Resiliency

I lost myself in the past few weeks. I have been struggling with some personal issues, and I let them take hold of me. I had stopped going to the gym everyday, started eating less and allowing myself to get distracted so I wouldn't have to think about my problems as much. I would let my days waste away if it meant I could temporarily be free of all my issues and give myself a delusional sense of relaxation, when really, the guilt had just been building up in the back of my mind. I started making excuses for myself like saying its okay to take breaks (which it is, but not the way I was doing it lol), One of my main problems was that I was dealing with some relationship issues, and putting others  before myself, but not in a good way. Sacrificing my personal well being just to make someone else happy, and lost the sense of individualism that I had. But I took a few days to think it over, and I decided its time to get back up. I realized it’s okay to be down for a little bit, as long as I learn something from it, which I did. I realized the significance of my progress, and how much it hurt to lose it. One of my favorite feelings in the world is stepping on the scale and realizing I’ve gained weight. Knowing that all my hard work- working out, eating right, taking care of myself- is paying off, I don’t think there’s anything else that makes me feel more accomplished. And I lost that for a bit, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let that put me down. I had a rough few months, but I did my best to keep up, and now that I’ve taken the time to realize that, I’m going to continue to progress and put my well-being first always.

I forgot how much I love training. In the past few weeks, I’ve been using my phone, video games and tv to deal with my problems, which, as you can imagine, doesn’t really help. Doing all those things leaves me feeling drained, guilty, and doesn’t do anything to help me. But when I am training, being active and working out, I am focused and connected, and it helps way more than simply distracting myself. Not only does it allow me to think and reflect on my current situations, but I am also taking care of myself, and doing things I love. The feeling of success, accomplishment and progress takes a lot of stress off of me, and motivates me to just keep doing better. When I’m in the right mindset, training is my favorite thing to do, it makes me excited to do everyday tasks- like getting up in the morning, eating breakfast, walking to the gym, it just fills my day with adventure. I love romanticizing my training. Playing adventure music in the background, wearing a cool outfit, and especially being outside, it makes training feel like a game, and it makes it so much easier to create forms, especially with my Nan Dao form, cause then I just pretend to fight off ninjas or something. I don’t know if this sounds ridiculous or not, but one of the main reasons I joined Kung Fu was to just add more adventure to my life. Before I joined, my routine was pretty boring, and it was filled with mediocrity. I would spend hours on my phone, procrastinate on schoolwork, watch tv and eat one meal a day. But Kung Fu changed that. When I’m in the right mindset, I’m excited to wake up early every morning, I’m excited to plan and create 5 or 6 meals every day, I’m excited to take care of myself and see my progress and I’m always super excited to go to class or the gym. Basically my entire routine has changed, and I couldn’t be more grateful. And when I’m sticking to it, every day is a good day. Of course I have down days, of course I get sick or lazy and I kinda fall off for a bit, but the difference between past me and present me is that I want to get back up again. I want to use my full potential, and I want to live my best life. In the past, when I got down some, I would just let it happen, and I would stay there. But every day my resilience grows, and I’m realizing it’s okay to have problems and struggle, because that’s just what humans do. But the beauty is getting back up. Everytime I reconnect with my intentions and realize how badly I really do want all my goals- I come back wanting it more, and I start working harder again. Dwelling on the past and all my problems isn’t going to help me, but sometimes it just happens. It’s more about getting back up again, and continuing to look forward.

Ella Grant