Hello lovelies! I’m in New Jersey until Wednesday visiting with my senior parents. No kids, no husband, just me and my parents. It’s lovely. We’ve got the Hamilton soundtrack blasting. I get my love of Broadway show tunes from them. My mother is a whiz at identifying show tunes and the name of their Broadway show going back over eighty years. It’s amazing.
Anyway, I digress.
What I really want to tell you right now is that I’m not perfect.
I’ve been away from home almost continuously since last Friday at 4 pm. I’ve done my best to stay on my Bright Line Eating weight loss food plan, but not all of my meals have been weighed. It’s those meals are my current nemesis. And again today we’re going out for a Korean soft tofu soup lunch. I’ll do my best. Nothing crazy like planning on eating sugar or flour, but my quantities will likely be all askew.
And do you know what? I’m okay with that sometimes. Because when I look at my whole life in balance, I don’t want to make myself crazy on BLE. I want to be happy and thin and free. I don’t get happy or free if I make myself a crazy person over being perfect.
Will it take me longer to be in my right sized body because my quantities are not perfect 100% of the time?
Yes, it most certainly will.
But I’m not in a rush to get to goal, because do you know what happens when I get to goal?
Nothing! I still have to preplan my food every day, not eat between meals and weigh all of my food for the rest of my life if I want to stay in my right sized body. So what’s the rush?
I’m just doing my best every day given the challenges that I face that day. If I put too much pressure on myself to be perfect, there’s a high chance that I will just throw in the towel knowing that I will never be perfect.
I’ve tried to be perfect. In fact, I go in and out of thinking, “I want to do this perfectly” and “I should be able to do this perfectly!” I’ve tried constructing mental hacks to make sure that I have squeaky clean bright lines day after day after day. I got a sponsor. I made promises and contracts. And do you know what? I was still NOT PERFECT.
So for now, this is me. Not perfect, but good enough. And I love myself more than I love the fantasy of diet perfection.
Do you know what I got yesterday? I got my first, “You’re not going to lose any more weight are you?” comment.
I had to laugh. I’ve been so ready for it because it’s something that we talk about a lot in Bright Line Eating: the comments you get when you are losing enough weight for people to notice. For some reason, this is a very common reaction. Because I was prepared for it, I didn’t even need to really respond. I could just smile and giggle inside.
So, Bright Line Eating is working for me, even without perfection. And letting myself be human is what I need today to be happy, thin and free.
I felt that it was important to let you know how I’m feeling today because I see way too many people throw in the towel on their chosen diet plan shortly after they realize that they haven’t been perfect on it and that being perfect might just be out of their reach at this time. If that’s what you are feeling, I don’t what that to happen to you.
Do you know what I do after my Bright Lines get a little wobbly? I do exactly what they tell me to do in BLE: I simply resume. No fanfare. No beating myself up. And from now on, no more big promises about how I’m not going to let that happen again. Just simply resume.
I hope that you are having a beautiful, peaceful day, fueling your body with things that your body thanks you for.
xoxo,
Wendy
P.s. I think it’s really important to add that my opinions are my own and not the opinions of anyone else in or at Bright Line Eating.
I agree with everything you just said. If BLE is going to be for life, I need to know that there are times when I may knowingly veer from the path. The beauty of it is that I know the path will be right there waiting for me when I’m ready.
I watched your summit last night. I did get interrupted and missed some of the section where you talked about what you eat in a day.can you review that please. I missed all 3 meals
Hi Diane! Please rewatch the video. That would be a lot for me to type out on my phone! Sorry!
Thank you Wendy for introducing me to BLE! I just finished the 14 day challenge and it was eye opening!! I knew I had a food addiction and just could not figure out how to deal with it. So this will be my last journey on how to get to my right size body, one day at a time, one meal at a time and doing the best I can! Thank you for your honesty in all of your blog postings!
Thank you for being real, I can never follow a perfect diet,so now im doing the best I can and I have slowly lost twelve pounds. I eat three meals and two snacks but I pick whole foods and avoid white flour and sugar.Im not perfect and thats o.k.
Hi Wendy,
As they say it’s the journey, not the destination that counts. I’ve been following your blog for almost 5 years now and have been through many ups and downs with you. I did the plant-based desserts (oh what a difference a few years makes), eliminated nuts (have reintroduced them again) bought a instant pot,and enjoyed veggies for breakfast too. I have learned a lot while taking this journey with you and hopefully will continue to do so in the future. I just joined the BLE 14-day challenge and I’m excited to get started. I am absolutely certain I have a food addiction problem and it’s been haunting me for a while. I can’t even imagine a life without sugar, so this new adventure is daunting and I’m not even sure I can do. But this post has reminded me that I just gotta take it one step at a time and not get hung up over failure.
My New Year’s resolution was to not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. I need to apply that in many areas of my life, not just food choices. It is hard and sometimes tricky but I hope to live up to it. Enjoy your visit home.
You are unstoppable!
This is exactly what I discovered on Weight watchers eating WFPB! That if I have a time where I can not be perfect, I have not failed. And I am not A failure. I just get back on track. And for someone who has eaten WFPB for 7 years, I am losing weight steadily, slowly and it feels soooo good!