My Spirit is My Master

Wow.  Nearly a year since my last post.  It isn't really a surprise that there is a correlation between my lack of posts and the way I've been feeling during this time.  Since my last post, my dysthymia and sugar cravings were rearing their ugly heads and they took over this past winter and spring.

Then things went from bad to worse.  About 6 weeks ago, my dysthymia suddenly morphed into panic attacks and some of the worse anxiety I've ever felt. Wham. Out of the blue.  After some hard work and a lot of bad days, I'm nearly feeling normal again (whatever normal is for me) but this awful experience has led to a lot of introspection.

1. I manage my stress poorly.  I have to exercise.  I have to let little things roll off my back.  I also recently attended a free meditation class and one of the mantras was "my spirit is my master."  It is my master. Not my dysthymia and certainly not my anxiety.  I can't allow them to take over.

2. When I stop exercising, my mental health takes a nose dive. When I'm on my bike, all the bad juju nearly vanishes.

3. I put way too much pressure on myself to be perfect and be productive and when I'm not, I'm overwhelmed by feelings of guilt.  Perfect is the enemy of good enough.  I need to cut myself some slack. That also goes for my weight loss efforts.  From here on out, my blog posts will no longer report my weight, my weight loss, and how much I have left to lose.  My focus will be on living a healthy active life.  The weight loss will come on its own.

We all have our demons and our struggles.  We have to learn to let the strength of our spirit keep them at bay.