Starting From Zero

Over the last two years, I have gained nearly 20 kgs. This was after I had lost 15 kgs through diet, discipline and exercise. Because I was once in a phase where I was losing weight, getting back in shape, and receiving compliments, I thought I could replicate it at any time.

Weight gain is a peculiar thing. It creeps up on you. At first, you brush it off as holiday weight, which you will burn off. Then it appears stubborn, and the needle moves to the wrong side. You console yourself, saying that what you have is water weight. The discipline slowly starts chipping away. It begins with that one extra bite, that burger you swore off, or the sweets that are ok to have once in a while, become a regular feature. In your mind, you go back to your past laurels of losing a significant amount and tell yourself, after this one time, you will be back. First comes the body aches, then comes less agility, the constant breaks to catch your breath in the gym, then the form and posture become wrong even when you are picking up the same weight, and finally, you refuse to look at yourself in the mirror and get on the machine because the mirror and the machine do not lie.

You refuse to believe the truth until you can no longer. The path for change does not start by hitting the gym with new vigour or going on a crash diet. It begins by killing your ego. By accepting that you are not the same person who lost all that weight. It begins by acknowledging that you are starting from scratch again.

Once that mental cage is broken, the ego is dissolved, you are ok to start replacing the unhealthy items with healthy ones slowly, but those with which you can stick for a long time. It means sucking up your ego and picking that lighter weight in the gym, not caring about what others think. You need to get your form right. It means walking the path again!

As with everything, transformation only happens when the ego is killed!

It is only killed when we stop lying to ourselves.