Keeping my lifestyle on the down-low seemed necessary even though there is no shame with clean eating, boot camps, and community support; all are non-threatening, harmless, and need not hide. Debilitating burns from sharing truth, vulnerability, and opinions causes trepidation and has kept me silent. Yet living a life skeptical of another’s negative reaction hurts the soul and prevents sharing. My hush-hush response has been a reflection of fear until now. As a walking success story, down five sizes, svelte and trimmer, others prompt me to disclose my secretive life in the gym, my food intake, and the overall how’s of my journey. What risk is there in sharing my story?
Recognizing lifestyles are successful based upon personal experience, I have treaded lightly when exposing my approach. This lengthy, but successful option requires readiness and is not what everyone needs. Since I searched far and wide for an easy fix for decades, I conclude others seek the same. What happens if I bare my soul, steer others along the same avenue, and they hop on board without similar results or hate the process? Am I responsible for their failure? Sharing my journey may inspire others searching for a sustainable solution to weight loss, but if not willing to plunge into the hardness required, it may lead to painstaking disaster, resentment, and animosity towards me.
Ultimately everyone is responsible for their own destiny. Sharing the disclosed information is worth an attempt to motivate, inspire, and encourage others. Perhaps their success will commence with a conversation about mine. Reframing my story that sharing is unwelcomed, risks judgment, and can make or break other’s actions, I now choose to view these inquiries as those seeking solace, solutions, and seeing the possibility for themselves along the path I have chosen. To share outweighs the risks of vulnerability and judgment. Sharing on the q.t. is about caring, yet a balancing act along a beam of possibility. Disclosing my journey and trade secrets is a gift worth giving. It may even transform lives as it has my own.