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Climbing The Rope: Breaking The Mental Barriers To Getting In Shape

By Zach Hunt

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 06Apr2009 Word count: 658 Viewed: 227 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

I will admit that I have struggled mentally with fitness. Being overweight has kept me trapped in the past and prevented me from getting in shape. It has, at times, paralyzed me and kept me from being more active. I was too afraid of the ridicule of others to try something new. I always feared that someone will say it: "What is Emily the Elephant doing here?", "Don't you know fat people can't do this?", "You should really lose about 50 pounds and then come back and try this."

The Weight Gain Cycle That Keeps You From Getting In Shape So the vicious self destructive cycle begins. The mental cycle that kept me and probably keeps you from losing weight and getting fit.

1. First you feel insecure because you are overweight and thinking that everyone is watching you, staring at you and judging you.

2. Then you stop doing physical activities and gain more weight .

3. Since you are not active you feel like a total looser and keep getting fatter, eating more and caring less.

4. Then you get depressed, hide more, do less and gain more weight and you end up starting all over again at the beginning.

I hated myself for being in that cycle, for being overweight and not having the self discipline to get thin and stay thin. It is an exceptionally destructive downward spiral that is quite difficult to break out of.

The First Steps to Fitness Freedom So how do you break out of this vicious cycle and find fitness freedom? I cannot say for sure what it takes exactly. I think it is different for everyone since everyone's challenges are different.

I can't even tell you what it was exactly that clicked for me. All I can say is that at some point I got so sick of hearing myself whine and complain that I decided to quit my bitching and do something about it!

I told myself, "Quit hiding out at home in front of the TV, Emily. If you don't like how you feel or how you look then make some changes and get in shape. Do something different if you want something different. Live your life to the fullest with no regrets." That is the self talk that I want to hear in my head.

Inevitably the doubt starts to creep in, "They will all be staring at you, laughing at you,"

When it does it's a matter of managing the dialog in my head. Reminding myself that my views are skewed and my fears are most likely not even real. Remembering a quote I read somewhere that stated, "What other people think of you is none of your business!

Personally I believe that the best way to break out of the cycle is to take action. Face the fear and do something, anything. Get out there and just do it. So that is what I did. I figured out something that I always wanted to do and took steps to do it.

How I Broke The Weight Gain Cycle And Started Getting In Great Shape Getting in shape physically starts with getting in shape mentally by identifying your mental barriers. Look at yourself honestly find out what is preventing you from getting thin? Ask yourself "What excuses do I make? What limitations do I have? What prevents me from breaking the self defeating cycle that got me overweight and depressed?"

Be kind but firm with yourself and when you make the decision to change, just take action. Getting in shape takes action and knowing where to look for help. That is what it took for me. I had to be firm and just.

I realized that my problem is that I was trying to go it alone and what I lacked was discipline. Then I would get down on myself and start on that crazy self defeating cycle again. So I made the decision to stop and to take action.

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