I made a deal with the devil

Well, the deal isn't actually with the devil, but with Marianne Williamson.

First, the bike ride
I just finished my first bike ride of the spring. I rode once last February when we had a sort of nice day, but today the weather was perfect. Have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE bike riding? It's my favorite way to get in my cardio, and according to my heart rate monitor I burned 550 calories just bike riding (it's only eight miles but very hilly).

I stopped at the gym on my return and completed a full hour of upper body weights doing a new routine. I found a DVD I purchased about three years ago but never watched until this morning. I watched it and wrote down the exercise to do at the gym. I work out better there than I do at home. The routine uses dumbbells only, nine exercises, three sets of 15 reps, three exercises each for deltoids, triceps and biceps. It took me the entire hour plus to finish the routine and my arms ache now. Then I rode my bike home. I was/am exhausted!

Biking is at at least a hundred times more fun than any of the boring gym cardio equipment. The fresh air and sunshine does wonders for the soul. Yes, I said SUNSHINE! In Seattle! With a balmy 64 degrees. It's a little piece of heaven on earth when the sun shines here.

The deal
Now about my deal with the devil. When I purchased Marianne Williamson's "A Course In Weight Loss" I made a promise to myself that I would read the entire book and give it a chance. I buy a lot of weight loss books and as you can tell from reading my blog, none of them have really helped me. Probably because I never really give them a chance.

Honestly, I don't like this book very much (it's a bit too Zen-Buddhist/new age for me) . I'm still on lesson one. It's called Tear Down the Wall.

This is what Marianne says on page 20:

Your first lesson focuses on the following visualization:  the image of excess weight as a brick wall you are carrying around. This wall has been built by your subconscious mind; its purpose is to separate you from other people and from life itself. Your fear has built the wall, and love will tear it down.

Looking closely, you see that every brick has something written on it:

A few of the words (she actually lists 26 words, but you get the idea):


Shame
Anger
Fear
Forgiveness
Judgement

You select the words that you can relate to, that you have in your past. She says: by allowing yourself to look and to feel, you will ultimately understand. This is a meaningful opportunity to see your light, by being courageous enough to look at your darkness.

She has a paragraph for each word, and you're suppose to fill in the blank for the words that apply to you.  For example:

Shame:  I am ashamed of ________________________________________.
Perhaps you acted foolishly, and cringe to think that other people still remember...
Do not go unconscious. Write it all out.

I sort of like the "Do not go unconscious" part since I do that a lot when it comes to bad feelings or sad emotions. I'd prefer not to think about them. Perhaps this is my problem.

This is a very painful exercise and not one I'm enjoying. However, I'm determined to follow through on this course, regardless of the bad memories it's dredging up from my past.

Funny but true, I'm not an Oprah fan in the least and the book is dedicated to Oprah. Cracked me up. 

My Weight
I missed Weight Watchers this morning. I just couldn't seem to get going in time to make my 11:15am meeting (I was still in my PJs!). I weighed at home and was a little upset by what I saw. 187.4. Not good. I'm trying hard to not beat myself up about this, but to just get back on track.

My plan for this week is to track everything I eat with eTools, follow portion control (two cups of frozen cherries is not a portion nor is eight ounces of chicken breast). I also want to follow the healthy eating guidelines as closely as possible.

I'm feeling pretty positive at the moment, but I'm also afraid as soon as I delve back into that book I'm going to be sad again. Do you really think you have to look at the darkness to see the light? That just doesn't make a lot of sense.