Doing the Math

Note: There will be a test at the end of class.

Last night when I got home from band practice, I was making some yummy healthy food, rather than my ritual of stopping by the Golden Arches and getting my customary gut buster meal and Diet Coke. As I was rummaging through the fridge and buzzing about the kitchen I noticed my daughters math book on the counter. Why it was in the kitchen I have no idea. She is 17 and stubborn as hell, with her own way of doing things. I shall not question her methods, just cross my fingers she was actually doing her home work and not using the book to crack walnuts or something.
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I picked the book up off the counter and walked it towards her room. I was never very good at math and still hate the thought of doing more than the basics. I wanted to see what kind of things she was learning so I opened the book and got lost in the mess of numbers and symbols that seemed to scream "You don't understand a single thing in here do you?! Hahahahahaha." Damn numbers! Always mocking me. I slammed the book closed and tossed it in her room, nearly flattening the cat curled up in the mess of blankets she calls a bed.

I went back into the kitchen where the only math I had to do was adding the ounces and calories that would be my dinner. I finished things up and sat down to eat. As I sat there chewing my fab food diligently, I pondered the numbers that had been making my brain hurt from my brief look. At that moment I realized that my losing weight is a lot like a math equation. All the numbers in the equation are elements to a final result. If any one of those numbers is missing or out of sequence, the end result could be completely different.

I cleaned up my food mess and started doing the dishes, the whole time with this little thought running through my head. Like most things I observe these days I began to apply a dietary lesson to it and I came up with some new math. We will call it Caloriculus.

My career of dieting has been long and varied. I have tried them all, it seems, and actually found one that had everything I needed in it. I didn't do the math right though, and left out an important part of the sequence that the plan was laying down for me. I had mastered the meal part and the exercise. I even became quite the expert on supplements and the science behind losing weight.

For sure I lost weight. A lot of weight. Like 80 whole pounds of weight in 5 months. I became stronger and healthier than I had with any other plan. Everything about this new way of thinking and eating was so right on. It felt like I would be unstoppable in reaching my goal. Well, even the best laid plan is vulnerable to human error, and boy did I ever error.

Part of the program called for doing two things that I just glossed over. Journaling and what they called, the Universal Law of Reciprocation. Journaling was for obvious reasons. To account for what I did throughout the day and use that as a guide. It was a form of checks and balances.

The Reciprocation thing was a bit more spiritual. The idea behind this was to do something good for someone and it would come back to you. A brilliant and heart warming idea to say the least. Follows closely with my belief in the teachings of Buddha. But like any kind of learning it is up to the student to practice what is taught and I was not the greatest student when it came to these two things.

As a result of missing those pieces of the formula I had failed to fix what was wrong inside of me. I completely missed the opportunity to really understand why I behaved the way I did when it came to food. I didn't add it up correctly. I thought I could get the answer right without doing those steps or showing my work. If a civil Engineer were to take short cuts with their calculations, lives could be lost. Mine almost was and the resulting downward spiral was not pretty.

My "little break" before I was supposed to start back up again took on a life of it's own and lasted several years. I had lost site of all my hard work because I never really got a handle on what I did all the work for. I never identified my addiction to food because I thought that having an addiction made me a weak person. "I don't want to sit in meeting every week reciting my name and listening to people cry and whine about how they got there", was my thought process. Sad. Nobody said I had to do all twelve steps or go to meetings. Just doing the first one would be enough to get started. The important part was to come to terms with what was really going on in my head when it came to putting food into it. It was the only thing that I didn't add to the problem.

So you could say I got schooled. I finally got real because I knew that if I didn't, it would be the same crap as every other time I tried to do the math. If you do the ACTUAL math when it comes to the "calories in, calories out" theory, it is easy to literally calculate your weight loss. Spiritually you have to learn a new way of solving it.

I am following the same plan now, just with all the variables in place this time. I also came up with my own equation to add to my myriad of daily mantras. It goes something like this: Being Greater than equals Becoming Less than.