Backsliding

Since starting my temp job approximately three weeks ago, I have gained 4.5 pounds.
This is after maintaining a stable weight for three months.

I'm not 'upset' at myself, more disappointed. I could feel myself sliding back into bad old habits: drive through for breakfast because I'm sleepy and rushed in the morning, buying junk food chocolate the other day because I had cravings, not getting as much movement in my day because of the schedule and style of the job. . . I'm just glad it's not worse: that I *have* packed my own lunch all but two days and have been eating reasonably well there.

I haven't been to Nia for a couple of months. Time to go back tonight, even if I'm tired.
I think one of the biggest challenges of exercise is to maintain the counter-intuitive awareness that (in most circumstances) exercise like Nia will make me feel *better* when I'm finished, even if I feel tired at the beginning of the class.

Nia is perfect for this time, because it stretches out my entire body and it emphasizes pleasure, not pushing through pain. I definitely need much more stretching *and* pleasure in my life right now.

In counterpoint to the physical backsliding, I continue to make progress spiritually, despite the fact that my daily practices have been minimal most days. I keep having small but potent realizations that I think I'm doing a good job integrating and holding on to. I did do a full cycle last night, and it felt almost effortless. I'm hoping that a breakthrough I thought I experienced just before I started the temp job really was as significant as I'd hoped.

It's 5:09am. . . I need to shower and figure out what to do for breakfast before I leave at 5:30am for my 6:00am clock-punch.

Distinctions

For almost two and a half years now, my "best" alternative to pain has been numbness. I have not been entirely without pleasure or happiness, but they have been comparatively rare -- and have often been "paid for" with an intensification of pain in the aftermath. Numbness has been safer.

But of course that hasn't been entirely clear to me. I've been functioning emotionally on a rather primitive level: deep in pain or avoiding pain -- and numbness has often been preferrable to brief or shadowed pleasure.

Except that now I'm slowly waking up to the fact that numbness is not the same as pleasure, nor happiness, nor satisfaction, nor relaxation. . . and I'm missing those feelings, those experiences.

I'm missing them enough that I might be ready to face experiencing them without Him here to share them with me.

And almost ready to not feel guilty about it.