The night before we flew to New Orleans, we had dinner in Chicago with my brother and his wife. My brother had a coupon for a discount on the restaurant's fried fish dinner and seemed surprised when both my husband and I passed on the fried fish. We opted for grilled meat and requested a tossed salad in place of the cole slaw. My brother shook his head and commented that we sure were strict with our "diet;" we said that this wasn't a diet - we just chose to eat healthy. He then said, "But sometimes you have to live a little."
I didn't have a good response at that point and just assured my brother that we were quite content with our choices. Since that time, however, I've had some time to think about his comment that we need to "live a little."
I don't want to live a little . . . I want to live a LOT! My brother urged us to live a little on the eve of us leaving for a trip that included New Orleans, San Antonio, Phoenix, Sedona and the Grand Canyon. From our perspective, we were and ARE living much more than a little! We could not have done all that we did and experienced all we experienced had we not gotten ourselves healthy (together my husband and I lost a total of 176 pounds and have been maintaining our weight loss for just about 3 years).
"Living a little" is often relegated to eating, and it usually means eating food that isn't very healthy. To be sure, there are times when we choose to eat something that falls far short of a Medifast lean & green meal, and we did exactly that for a couple of meals in New Orleans and San Antonio. Part of the reason we chose to make healthy choices at the restaurant in Chicago was because we knew we would be enjoying local cuisine at those other locales. When we make those other choices, it's on rare occasion and for something really special. When we do that, we aren't "living a little," we're living a LOT!
Because we've gotten healthy, we no longer worry about whether or not we'll fit into an airline seat. We can now walk for miles (as we did through the French Quarter of New Orleans, along the River Walk in San Antonio, and in Sedona and the Grand Canyon). We no longer shudder when a camera is pointed in our direction. Getting healthy also resulted in us being able to help others get healthy, and we now do this as our full-time jobs (which enabled us to be on the road for 19 days).
Living a little? I don't think so! A friend of mine who lost 135 pounds on the Take Shape for Life/Medifast program (and has been maintaining her weight loss for 8 years) recently said that "Most people say they get their life back, but now I have a life I've never experienced before!" Her comment really sums up my own feelings, and that's what I want for each of you!
Do you want to live a little or a lot? If you want to live a LOT, it begins with the choices you make today. There will be some short-term sacrifices for sure, but don't focus on what you've giving up, focus on the life you can create for yourself. This program isn't about deprivation, it's about truly creating a healthy life that can be richer and more full than you can imagine. You will create this new life one day and one choice at a time . . . choose wisely :-)
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