leaves and climbing trees. Out of respect to my dad, I didn’t drink until I was the legal age of 21 and I hated my first drink, a sip of mekong in Thailand with my Grandpa Sook, and I hated my beer, a Guinness, and I hated my first liquor drink. Then I turned 25 and alcohol wasn’t hated so much. The thing I realized over the weekend, I am a social drinker. I don’t drink because I love the taste. I normally drink to take that shy edge off of my personality. Liquid courage. When I woke up feeling like death spinning in a slow cooking microwave, I. of course, cursed all drinking and vowed to never do it again. Part of me, in all honesty, a very large part of me, wants to give up drinking all together. The small part of me raises it’s hand and asks, “what about a great pinot noir?” Out of all the types of alcohol in the world, a great bold cab is my favorite, but I don’t like drinking alone (social drinker). So as I try to figure out what the hell I want to do, I am doing “dry July.” No booze for the month. I also want to do this because I want to train properly for my half marathon.
Food: I wish I could say I became a vegetarian years ago because I was troubled by how animals were treated, but I grew up near farms. The farmers I knew didn’t beat or abuse their animals. They fed them by hand and checked in on them daily. I was surprised when I discovered slaughterhouses of course, but my family hunted, we ate what the men killed. I became a serious vegetarian while reading “Happy Yoga” by Steve Ross. I loved his yoga on the Oxygen Network and was looking for more in my life. That book gave it to me. In it, he mentions two things: how toxins enter the blood stream of the animal no matter how cruel-free it is killed because it senses the death or fears the death and how long dead animal (meat) has to sit in our stomachs to be processed. The latter grossed me out so much that I went strictly vegetarian the next day. I stopped being a vegetarian in Nov 2011 with the full intention of returning to a vegetarian lifestyle in January 2012 after my trip to Australia. It’s now July of 2013 and I am finally returning to the lifestyle 100%, but as I return, I want to ultimately cut out all diary (sadly that means no goat cheese), highly processed foods/packaged foods (I’m sorry, I waste way to much money on fresh vegetables to give up frozen vegetables right now), and sugars. I want to fuel my body properly and with healthy foods not shit that will weigh it down. By the end of 2013, I am hoping for more of a natural, raw, vegan diet. (Seriously, I’m going to miss the hell out of goat cheese.)
Slothness: For me, looking at pictures that were posted on Facebook was a huge reminder at what huge success I have had in losing weight. 23lbs. When I tell people I was at a weight of 153lbs (the most I ever weighed in at was 160), most don’t believe, understand, whatever. I was a chunky monkey. I am 5lbs away from my goal of 125lbs and I know that goal is easily attainable just by getting my lazy ass off the damn couch. I don’t know what clicked in my head to make me finally stick to the working out and the running, but I want it to continue. I am doing this half marathon (what the hell was I thinking) because a part of me says I can’t and the other part is saying fuck you, I can just you watch. I want to do this half marathon a little bit lighter in weight because it’s going to be hard for me: mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically and I don’t need to carry any extra baggage with me across the start/finish line that’s for sure.
So, this is where I am at in making a difference in my life. I try so hard to be a positive force for others that I really wasn’t being a positive force for myself but now I am. I refuse to settle back into the old me, blah/sloth/lazy/fat me. I want to better me. Make a difference to me. If it happens to inspire, move, motivate, whatever someone else along the way, then fuck yeah!
Listening to “Sugar” by Editors