Strike the Roots

In this pandemic, I did the most cliché thing ever at night: walk up to the refrigerator to find something that would fill the emptiness inside me. The only comfort I get from this habit of mine is that I am not alone. One in three of you reading this also do that. It is frustrating to indulge in those sugary items only to curse yourself when you stand on the weighing scale. Even my story was like that until this year.

I am a fresh high school graduate. Just like many of you, many of my plans for the summer were either postponed or cancelled. I had plenty of time with myself so I decided to do something about my weight. At that time, my weight was 186 pounds and I was five feet four. I had been a chubby kid but lately I had gained a ton of weight. Well, I never understood the reason for being so fat. So, this time I decided to lose weight before I start college.

I was very religious about my research. I scanned through countless articles on intermittent fasting, keto diet, HIIT workouts and plenty of other things. I started with intermittent fasting and running. I started losing a lot of weight which was really encouraging. By following this same regime, I lost about 20 pounds in 4 months.

But the truth is, I was still on the road to failure. Deep down I knew that my success will not be permanent.

Almost all day, I had to fight with myself to control my cravings. I have a sister who would regularly eat chocolates and pasta and I had to hold myself together. I felt like I was being punished. This constant battle inside my head would often lead me drained of energy. I could not focus on any other thing. If I was making good food choices, then I would be procrastinating the entire day. I would binge watch pointless movies instead of focusing on my online courses. I would be irritable often. If I had a productive day, I would go and relax over instant noodles and chocolates. Well it was a dangerous see saw of choices that I was riding every day.

By the time the sunset, I would be drained from constantly fighting myself.

And as time passed, I realized that I would always be stuck in this cycle. Even when I reached my goal weight of 110 pounds, I would still be counting calories and battling myself over internal choices. And yes, I would have ended up on that road had I not realized something so important that was hidden in plain sight.

As I was returning from my morning run, I saw a tree that had fallen down. I asked the gardener who told me that water logging in soil had made the roots weak. A hundred-year-old tree died because of being struck at the root. The tree was majestic and easily a hundred years old and yet, weakening the roots had caused this tree to fall. I realized that...

Every problem has a source and if you erase the source, you erase the problem.

Dwelling deeply on this thought, I realized that there is a reason why people do things. Everyone starts off a bad habit because it makes them feel a certain way. Eating chocolate gave me comfort. There is always a hidden reason why people take up a certain activity. It is because those activities make them feel a certain way. This sentence has a lot of power if understood.

Figure out the root of the problem and strike it down.

BOOM!!! The problem is gone.

Think about it. How does eating chocolate make you feel? Happy, Satisfied and Content. If so, replace what gives you happiness. When wanting to feel happy, replace eating chocolate with playing with your dog or your siblings or your children. How does binge watching pointless tv shows make you feel? Relaxed? Then practice meditation or sit in a hot shower to make you feel relaxed.

The point of the argument is that we make majority of our decisions based on emotions. Associate emotions with things you want to accomplish and voila! You have the guiding factor to make the right choices. This is the most sustainable weight loss solution and perhaps the solution to all your bad habits that no one is talking about.