"Be Fat Free" & other Triumphs

Today was a little bit beyond crazy for me. I can't even explain it...

It's funny though because today was the day I decided to start what I needed to, spiritually and physically, to break this cycle that I've found myself in.
I woke up so anxious and scared and ended my day at work more anxious and scared...
And usually I jump IMMEDIATELY into my usual stress eating. No matter the commitment I made. Ignore my goals... I can start over tomorrow, but today...
I made a choice to ignore myself and stay focused. I ignored the desire to go against what I knew I needed because I refuse to lose this battle. I refuse to lose this war.

So... Today... I went to the gym instead (after I winded down with random YouTube videos for a minute) and I wrote and now I'm going to do a little bit of prayer because I NEED those things and I won't be distracted or attempt to manipulate myself into thinking I need something else. I even made it a point not to come home and eat ANYthing immediately because that's still a reinforcement of a lie (the lie that I can actually find comfort in food).

As another little plus for me, this helped affirm for me that I was going to move forward with my plans for the rest of the year.
One fun on is I made another Instagram wholly dedicated to My fitness/health journey. I named it "Be.FatFree" Lol.
Feel free to follow it, just to make me happy. And see the progress I make over these next few... Wait. This is permanent. So... Follow it to see the progress I make... Period 😀

Alright, I'm out. I gotta do this hair now that I've sweat so profusely. 😛

This is just the beginning, but... I'm doing it.

Be Blessed y'all.
😘❤

-Benita

Dating Jesus || In ALL things... Have Grace

If I've learned one thing during my weight-loss journey it is the importance of having grace for myself.

I know this series usually focuses on my relationship with God, but for me, my weight-loss/fitness journey is my visual representation of my walk with Christ. For me, I can see no difference between how I take care of my body & how I worship God. After all, we are called to worship and honor God with our bodies [Romans 12:1; 1 Corinthians 6:20]. So it only makes since that I use this example when talking about grace.

Currently I am in this place in my weight-loss journey that I've seen before. Feeling a little hopeless. Hopeless because of countless attempts to eat better and exercise but I keep allowing myself to be distracted or unmotivated. I fail. And because I keep telling myself that I'm failing or I suck at this, I remain in this pattern of self-hate. And that's unhealthy.

So, I had to step back (and really I have to do this often) and remind myself that I truly can start over at any time. And although I might be operating in fear right now, God has given me grace and victory over anything. I have to remind myself that every error I make is just that, an error. It's a part of the journey and I can't hold onto a false belief that I'm going to get everything right the first time I try. I spent 20+ years creating bad habits for myself. One day won't immediately erase those habits.

You have to have grace and allow for mistakes because in all realness; You're learning how to live again.

The same thing can be said for your Spiritual journey. You're a new creation which means old things are officially in the past, but this doesn't mean old habits just end. It doesn't mean old beliefs that we held on to just go away. And this doesn't mean you will automatically be able to do everything you're supposed to do the first time you try. This is why I choose to emphasize this as a "journey".

Ultimately God intends to work on us as individuals and as a Body until the day Jesus returns [ Philippians 1:6]. This means there will always be areas of growth and improvement. And this means that there will also be times where we fall short or even give up. That's the human in us. The goal, however is that, eventually, we become completely Spirit led.

The thing about that is, we have to put in a lot of effort and time throughout our lives in order to know God's will for us and in order to do His will. Again, this is where error is expected. And this is why God's grace is sufficient. We just don't want to become dependent on Grace when we can do better with His Spirit in us. God's grace is what has frees us from having to live in sin [Galatians 5:13; Romans 6].

So... today, I'm going to walk in God's grace and forgive myself for the mistakes I make along this journey to full health. I will proclaim victory over my entire life because God has graced me with it. And I will NEVER give up on myself because God chose me and adopted me. Because God needs me to help Glorify Him. And God loves me so much that he allowed Jesus to be crucified for me.

I will rebuke any thoughts that attempt to keep me trapped in my old ways and rebuke myself if needed.

I pray that in all things... we ALL experience and dwell in God's grace & glory.

Stay Blessed y'all.

♡♥
-Benita

Le Struggle Life || Same Vision, Different Goals

Here I go again...

So, as usual, the struggle to get fit is REAL. I've been watching myself, over the past year, gain every bit of the weight that I had lost back.
It sucks.

I've made mention before that my physical health has a strong correlative relationship with my spiritual health. As such, when I first started noticing the weight gain, I immediately wanted to figure out where I was slipping. And it took me months. Almost until the end of last year to figure it out, but I got it. Aside from my eating being sporadic along with my exercising, my general focus had shifted back to an unhealthy one... 

I wanted to lose weight.

Although my being over 200lbs warrants a need to lose weight, that shouldn't be my focus.
I've been setting myself up for failure.

I could spend as much time as I wanted to worried about the number on the scale, but that wasn't pushing me to stick with anything. There needed to be a full shift.
At some point I had to accept that I needed to create HEALTHY Habits for myself. There's no one-time shot at this thing. My lifestyle of worshipping God with my body has to be a LifeStyle. My way of life. My own personal culture. And I hadn't Really accepted that. I wanted to look a certain way by a certain time to prove Something to nobody in particular. And the reality is... I entered into a relationship with Jesus a LONG time ago so He is the one I should be trying to impress. He is the one I should be attempting to please. And ultimately, through my diligence, He will be glorified.

I'm blessed each day that I wake up because it's another chance to get this right. I'm not settling for mediocre anything and I'm not going to attempt to withhold grace from myself when I do mess up. 

No longer will I convince myself that I'm just supposed to be fat, simply because it's hard to find a balance that works for me.
No.
Not anymore. No excuses.
With all that said, I have set it in my mind (and on paper) that no matter what, I'm never giving up this journey. No matter how long it may take me, I'm worth way too much to neglect myself. Afterall, Jesus died for me to have victory.

So, in order to support my healthy addiction to never giving up, I've decided to take this ship one step further:

1) I joined a gym [my apartment fitness center may be convenient & free, but it's no motivation to keep me going... so I figured if I'm paying I might have a little bit more invested]

2) I'm sticking with making monthly, weekly, & daily fitness goals (getting my water intake up is my only daily goal for the moment). Each month I'll take the time to evaluate my progress towards my goals, see what I still need to work on & why, and I will carryover and unmet goals (making any changes as needed)

3) I'm making it my biggest goal to get moving! I spent 5 years in college & 13 years in school before that. I walked ALL my life. But as an adult my life is nothing but sitting down. I'm either at my desk or driving all day & I've neglected the physical activity my body was used to doing in order to, if nothing else, maintain my weight. So, I'm keeping this in mind when it comes to physical activity. When I talk about balance, this one plays a huge part in my struggle. I'm focusing more on it, but it's definitely hard.

And last, but not least...

4) I'm setting a goal to do Color Me Rad this year. I'm really excited about this one. Phoenix has theirs in November so that gives me plenty of time to train. It'll be my first race... Ever. (Yikes)
I'm hopeful to do a practice 5K before, but life has been semi-stupid recently so we shall see...

So the saga continues...

I'd love to hear from you:
Can you relate?
Let me know what's been keeping you from accomplishing Your fitness goals. And if you've been able to get motivated and stay there, share what's worked for you and why?

Stay Blessed,

♡♥
Benita (:

Becoming Me: "No Compromising" Season

So… I found myself getting a little too comfortable with being mediocre. Or should I say… I got content with doing nothing exceptional.

When I say this, I’m talking about my fitness journey. But, I’ve mentioned before that there’s a positive correlation to my fitness journey and my relationship with God. In other words… when one gets better so does the other, but on the flip-side of that… when one is bad, so is the other. As such, here I sit, looking at the buttons on this shirt gaping simply because I’m sitting down and I find myself thinking…

Where the heck am I slipping?!

I’ve been noticing my weight gain for the past month, but I’ve pretty much ignored it. Or rather… avoided it, because you can’t ignore your weight gain when you’re a person who stares in the mirror as much as I do (lol) or examines your body as much as I do. You can’t ignore the fact that you’ve started to allow yourself to eat fried food and Cheetos again, after saying how you can’t eat those things right now. And… you can’t ignore the fact that the clothes that you have been complaining about being way too baggy, now fit more than a little too right…

Yea… there’s no ignoring that. So avoided. Yea, I’ve been doing that.

The funny thing is, ok, maybe not “funny”, but the interesting thing is… I’ve been praying about this thing for a while now. As soon as my 4-week gym challenge was over and I decided to take a “break” from the gym, I probably started praying a week after that. Simply because… I never went back to the gym. lol But seriously. I saw the shift occurring in my mind, so, I started praying. It was probably a preventative prayer because clearly I still went weeks without hitting up the gym.

But the issue didn’t just stop with the gym. At the very end of my church’s corporate 3-week fast, I got the urge to listen to secular music. Now, those who are close to me know that I haven’t willfully listened to secular music since about early November, October (except when I went to the Lauryn Hill concert on Nov 28^th). So, when I got the desire to listen to secular music, I immediately questioned, Is this okay? This has GOT to be something the devil is tryna pull while I’m fasting. So I ignored the urge… until after my fast. And immediately I felt convicted.

The thought was Why do you think you have the right to compromise because you finished the fast when before the fast you didn’t?  

I did ignore that voice.

I did ignore that conviction because I wanted it to be okay since it was “just music” and I didn’t understand how others had the ability to listen to it and be okay, but I couldn’t. I’m just condemning myself…

Or so I convinced myself…

The reality was… it took maybe a week of alternating between secular and Christian music (‘cause I have to start my day off with Him in mind) for me to begin thinking about the times I spent listening to those songs before. It took me back to memories that I had actually forgotten about.

And then the voice came back:

You don’t have the right to compromise right now.

I listened this time. Accepted what He was telling me because I didn’t like where the alternative was taking my mind. So I let the music go and went back to my usual rotation, but decided to add some variety to it. Found some good songs on Amazon too. (:

But I was avoiding that other thing… I still wasn’t going to the gym.

The place that I knew I needed to be at if I wanted to, at least maintain my weight. Then my eating habits started getting worse and then shift in the scale exceeded my 5lbs warning zone…

But yet… I still avoided the issue. But, there went that pesky conviction: Why exactly do you think you need to “maintain” anything? You haven’t even hit your SHORT-TERM goal yet? Why would you want to maintain… this?? YOU DON’T HAVE THE RIGHT TO COMPROMISE! This is NO COMPROMISING SEASON.

Since then the thoughts have entered my mind weekly…

No compromising season.

Don’t get comfortable.

STOP getting comfortable

You don’t have the right to “maintain” anything right now

You need “consistency”, not comfort.

I think the reason I rebuked these thoughts was simple:

laziness and… doubt.

All schemes of the devil.

I found myself questioning why I couldn’t stabilize a little, maintain for a while before I worried about taking the next step?

But, the proof is in the pudding… well the reason is in the product.

My gaping shirt

The increasing number on the scale

My less than healthy appetite

And… in other areas of my life where I have been slacking.

Here I am, questioning why I can’t “maintain”… mediocrity. Why I can’t compromise my form of worship. As if, I have the right to slack on something that is supposed to be my way of glorifying God. I’ve been told before “Don’t lose the revelation” when I found myself in a similar situation last fall, and I guess I lost it again.

I’m human & God’s grace is sufficient so this is not me condemning myself. This is how I

1) motivate myself.  

2) hold myself accountable and

3) hopefully motivate someone else.

Those of us in the journey to lose weight, be healthier, or just change, can often get to a point where we just think This is getting too hard or redundant. So we lose focus, inevitably allowing Satan to enter our thoughts and we lose the revelation of why we started our journeys in the first place.

But when you hold on to what God has told you. When you constantly check yourself, your situation, and remind yourself that your goal is realistic, desired, and in some cases, REQUIRED, for you to be the best you… Then you can decrease the likelihood of losing that revelation and can call out the devil for who he is-- A liar intent on stopping you from fulfilling your purpose.

I say… Access DENIED Satan.

In this life… There’s NO ROOM for Compromising, especially in the Year of the Miraculous…

No… We ain’t got time fo’ dat

Stay Blessed,

Benita Angela (:

Will The Real Benita Please Stand Up?!

I have not given an update on my "Becoming Me Journey" in several months. I apologize for that. I've been pretty busy... Becoming me.
For anyone who ever saw my video from when I began this journey you know that my journey is 3 parts.

1) My Natural Hair Journey
2) My Fitness Journey
And... Most importantly
3) My Journey closer to God

Over the past few months I have made mention of my Natural Hair progress, even creating an album on Facebook. I have also posted more than a few posts relating to Christianity (mostly Bible verses). But... I have not made ONE mention of my progress towards my Fitness Journey.
Why?, you may ask... Well that is because I had made absolutely no real progress towards that goal. I think back & realize that even posting my lack of motivation or progress could have been helpful, but... That would have also been admitting that I just wasn't trying. Yes, I was in denial. Denial that I really couldn't identify what I needed to get healthy.
But I was also in denial of something else. I was in denial that I was afraid to lose weight. Yup, I said it. I was afraid to lose weight.

*woosah*

I've now admitted it. Out loud.

You see, like it or not, once you've carried around some LB's for most of your life you find yourself making them a part of you. Not just physically, but they become a part of your identity. Being overweight has become a significant part of who I have created myself to be. My weight & a few other things (I'll address those in a Closer to God update). And yes, I said "created myself to be"... Because I am NOT an overweight person. I am a person... I am Benita, and I am overweight. Putting it like that causes some convictions to enter my heart & I won't dismiss it this time... Or ever again.
You see... My personality, who I am, has NOTHING to do with my weight. Absolutely nothing. It may be a symptom, but it's not a part of my identity. I think I'll break down the "symptom" in a future post.
Back to what I was saying... I am overweight & being overweight has become so much of who I am that subconsciously I was afraid to lose that part of myself.
I still confront the denial. I tell myself that I'm only going to allow myself to reach a certain weight and see how I like it before I lose more.
That's my mind fighting against what my spirit tells me. 50lbs lighter is scary to me.
What will I look like? Will I still be me?
The answers are, Thinner... And OF COURSE.
But my mind can't yet comprehend that. And if I said something like 80lbs lighter... Oh no, my mind is not ready. My spirit leaps at the idea, but my body... Nervous immediately.
So I rebuke my body; Remind it that a big part of this journey is recognizing that I'm not at all who I thought I was; who I tried to be. I'm Not who I WAS.
Have to continue to stay motivated & Become who God created me to be and no, overweight is not it. Time to embrace who I am!