Kicking Nancy to the curb

I'm going to lead off by informing all for you that it's for the best that I only blogged one day last week.  And for the best, I mean, to your benefit.  This blog is essentially a journal of my inner monologue, or at least the PG-13 parts.  I would need a VERY anonymous blog if I were talking about the "other" stuff.  And the last 7 days, that PG-13 inner monologue has been such a Negative Nancy.  In fact, I went ahead and b***h slapped the crap out of said Nancy on more than one occasion in the last 7 days.  Where the heck is all of this coming from???  I have worked so hard to cultivate love and kindness into my thoughts, and suddenly there is this barrage of badness beating down on me.

 

Blech.

 

I'm really not down with all of the self-negativity, because it breeds self-doubt, which breeds self-sabotage,  which spells eventual failure.  I have come too far to feel failure.  I have come too far to give up on myself, or worse yet, make my position worse for myself.  In the past year, so many good things have happened for me.  Finally, my life seems to be working out and taking the path that I have worked so hard to forge.  It is too much to give up.  I would love to give up those negative thoughts, though.  Those are pretty toxic to me.  So I'm going to throw 4 of them out right now, but I'm going to follow them up with reasons why those negative thoughts are not valid.

1) I only got in 3 out of 4 scheduled runs this last week.  Yes, but I also went on a 2 day ski trip, and got in as much exercise as I usually get all week.  Suck it up, buttercup, missing a 45 minute mid-week training run due to weather is no big deal.

2) My booty is flat.  Ugh.  Better flat than fat.  And really, it isn't even flat.  It just isn't a bubble butt.  And really, why is a bubble butt such a big deal???

3) I can't believe I'm letting myself eat this sandwich.  I'm going to get fat again.  Because that's totally how it happens... one sandwich on a day that you work out anyway, and it's all done for.  Totally a rational thought process.  I think all of the low-carb dieting has really damaged my relationship with food.  I automatically decide that eating carbs means I'm going to puff up like a jet-puff marshmallow.  When I originally lost all kinds of weight after college, I most certainly ate bread and sandwiches.  No big deal back then.  But now you would think I'd watched myself drop-kick a cat, I'm so horrified with what I've done.

Fun fact, I ate TWO sandwiches before this picture was taken, and I would probably say/do something very unkind to anyone who ventured to call me fat at this point in my life.  Myself especially.

4) All of my runner friends are faster than me, and it's going to be embarrassing when they have to wait for me at the finish line on race day.  This thought practically could be its own blog post.  I have it all of the time.  I feel so inadequate when it comes to my running capabilities.  The truth is, at the end of the day, we all have to run our own races.  And my runner friends have been made aware of my pace, and chosen to sign up for events with me anyway.  Someone is almost always going to finish a little bit ahead of someone else, and that's just life.  Coming in behind someone else is not a failure unless you did not race to your personal best level.

Despite crossing the finish line with Nerky, Cait and several of my family members finished ahead of us.  And sometimes that's just the way it goes.

I really am going to do my best to work past these negative thoughts this week.  It's disappointing that I have wasted an entire week on them already, when they deserved not even one square inch of brain space.  So, onward and upward, right?  Move out of the way, Negative Nancy.  I'm hiring Pollyanna as my new inner monologue.

What negative self-talk really gets to you?  What thoughts do you need to release and move on from?