Grass by Piece of Grass.

I WIN!!

Today I was the champion of an almost 6 day fight in my head. After my lunch break I slipped into my workout clothes, put my tennis shoes by the door, ready for the trail I would hit at 5pm.

I don't know if it was sitting in my workout clothes for hours that made the change or if it was the sunshine or the fabulous lunch I shared with a friend but when I started to jog today it didn't trigger a fight. Two and a half of my four miles were spent running today.

the view from my water bottle.

I kept laughing at myself. "Jog to the next tree", I would say. Before I would reach that tree I would say "Jog to the telephone pole." and on and on the hour went. Sometimes I would set a marker and then decide I needed a shorter goal..."forget the bush, just jog to that tall piece of grass. Then think about the stupid bush." I might have taken it piece of grass by silly piece of grass but I made it a mile in 12 minutes and then started jogging again.

That jog was like my weight-loss. I have broken down my goal not in half but in 10 pound (or less) intervals. If I thought about the end goal I would give up before reaching it because I can't see it, it's so far away. When I was jogging, it was the same thing. I knew the mile marker was out there but I didn't know how far away it was so I made the goal shorter and by the time I saw the mile marker, the end, I knew I could finish what I started. My short goals I call "mini-markers" and still sometimes 10 pounds feels too far away so I break it down to my goal that week. Then the goal for the week is too far away so I step on the scale in the mornings during the week...not to record what it says but because that morning scale step is like the next piece of grass.

Maybe I have a short attention span or maybe I'm just really good at breaking huge goals down into manageable pieces. Whatever the reason, I'm going to keep concentrating on that next piece of grass and eventually I will have reached my goal with a big bottle of water in hand.