Motivation and Habit

I once found an incredible tumblr that slapped trite and stereotypical fitness motivational phrases on top of pictures of people drinking.  It was pretty hilarious.   But in spite of the fact that it was meant to poke fun at the fitness motivational phrases themselves, one of them actually stuck with me and I'm still thinking of it many weeks later.

Ready for it?

Here it is.

This phrase would be annoying as hell if it were pasted over some stock photo of a person jogging.  Notice how the whisky instantly elevates it.  Click on the link above for more of these gems.

I've been thinking about this phrase a lot lately, and about motivation and habit.  

At the beginning of this blog, I felt an almost "other-worldly" force inside of me, willing me forward to do this.   It was like having a manic urge to succeed.   It was like crack.  I couldn't wait for my next weigh in. I couldn't wait to write my next pithy blog post.  I couldn't wait.   It was exciting.



I think that what I was actually experiencing was "motivation."  I was taken over by something bigger than me and that's what gave me the initial boost to get off the couch and start making a change.

But eventually that fire faded.  I guess it always does. And then "habit" gradually takes over.

I've been diligent about going to the gym and (with the exception of this past weekend) I've been very good about adhering to my new lifestyle.  I don't do it because it's fun.  I just do it because it's "what I do."  And I suppose that's a good thing because it should yield results. Predictably. Slowly.  But results nonetheless.

But you know what "habit" isn't?  Exciting.    There's nothing at all exciting about "habit."




I keep telling myself: focus on The Big Carrot!  That's your motivation!    But even The Big Carrot, while definitely helping me stick with the program, cannot compare with the feeling I had at the beginning of this---with the "motivation phase."

The motivation phase of this lifestyle change seems to have run its course.

Sometimes I think the motivation phase is really just the "denial" phase of the lifestyle change.  Like....at the beginning I was doing things that were so out of character (working out?  not eating pizza all the time?!) that I could still envision a "some day" when this "weight loss thing" would be over when I'd get to go "back to normal" and enjoy ALL the foods again and not have to spend time working out......but magically be skinny and hot while doing it.

But then after doing this long enough.......I realize that this is the new normal...or at least it has to be if I want this to work.  Unless I want to be unhealthy and slide right back to where I was, there will never be a time when I can just eat whatever the hell I want and not go to the gym.   This is a lifestyle change.  A new way of doing everything. And there's no end in sight.

I think I understand now why most "diets" fail and most dieters regain all their weight.....to have life-long success, you have do this long enough for motivation (aka: denial) to die and for habit to set in...and it takes a really long time for something to become a legitimate habit.  

I am going to define "habit" as not simply doing something over and over again, but as doing something over and over again so many times, that any hope or glimmer you've ever had of things getting "back to normal" has completely died out because the habit is what's normal now.

I don't think I am completely there yet, but I do think I am getting close.   Sometimes, in my weakest moments, I envision a time when I don't have to budget at least an hour a day to work out and when I won't have to worry about calories.  I feel like for this to truly become a habit, those thoughts have to be completely gone.

So I'm somewhere between motivation and habit right now....and leaning more towards habit.  I know this because at this point this has become less and less about "getting a trip to New York" and more and more about "how do I make sure that this is a permanent change?"

I am trying to think of the best way to get over this less-than-exciting hump....and more importantly how to keep my posts interesting.  It's not easy coming up with material for this stage of the process because so much of what I am doing now is just the day to day drudgery of trying to make this a habit.

Motivation is flashy and lends itself to shiny gifs and instant gratification like on the Biggest Loser.

Habit is the boringest of all boring things in the world.   Thanks for sticking with me through it.