Well as my vague post alluded to yesterday, I think I have stumbled on something important to me. In fact, I believe in many ways I have been sabotaging myself since the inception of this blog. For the longest time I have wanted to lose weight.  It started off as being able to do more as well as being able to live a more active lifestyle.  Those aspects morphed into being a better father and husband, and finally it has ended up with me grouping my weight loss with my own value.

This started years ago.  I can’t think of many things in a positive light about growing up.  Kids made fun of me, joked at my peril, and dined on my misery.  Throughout middle and high school, I never felt like I was ever respected nor liked.  Hell, at some point in middle school, I would pay kids with toys or money to be friends with me (I would be rich if I had kept all my Star Wars and He-Man toys now… damn them:) )  Even some of the friends I thought I had in High School ended up making inferences about me to prop themselves up when we got into college.  For as long as I can remember, I have associated my value with my weight.  In my world, I was a fat **** and that was about it.  Even when I got to college and I thought things would be better it didn’t change.  And it wasn’t just students!  I remember going to a dinner at one of the professor’s houses in college for Band Staff Appreciation.  Some of the professors had been drinking and right when dinner was being put out, the director of percussive studies shouted out “Better get in there before Sammy eats it all!” And that was a professor… a supposed professional.  My conducting instructor told me I was too fat to conduct and that I would never be able to play professionally until I lost weight.

I say all this not to invoke sadness or for you to feel bad about me, I did it to explain how even now I am assuming that I will only be a great person when I lose weight.  The notion that I am a good person now has never entered my equation.  The idea that I am the man I should be emotionally and personally is something I would never believe.  When I looked at the postcard I sent to Jack… and it said Hope… something flashed inside my head.  My entire premise of losing weight is skewed. My tag “to lose half the man I am in order to become the man I want to be” is even sending the wrong internal message.  I am the man I want to be, I just need to live long enough to enjoy it.  I am caring, professional, cool, loving, lovable, smart, encouraging, brilliant, educated, determined, creative, etc. etc. etc.

I am not sure if I will change my tag, because… well, it sounds pretty good, but internally I need to change my thinking.  No matter what my weight is, I am still going to be the wounded fat kid inside until I get my mind in order.  I will never think I am worth it, until I believe I have worth.  My entire life, I have spent and endless effort to prove my worth to everyone else while I have felt worthless myself… and then when I am rejected or not chosen, then I can just use that to prove to myself I am right.

I look up to Tony quite a bit, because he has a goal and understands himself.  He believe in himself more than anyone I have met thus far.  I need to crawl inside his head and figure some things out. I just know that I have hit the limit for my mental capacity.  I lost weight before because I didn’t want to die.  I may have prolonged my life by losing 70-80 pounds, but I still haven’t proven to myself I am worth it to go further.  I still tell myself to this day that I am not worth having friends, or worth people hanging out with me.  I continually tell myself this is the best I could hope for and I cut myself off from the one thing I look for most… HOPE.

I am not ashamed to say I see a therapist.  I definitely need one.  I told him today I find myself fighting with an entire other person.  This person has the confidence and power I lack, but also the anger and grudges from the past.  I have kept him hidden because I was scared of who I would be, and this has turned me into a completely subservient human being.  I do… do…do and never think about anything outside my box.  Today was the first time I ever thought about the fact that I have just robbed myself of half of who I am.  No one else forced me to believe this way, but I chose on my own.  And in the end, I am the only person who can put me back together again (if you reference Humpty Dumpty, I will hunt you down).

So while losing weight is what I have to do to maintain a healthy and long life, it is not the journey that will make me feel like I am the man I want to be.  I need to separate the weight of my body from the substance of my soul.  I will not be the man I want to be until I can believe I am already that man.  Once I can truly believe in the value of who I am, you better look out, because this man is going to kick some major ass.  I am glad I am realizing this now, because I would have still been dealing with the same issues even at my goal weight.

I say all of this understand I am only at the beginning of this internal fight.  This is a harder journey than losing weight, but the struggle is one that will redefine who I am.  It is truly time for me to believe I am finally good enough and already the man people care about, love, want to hang out, be friends with etc.  I am already that man….  I just need to create a smaller version of that man.  So instead of losing half the man I am in order to become the man I want to be, I just simply need to accept the man I am is already the man I have wanted to be.  Once I can truly grasp that, then you all better watch out, because I know I can truly soar.

And as far as the man who I hide full of rage and anger… well, I am going to have to get to know him.  I have always been the self-sacrifice guy and it is about time I became whole again.  Now, I am not going to go on a shooting spree and kill people on my “list”…. not that a list exists… I deny anything that was just said, but it does mean I have to come to grips with the darker side of myself. Now, I should have written this back on the fourth and I could have brought in the dark side reference, and that true balance is the existence of a presence of both light and dark characteristics, but I am late to the party (boo-hoo).

So I know this barely made any sense and only scratches the surface of what I would love to say (anonymously), but I have had my aha moment, and it is one of acceptance more than realization. Maslow would be proud of me… well, maybe.  So, thanks for all your comments and messages that showed me you care, thank to Jack for asking for our note cards, and thank to Tony who just doesn’t seem to give a shit what most people think.  You may have created a monster here…