No Eating After Dinner Challenge: Day 18

Sometimes when you make small changes, it’s more difficult to see when it is working. The motivation isn’t always there to keep you on track until one day you begin to see the difference your daily adjustments are making.

With yoga, I felt calmer inside but physically I couldn’t tell until one day my plank to chaturanga flowed with ease.  My body was bending further during forward folds and my flexibility made me more limber than ever before.

With social media, it wasn’t till recently that I saw the long term effects of minimizing my time on these accounts. I was able to think clearer, not be as anxious and writing came to me with ease because I wasn’t bogged down by all the noise.

With this current challenge, I thought by eating before bed, it would allow my body time overnight to properly digest food. I would then wake up in the morning feeling good about myself. One side benefit that I’ll gladly take is the inflammation and bloating in my stomach is gone and I’ve lost a couple inches around my waist. My pants are getting looser even with this one simple change.

It can be hard to keep up with your new habits everyday when an instant change doesn’t occur. That’s when you need to step back and look at how far you have come from day one.

When I look back at the woman I was four years ago, it is not the same woman I see in the mirror today. As a whole, we are in the mindset of immediate gratification but that only satisfies us for a hot second. The lasting changes, the ones you can’t always see right away, will stay with you for a lifetime.

This is when the comparison game can kick in because you see others being more successful, speeding through processes you have difficulty with, and in your mind they are doing better than you.

STOP!

You don’t know what the details of their days look like and if they are doing more or less work than you are. You are unaware of their whole situation because all you are seeing are the highlights. If you keep looking outwards to others for answers, your joy will be gone.

It’s time to look inward knowing that you are doing your best to move your habits along to where you want to be, not where others are.

I find myself getting sucked into the comparison trap but then I remind myself that my path looks very different than theirs. And when I feel that twinge of jealously or anxiety then it’s time to get off the phone, listen to the voices in my head and write my own story.

The speed of my journey is different than yours but doesn’t mean I am doing it wrong OR better than you. We are doing exactly what we need to be doing in this moment and my position in life is where it is meant to be and I AM MORE than okay with that. If I don’t like where I am, the only person who can change that is me.

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