The Before and the After

In January I started a 12 Week Body Transformation Challenge. I needed a change of pace, a new beginning.
Also....we didn't have much extra money and I didn't fit into most of my clothes.
So there's some motivation.

I decided to go all in. Act as if I would win. Work like I knew I would win. $80,000 is nothing to sniff at so why not?

I weight lifted every morning 6 days a week, spin classes 3 days a week, Insanity and yoga in the afternoons, I ate cleaner than I have ever eaten for longer than I ever wanted to. TWO entire months of weighing and tracking all my food and not eating even one tiny cheat food.

I must be crazy. Totally crazy.

I changed a lot. The before and after pictures blow my mind. First of all, I never really thought it was in the realm of possibility that I would see my abs. Secondly, somewhere along the 12 weeks, I forgot about the importance of my appearance.

The first few weeks I got up extra early and went to the gym. I lifted weights and ate pretty clean. I tried to control portions and think positively. Somewhere around Week 3 I had my first of many meltdowns. I wasn't seeing much progress and the consistent effort and sacrifice were HARD!
I almost gave up, but right around that time Bodybuilding.com sent me an email saying that most people give up in Week 3. There are few things that motivate me more than telling me I'm average, that I can't do something, that it is too hard.

I started researching. I wanted to work harder. And Smarter! I learned a LOT and made a plan.
Then I did more research. I changed plans and got more specific.
The only real constant was the weights. Every morning at 6am I'd leave my house to KILL another workout. I made all the ugly faces. I pushed to failure, paused for a second, then pushed out a couple more reps. Then added some weight and did a couple more for good measure.
Every day. Every day.

By Week 8 or so it was a habit. One Saturday Evan suggested that I not go work out......I almost cried. He saw the look on my face and immediately reconsidered.

Cliche, I know. But really, lifting weights has changed my life. First thing every morning I do something hard. Really, really hard. I steel myself, grit my teeth and lift heavier. I sweat. I struggle. When I fail, I mentally size up what I'm made of, then decide that I am made of more and I push harder.

I do that every morning.

I can't express the internal miracle that has happened. I love my body. I am amazed by what I can do. I am impressed by the miracle of the body God blessed me with. Long before I saw my abs, I began feeling wonder and awe at this incredible temple that is my mortal shape.

This is a crazy, new feeling that I am unaccustomed to. I desperately wish I could give everyone I know the overwhelmingly transcendent high of feeling this way. I still have love handles and stretch marks, plenty of things that aren't aesthetically pleasing, but I. Love. My. Body. It is incredible in its imperfection.

I don't really agree with all of this meme--it is hard to workout.

However, the eating clean part. Yeeeeeees. Yes. Hard, hard, brutal. Saying no to cookies, cakes, ice cream, the stuff people give you. You don't even have to BUY stuff, people show up places and WANT you to EAT their delicious goodies! It is inescapable.
All I can say is, it did get easier. I know people say that, and I know it is true. The truth of that statement in no way diminishes the superhuman effort of the first few weeks. And the periodic moments even after the habit is established that hit you hard and fast and powerful.
When you've been good for weeks and then you smell the freshly baked something or other and your knees buckle.
Or when you are staring down a mountain of cauliflower and spinach and egg whites and the tears run down your face. And you eat it anyway.

The last couple of weeks we went totally without carbs. Except the carbs in vegetables. The last week we had no carbs and as little sodium as possible. Almost every day for lunch I fed my children peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. With my fingers.
Hard.
I wouldn't even lick my fingers because I knew I would cave and eat every baked good in sight.

For me, this felt like an achievement comparable to climbing Mt. Everest.

WEEKS!! MONTHS!!

It didn't happen overnight. It grew slowly, the choices picked up steam as I went. The inner strength and determination I found while weight lifting created the momentum I needed to make hard nutritional choices all day.

In the end. I don't think I'll win the $80,000. I never took any fat burners, I didn't have a personal trainer, and I definitely learned as I went.

I don't even mind.
I lost 15 lbs.
I lost 10.75% body fat.

I gained a pound of muscle.

I am 15 lbs. heavier than I was when I got married, but I fit into those same clothes.

I came right up against the bedrock of who I am. I conquered fears. I struggled and persevered.

I learned something in a real, physical, tangible way: The way to growth is straight through the pain.
Society today wants everything easy and immediate. Happiness Now!
It just doesn't work that way.
Real lasting happiness is earned. You cry, and grunt, and burn. Push. Heave. Strain. Collapse.

Sometimes no one even notices the sacrifices, the effort. And the option to quit is always so easy and so present.

The joy of a job well done, of hard effort, of struggle, of growth. I have missed out on so much of that joy, because I didn't want it. And the easy road only has so much shallow, repetitive pleasure to offer.

I guess in the end, this 12 week challenge gave me two lasting things.

One.
The joy of the pain. I learned to appreciate, to actually enjoy and recognize the beauty of the failed effort. Effort at all, for that matter. Life throws heavy punches. We all feel them. The times that strike you to your knees with the weight of pain, sorrow, guilt, anger, loss, or monotony. If only somehow in the moment we can feel the joy of soul stretching growth, life would never be able to keep us down. And maybe not always joy-- for some punches, there is just the pain. But we can have satisfaction, pride even, knowing that we will survive. Knowing we can conquer, change. It is a choice, but the pain and the failure can be used to steel our resolve to improve.
The pain IS our improvement.
And we don't have to wait for the results to come to feel happy! We can be happy IN the struggle. Find a deeper, stronger, subtler kind of joy in the dead center of our hardest times.
The craziest, possibly questionable idea.....is that we can choose to make life hard.
To attack our weaknesses.
To aim painfully high and seek out our limits.
To set goals so big you set yourself up to fail majestically.
Over and over again. It's a brand new idea for me, terrifying and exhilarating.

To be happier I need to make my life harder.....It sounds so wrong.
But in practice it feels like Freedom. Adventure. Adrenaline. Alive. 

(Just so you know I am taking this idea seriously: In January I set a goal to get totally shredded and see all my abs and obliques in 12 weeks. I failed, but I can see my top 4 abs pretty well.
I failed.
Period.
But I SMASHED straight through all previous fitness goal successes in my life.
The day that challenge was over, I decided that by July 1st I am going to deep clean our entire house. Every closet and corner and the garage. I am going to work like I will accomplish this even though I have no idea if it is really possible. Also...I've already entered another body transformation challenge. My mother told me I wasn't built to do pull-ups. That I shouldn't even try. I love you, Mom. Thanks for handing me my next goal.)

Two.
You. All of the "you"s in my life. It is overwhelming to me how incredible people are. The family, friends, and even acquaintances in my life brim over the top with their excellence. As I have looked with different eyes the last couple of months, I have seen people conquering personal demons, persevering through real tragedies, and, sometimes the hardest of all, living with love, grace, and real daily strength. Those tiny unobserved moments of every day life. Those are the ones that have brought me to tears recently. To the people in my life who I see making those tough daily choices to be cheerful, to be kind, to be honest, to be patient, to be vulnerable, to be good, to endure, Thank you. Thank you so much for your life and your example.

You are not average. You are not ordinary. You were never meant to be.


For the people who asked:

Disclaimer: Bikini top was purchased solely for these pictures.

For the record. I could never have done this without the unfailing support of the naturally leanest person I know, who still managed to lose 5% body fat.