Thinking vs. Taking Action

I now have an additional reason for not posting for the last 2 days...yesterday my precious laptop was inadvertantly knocked over and thudded onto a carpeted floor.  I had it leaning against a table leg and bumped it so it flopped over flat on the carpet.  It seemed so inocuous at the time that I didn't even think to check it out immediately, but an hour later I went to turn it on and kept getting a message saying "A problem has been detected" with options to run a check, etc.  After 3 tries, it dawned on me that it's "fall" was likely the culprit.  DAMN!  I hate when I discover a problem and slowly realize I was likely the cause.  I have an email in to Dell but haven't heard back yet.  Here is yet another indicator from the universe that I need to slow down and not be on autopilot as I move through my days.  HARUMPH.

Okay - I have a confession to make...I've gotten sloppy about tracking points this week.  So much of what I eat for breakfast and lunch are repeat meals where I've come to know the points and run the tally in my head, intending to write them on the tracker, but not getting around to it.  If dinner is something that needs me to look up the points or pull out the calculator, I just sort of wing it in my head.  This is NOT GOOD.  I'm sure I've stayed within my daily allotment each day, and haven't borrowed from the extra 49 for the week, but how can I be sure if I don't write it all down.

Why do I resist this discipline so much??  Most discipline, as a matter of fact.  For a couple of weeks it was fresh and new and gave me a feeling of power over my intake of food to write down my food, before I even ate it.  Then it slowly became a pain in the rear to have to get out the tracker...I know oatmeal, I know my standard breakfast sandwich, the salads I fix for lunch, the roasted veggies, etc.  I am vowing to get back to tracking and just pulled out a fresh (and unused one so far this week) and have written in points for the day.

There are a couple of sayings in AA that I think are fantastic, and apply here, IMHO. 

1) "You can act your way into right thinking but you can't think your way into right acting." 

2) "Bring the body around and the mind will follow."  This one refers initially to when one begins AA for the first time and everything seems so foreign, confusing and overwhelming.  But it really has relevance for embarking on any new endeavor.

Now obviously these don't mean that you shouldn't plan and create goals and strategies.  But all that "thinking" can't achieve desired  results or I'd have weighed 150 pounds within 6 months of beginning this weight loss journey.  Alas, it's been 20 months, and while I started out great by actually DOING (taking action) what was required (losing ~30 pounds in the first 6 months and going from 222lbs to 192), I began floundering when I had 2 injuries that sidelined me from exercising for a time.  And since March of 2010, when I had my 2nd knee arthroscopic surgery - I've struggled and just not been able to renew my previous level of commitment and ACTION.

So while I've been doing better about tracking, eating and exercising since I began WW in January, the little frustrations have already begun to negatively affect my ACTIONS - so far only with the tracking, but I know myself well enough to know that it doesn't take much for me to begin the slippery slope back into floundering.  This doesn't have to happen, especially since I have the awareness of it at this juncture.

Even though I don't "want" to track, which is a thinking function, I can track anyway, which is ACTION.  I don't have to like it to do it.  I know that it's an important tool and will help me stay on plan, which will inevitably lead to desired results, which will make me feel good about myself, more content and peaceful - which are thinking functions.

Boy - writing that last paragraph drives home something I've read from a few other bloggers in the last few weeks...that I THINK TOO MUCH.  If that helped me, it'd be okay.  It doesn't help - it muddies my mind and my resolve.  It pulls me away from my intentions, and then my willingness to continue taking the right actions wanes. And I slide back into overeating at best, bingeing at worst.

So I will do the next right thing, which in this instance is tracking.  It's a simple discipline that will help remind me of what I want and what I'm striving for.  I'm a fast forgetting, so I need all the reminders I can get.  And now I'm off to eat my salad...after I track it :) !