The following is a guest post by Christen, a fellow member of a Livejournal support group I’m a member off called 100 Pounds 2 Lose.  She shared these lessons with us yesterday and I was touched.  I thought perhaps it would touch the rest of you too.

Christen Before

Exactly one year ago I started a new way of life for myself. I wish I could tell you it was easy. I wish I could tell you I never wavered. Both of those things are not true. However, I CAN tell you that it has been the most amazing, most liberating, most fun and absolute best year of my life. A few months ago someone messaged me about my weight loss and asked me what the best lessons I had learned were. I was going to do a video about it, but my camera is officially d-e-d. So, in true writer form, here is a written list:

Things Christen Has Learned (Alternative Title: “Christen, You Are Pretty Much an Idiot, But Sometimes You Get it Right”)

1. Ask for help. Even if you’re shy as hell.

Before this year, I was too timid, scared and proud to admit that I ever needed help with something. I never asked questions, and I took everything anyone told me as unchangeable or unquestionable. It was even so bad that sometimes I was too scared to even ask where the bathroom was in restaurants. However, this year I learned something incredible: people LOVE answering questions. Really. People love to help, if you’ll let them.

The biggest way this lesson came to me was when I finally (finally!) went to the gym for the first time. I got a personal training session from a very nice (and veeeeery attractive) guy named Anthony. And he WANTED to help me. He WANTED to make sure I was doing things right, that I had the right information.

The day after my personal training session I looked at my little workout sheet and realized that I didn’t remember where the next machine I was supposed to use was. I sulked for a second, contemplated leaving and giving up, and then timidly waved over a gym worker. I asked where the machine was (after apologizing a million times for bothering her) and she took me to it, reiterated how to use it, and asked if I had anymore questions. I had an epiphany right next to the lat pull machine. People want to help other people. It makes them feel good.

Ask for help from people, and they will give it. Family, friends, and even strangers. They will help. Ask.

2. Weight lifting is good. So just freaking do it already!

I’ve already mentioned that I started my weight-loss efforts last March. But I didn’t get my butt into the (free! two seconds from my house! full of top-of-the-line equipment! FREE!) gym until last September. Yeah, I’m not proud of myself. However, once I went and got into a routine that I loved, I was absolutely hooked. Weight-lifting especially made me feel amazing.

I am (very, very, very, very, VERY) lucky enough to have all these trainers and awesome pieces of equipment at my disposal, and I use the shit out of them. I can’t believe the muscles I have now. But more than that, I just FEEL better. The muscle ache is almost addictive to me now. Weight-lift. It’s good for you. DO IT.

3. Intention. (Aka Jillian Michaels is a crazy bitch sometimes, but girl sure knows what she’s talking about.)

I know some of you may have issues with Jillian Michaels/The Biggest Loser, but a few months ago (I think it was last season), Jillian said something that absolutely knocked me on my ass. One of the girls was exercising, complaining that she wanted to quit, saying she couldn’t do it. And Jillian said something like this: “You have to have an intention when you exercise. Without intention these moves are just punishment.“

I decided to intend for myself when I exercised. That is, not focus on what other things I could be getting done (like watching “Oprah”) or wishing I didn’t have to exercise, or thinking I can’t do a certain move or another lap or another rep or whatever. I will intend to have a healthy body. I will intend to do good things for myself, to carve out personal time for myself in which to move my body. I will intend to be good to myself. It was no longer punishment. It was love. Thanks, Jillian. Love your biceps!

4. You will change in some ways, but in other ways, you will be exactly the same.

Shit. I will admit this, right here and right now: I thought losing weight was going to solve my every problem, big or small. I really, truly did.

It DON’T.

I have changed. In so many unbelievable ways. I’m 1000% more outgoing now (karaoke with strangers? IT’S ON), more outspoken, and more fun. Much, much, MUCH more fun.

However, the bigger problems, like my inferiority complex, my incessant need to be heard, my whiny-ness, my annoyability: they’re all still here. Alive and kicking. The core parts of your personality don’t always change. The bad parts may still be bad when you lose weight. But the good things, for me at least, were magnified.

I love myself now as I am, even the bad parts. And I’m working on the “bad” stuff. But please don’t think that losing 75 pounds makes you perma-smiley and pooping rainbows. It doesn’t work like that.

5. Live your freaking life.

This is the most important thing I’ve learned this last year. The absolute most important. No matter what the number on the scale says, what size is on the tag of your jeans, no matter how bloated you feel one day, LIVE YOUR LIFE. Live it.

Don’t wait for the scale to say a certain three-digit number before you do something you’ve always wanted to do. Just freaking do it. I skipped so many experiences in my life that I should have had because I thought I was too fat. I didn’t go to a single dance in high school, with the exception of my senior prom (and that was only after sitting in a Dillard’s dressing room the night before, sobbing about my dress looking “bad”). I didn’t go to grad night at Disney World. I didn’t try out for improv groups that I wanted to join in college, or go to club meetings or social gatherings or parties I was invited to. Because I honestly thought that the people there wouldn’t want to like a fat girl.

BULLSHIT.

Live. Your. Life. Don’t wait for the scale to say the right number. This one seems the most obvious, but it’s also the fucking hardest to actually do. I live my life now. I live. I really, truly, fabulously, loudly, annoyingly LIVE. I try my damndest to make every day beautiful, for myself or for others. I try to find something in every day that I would want to tell a story about. I try. I try and try and try to live. Do it. Just live it. It’s beautiful.

Christen 75 Pounds Closer to Goal!

Christen… thank you so much for sharing your lessons with us!

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