Living in the Moment Instead of Behind Ourselves
if you have been following along my journey you probably know my butt is something i am still self-conscious of
Take this photo for instance, a friend innocently snapped it in 2016 (I was already partway through my weight loss journey here), when me and my two good friends were having the most fun during a partner workout. I was mortified when I saw it. I had already felt so much more confident about myself for successfully losing 15 pounds at that point, that one photo of some dimpled skin & what my backside looked like in action brought it all crashing down.
Cellulite is the herniation of subcutaneous fat within fibrous connective tissue that manifests topographically as skin dimpling. We were on a snorkel tour in Costa Rica when one of the girls we were chatting with asked me, “How do I get rid of cellulite?”
People have a misconception that they just haven’t stumbled upon the right cream, pill or machine yet and I might have some insight as to which one is the ticket. I will be the first to admit that if I could have rubbed a cream on my skin & it would have eliminated fat (because that is what cellulite is) then I probably would have doused my whole body in it when I wanted to lose weight! The only proven thing (besides expensive cosmetic procedures found in a plastic surgeons office) that will effectively reduce cellulite is a proper diet & exercise .
It’s no secret that I’m not a fan of winter and we love to escape the cold weather and head somewhere warm. Every year my health & fitness regime began with the goal of feeling a little better in my bathing suit on vacation. It was an annual cycle of binge-dieting and exercise only to put on 10 pounds while I was away (trust me that happened on a one week all-inclusive in Mexico before). I would feel horrible when I got home, fall off the wagon with any slight glimpse of a healthy choice I was making and so would continue the cycle. It was exhausting and an emotional roller coaster and I wanted off of it, for good. I just had no idea how to go about it and I needed to stop with the fad diets and inconsistent spurts of exercise. It was getting me nowhere and effecting the way I thought of myself very poorly. Constantly chalking it up as a failure when I just didn’t have the tools to make it a success.
For a person who prides herself on confidence, I am still working on it, but one of the additional perks to my journey was growing a bit more confident in this area. Weight loss is also about gaining our confidence back too! Sometimes people get this distorted view about confidence tying it to ‘thinking you’re better than others’ when in reality, it means just being more comfortable in our own skin! It’s putting on your bathing suit and not worrying about covering up a certain part that you might not like. It is someone catching a candid photo of you & not telling them to delete it. It’s living life in the moment instead of worrying about other things.
-Ash
