Hell and Home are Just Eleven Steps Apart

(This post was written on Wednesday, but issues with my computer and Blogger delayed its arrival here.)

Eleven steps. I know that most self-help programs encompass twelve steps, but eleven steps are all that stand between me and my goals. The eleven steps shown in the photo to the left to be exact. These eleven steps [currently uncarpeted due to the aftermath of "The Flood"], lead to my basement, which contains in a single room, everything I need to accomplish a goal I have "pursued" for many, many years now.

Now I bet you didn't know that "pursued" is a relative term.

• Some of us when we pursue something, get very active. We get up, get motivated, and go with all guns blazing after that accomplishment until we finally capture the prize.

Some of us when we pursue something spend a lot of time talking about it, hoping for it, and wishing it to be so; while never actually making any definitive plans or taking any decisive action which might result in our actually procuring what we claim to be pursuing.

Then, there are others of us who make a plan, follow-through on that plan to accumulate the necessary resources to accomplish said goal, then spend a lot of time talking about the goal itself and all we've done to prepare ourselves to achieve said goal. And that's where the buck stops.

Regarding the goal that is the stimulus for this post, I fall into this last group.

The plans have been made. The resources appropriated and ready to be utilized. The goal itself and the how and why behind it have been talked into the ground. Now it's time to just shut up and in the prolific words of the old Nike marketing campaign, "JUST DO IT!"

So, that's just what I'm going to do. I am telling you all about it because I am soliciting the help of each one of you as well as this man...Mr. James K. He, as personal trainer extraodinaire! You all, as either cheerleaders [to keep my morale up], or as naysayers [to give me someone to prove wrong as I love a challenge]!

Ms. Just Write Now was a babe [back inna day]. She was an athlete, a swimmer, a Pom Pon Girl, a virtual DIVA! And she let it all go to pot! Now most women blame their transformed bodies [and I don't mean that in a good way] on the babies they've had. RYAN, THIS IS NOT YOUR FAULT! [*Ms. Just Write Now so proud of herself for being strong enough to swallow her extreme vanity (as in street clothing, she "camouflages" well), and let you all see this before pic as things stand today!*] As a matter of fact, the day after I had Ryan, I weighed less than I had since before college, and the pic shows me when Ryan was just 4 weeks old....he was not as big as the bowling ball I was using....and his svelte Mommy was not bad off herself. During the entire full-term pregnancy, I gained only 9 pounds....that's right, NINE pounds. Ryan being a true lover of his Mommy was born weighing 7 pounds 4 ounces, leaving his Mommy holding no extra poundage for having carried him.

No, I can honestly say, that the body I'm dragging around currently is due in its entirety to my own love of junk foods, and a good, not-so-healthy case of the lazies. For years, I've talked a good game about getting it together again. I made all the preparations.....work-out clothes: check, gym membership: check, Weight Watchers at Work: check, I even outfitted a gym in my new house last year....check out the Body Mecca just eleven steps away in the basement.... There is a fully digitalized treadmill with a wide based tread and a CD player, a digital stationery bike, an Ab-lounger, and a 3 stack-3 station Universal Weight Gym, all just sitting there waiting to be of service.

This brings me to another point....
I am appalled to find out that one of the things I find most despicable in others can be found inside myself [isn't that ALWAYS the case].....wastefulness. To have access to all that one needs to accomplish a thing and still not make the necessary effort is inexcusably and unforgiveably wasteful. Even more than that, it is something of which we should be ashamed. So many would give all that they have for even a little bit of what I have and what am I doing with it? Well, at least as it applies to this goal and the resources I have access to which will enable me to achieve it, I am making a change....or should I say I am exerting the effort.

I have hired a trainer to get me started and to ensure I am on the right track. I have my first session today. He, [my trainer, torturer, rescuer depending on how I choose to view him at the time] will be back on Saturday and then again on Monday until I can handle this on my own. I will give one-hundred percent effort, heart, and dedication to making my dream a reality.....not quite this [pic courtesy of Leon of "Yeah...I Said It" blog fame], but halfway between here and where I am would be completely acceptable! Today is the day it starts.....when it will end, if it will end I can't say, but I have and will continue to commit myself to making sure that the gift of health [really good health even in this alien body] that God has chosen to favor me with will not be given in vain. I will celebrate my health, I will celebrate my body....this one and the REAL one underneath, and most of all I will celebrate ME! I'm hyped now! I'm ready to rush into the future that is mine for the taking. I'm all over this thing and for those of you who are pulling for me, the ones who've GOT MY BACK, I'm going to do this. For those of you who are waiting for me to fail, eat your hearts out when I don't. The time is now, the die has been cast, and in ten minutes my trainer and I will undertake our task....to find the muscles I KNOW still live somewhere beneath all this fat. Could we fail? As I used to say as a child, "we could might". Nevertheless, we can only fail if we first try, so here we go and let the chips fall where they may.

Before I finish, a word to the wise, IF I WERE A GAMBLING WOMAN, I WOULDN'T BET AGAINST ME! HARK! Somebody's knocking at my door ;)

THREE HOURS LATER....
Remember him? He's been here and gone.
I don't hate him quite yet, but the fact that I can barely support the weight of the body that believes itself to be mine, doesn't bode well for the future of our bond. I will say, the man knows that of which he speaks. I'm still all-in....100% died in the wool true blue....but DAMN!, does it have to be so hard?


Remember these? They used to be the stairs to my basement. Now they're all that stand between HELL AND HOME! Before today, I have run up and down them so many time without thinking, that right now, I'm dumbfounded by the fact that getting up them following this morning's session was tantamount to scaling Mount Everest. Eleven steps....just eleven steps between the me that I am and the me that I want to be. Just eleven steps between the Heaven that is my home upstairs and the Hell that is my Gym in the basement. Just eleven measley steps. What to do? What to do?......The longest of journeys begins with one step...

one, two, three....see ya at number eleven or somewhere in between....check back and be a witness to this historical climb!

(Pic to right is a lil' leg for a special pal....you know who you are!)