This past weekend, I shared lunch with three Code Red rebels who are all at different stages of their journey.
One is a brand new rebel jumping in with a 10 Pound Take Down challenge and accountability. She is excited and feeling strong. One has done challenges and a custom program with great success. She lost over 120 lbs. but is now struggling and put 20 lbs. back on. The third rebel is a challenge hopper. (She signs up for the 10 Pound Take Down challenge off and on, hanging out on the Code Red Life page in the meantime.) She lost 40 lbs. and spent two days off insulin before self-sabotage kicked in. She regained the weight and is back on insulin.
Listening to their stories, I could literally hear the shame and judgement they have been attaching to every past, current and even future choice. I get it and I am guessing many of you do too. It could be weight loss or even some other life goal we just can’t seem to reach, we all do it.
Over our lunch, they all had questions, but to my surprise, the one that we spent the most time on was NOT how I lost the weight. (I learned how to fuel my body through a Code Red custom program. The Code Red Lifestyle works.) The answers they wanted are the same answers I also searched for. How do you push through, how do you keep going, how do you make it last?
“How did you climb over that wall I seem to run into over and over again?” 
You get started, you may even get a few pounds away from your goal and then end up going back to old ways. The story is pretty typical: life happened, stress levels were high or even as simple as you were at a restaurant with your favorite dessert. It started by telling yourself, “Its okay, I can have just one piece of cake.”
Most of us know that moment. We’re faced with a situation out of balance from our goals or our plan. We’ve felt that wall, looked up at it, maybe even started to climb over it. Most of us know what was going on in life to start our fall backward. And the situations may change, but the pattern is the same every time.
The choice. The guilt. The frustration. The disappointment. The acceptance.
We’ve gone down the rabbit hole everyone in our life expected us to go down. We start to justify that it is easier to stay fat. After all it is what everyone expected of us, including ourselves.
I can see heads nodding with understanding. (Stop that! Right now!) Try this on instead: “It does not matter what others expect of me. I do NOT expect that of myself. I am going to continue on this journey and do what it takes to accomplish my goals.”
Okay, now back to my lunch with the rebels…
“How did you climb over that wall I seem to run into over and over again?”
I spent years in counseling trying to figure out why I did not have the life I wanted, which was basically what I believed everyone else had. Hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars later, I learned that what I wanted does not exist. I believed everyone had life easier than me. I believed there was a secret I did not have. They seemed to always be happy and in my mind they would never face any of the life challenges I seemed to have EVERY day. But the truth is, everyone has challenges, everyone falls, the difference is if you choose to use those falls as excuses or lessons.
Similarly, the assumption these rebels (and many other people) had is that I never struggle anymore. They assume it’s not hard anymore. The assumption is I never fall when I hit a wall (or maybe I never hit walls at all these days). The reality is that WE ALL FALL. I fall. Constantly. The difference is how far you fall and how you respond to it. The change I really had to make to be successful in my weight loss was actually to learn how to fall.
Tip: “Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” -Henry Ford.