When you fall flat on your face...

It's funny how a few days of utter abandonment can make one feel fat. I'd been feeling pretty fly about myself lately. After all, I've had one success after another. But it's good to fall on one's face every so often. It smacks a bit of sense in to you and (hopefully) gives you the determination to work that much harder.

The Saturday afternoon that I managed to put a check on my eating, I started feeling that fatalistic twinge, that all-or-nothing attitude that has gotten me into trouble in the past. You know, the "I completely blew it so I should give up altogether" type of attitude. I felt fat and like I had somehow managed to gain back all that I had lost by eating badly for a few days.

It was a twinge I knew to expect from my past weight-loss experiences, so I've been carefully telling that five-year-old self that the world isn't over, that I have not blown it unless I say I've blown it. Fortunately, self-talk works if you keep at it long enough. Like the drip-drip-drip of water torture, you'll eventually get through to yourself. But hopefully without the going mad-as-a-hatter bit.

Today, the twinge has definitely given over to determination. Every choice is a new opportunity. I can turn the ship around. And it's fitting to recall the quote from my meeting leader that so struck a cord in me:

When you fall flat on your face, you're actually moving forward."

Failure is just as important as success. Just don't let it beat you!