A little bit of everything

It's all in your head

21/12/2020, 23:49

If I had to draw any sort of conclusion from this waste of a year, it's that the hardest fight or the toughest choices you will have to make in life, are the one's that go completely against your natural instincts. 

Today was the shortest days of this year, supposedly. Regardless of that, to me, working 9 hours a day from home and seeing my loved ones, under ridiculous circumstances, out in the cold, for barely a few hours, was just as insufferable today as any other day this year. And what's even harder is, aside from the stress and the anxiety that we all have to face day by day in this situation, I choose to make my suffering even more profound, and force myself to do things that I had never bothered to do before in my life. Things like maintaining a diet, saving up, exercising (but not only in the fun way, like volleyball or walks with friends, I mean getting up at 6 am to go to the gym before work) or having an active social life. 

I've realised the amount of strength that, not just all of these things combined,  but barely keeping up with one of them, requires. I've also realized that this strength is purely mental. It's all in your head. I keep telling myself that, if I wasn't on a diet, I wouldn't be dying for that stupid loaf of bread. I just convinced myself that I want it for the mear thought of not being able to have it. How stupid are we? Why are we so obsessed with having the things that we just can't have? I have a new found sense of admiration for people who do this as a way of life. How are you so mentally strong?

Throughout my whole life, and I can say this now with perspective that I have gained over the year, I have always felt the need to go after things that I just couldn't have. Whether it was a boy that didn't like me enough, or who had a girlfriend, despite me having many other options among really plausible guys. Or perhaps, a longing for a different life, in a different body, under another roof, in a completely random country. There was also my desire to look a certain way or believe a certain things. I have found that, despite the fact that this is a very common trait among people, it is a very self-destructive thing to do. It's all in our heads. 

When one convinces themselves that what they're doing is going to have no impact on ayone or anything, when we believe that we aren't worth enough or aren't motivated enough, in the end, we are not capable of doing said thing. The reason isn't that you don't have the ability to do it; it's that you're not allowing yourself to give it a real try. This is all of course rooted to a fear of failing; it always is. It's always better to try something that you believe will ultimately fail, and in the end succeed, and even if you don't succeed and fail, it's okay, because that's what you were expecting in the first place; but it's all in your head. Failing is just a part of life and we have to start coming to terms with that. 

I cried today thinking about how hungry I was. Truth be told, I wasn't actually crying about how hungry I was (I was hungry, but it wasn't that dramatic), but I had convinced myself that I was in that state of hunger, to the point where nothing mattered to me except eating the first thing I could find. Why did I do that? What did I accomplish? Another step back from my diet, to disappoint myself and the people who believe in me... It's ridiculous, but I just could not think of anything except food, food, food. That has never happened to me before in my life; mainly, because I had never tried to be on a diet before and I never had to know what it was like to have something in front of you that you wanted so so bad, and you just couldn't have it. Not because it was bad for you, or because it would cause a scene or ultimately hurt you; but because you, fighting against your natural instincts, weren't allowing yourself to get it. It was all in my fucking head. And today, I lost this fight with my instincts. Today I gave in to greed, to glutony; I was weak. 

I truly believe that the easiest and at the same time hardest fight that you can ever lose is one against yourself. Of course it's easy; it's just you. There's no force, there's no one insulting you or holding you back, heck, there's no one even trying to convince you to do the right thing. It's just you deciding to let yourself down or not. But hell... That moment when you've decided to dissapoint the only person in the world who will love you no matter what, that moment when you look at yourself in the mirror and realize that you can't even trust yourself... That can plant some judgy feelings very deep inside of you. And all because you lost the fight with yourself. 

I know that I'm not one to talk about willpower, or achieving your goals, or to be any sort of role model to anyone; but I do try to be better every single day. Every day, I get up and I try to go against my stupid instincts; the ones that ask me to be lazy, or to cheat on my diet, or to slack off from work. Everyday, I get up and I try to make myself proud of being who I am, even if all I did that day was not deviate from my plan. I try to help as much as I can around the house, stay healthy and work as hard as I can. I can force the thoughts in my head to be strong and positive, instead of negative and weak. 

The point is, even if I never feel like I have achieved all of my goals, even if I am never 100% proud of myself (because I can always do better), I want to go to bed at night and feel like I won every single night. I won. Today I cheated, yes, but, in spite of that, I won, because I feel ashamed and I won't make that same mistake again tomorrow. I won because I learned a lesson and I will be stronger tomorrow because of it. I won, and I can go to bed feeling just a bit proud, and hoping that better things will come. Today, I won. 

See? It's all in your head.