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  Week of 3/17/2011 - Featured Blog Post

Being Honest With Myself
JOHNTJ1


If I told you I found the secret to success and happiness; if I told you that you could wrap up all of your self-help books and sell them at the book and music exchange; if I told you that you never had to track your food or exercise, ever again you wouldn’t believe me, would you? You’d be anticipating that now famous line "But wait there’s more..." Well, friends I found it, quite by accident, but I found it and it’s as plain as the nose on my face. It’s called honesty, more specifically being honest with myself. I can be honest with and about you until the cows come home. I can be supportive and loving and all that cool stuff but until I am honest with myself about who and what I am and how far I need to travel, then it’s just a really nice exercise.

BTW: Honesty does not mean beating yourself up. It’s why we are afraid to examine it. Some brilliant person many eons ago took the basic principle of physics and applied it to everything in God’s creation: "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction." We’ve taken that maxim and engraved it upon our souls altering it to mean "For every fault there should be an equal amount of guilt, pain and frustration and oh BTW I’ll never into my dream outfit!!!"

So let me be honest

I abuse food. It’s my drug of choice. Everything I have learned in the past fifty seven years tells me what is good for my body and what will ultimately harm it. I choose to ignore those warnings. I’d rather dwell on how difficult it is and give myself a pass. My grocery store has two entrances. The first leads you right into the produce and health food departments. That’s where all the good stuff is. The second entrance barely allows you the opportunity to catch your breath when you are accosted by a display of cookies, cakes donuts, pies or candy, depending on the time of week or the season. I know when I walk through door two I am most likely going to grab something that isn’t good for me. It may taste good. It may provide some gastric pleasure, but when I step on the scale every Thursday I really shouldn’t be too surprised when the needle doesn’t move, should I? If I walk through door number one I am more likely to get a more positive result. Door two tastes better but door one gives me a long term result... one I am looking for.

Honesty drives everything about us. Only I know when I’m not telling you the truth but in short order it begins to show. When I am not honest with myself I get results because I can adjust the way I live to help me reach my goals and objectives. When I tell myself "it’s okay to cheat," then as my trainer told me once when I wouldn’t hold a plank correctly, "The only person you are cheating is yourself, John." Amen.

You don’t need to take a billboard out on the interstate and advertise your flaws. Find out what’s holding you back and come up with a plan to deal with it. Pat yourself on the back for being brilliant enough to think of it. Honesty has nothing to do with guilt. It has everything to do with seeing how far you’ve come and realizing how far you have to go. We treat it as a sad occasion but really, isn’t it a cause to celebrate? You’ve found the secret of your success.



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