You must be your own biggest fan.

Refuse to bad-talk your body, nitpick your appearance or kvetch about your weight. Find something to dig/love/ appreciate about yourself — just the way you are.

I love day 75 of 101 days of blogging. Today also makes it (almost) 3/4 of the way done with the 101 days!

Have you started a journal yet? Mine is in full effect, which has been so therapeutic for me this week. Yes, yes, I’ll tell you some stories soon.

If you have a journal, do yourself a favor today. Journal a post and begin with:

I dig/love/appreciate ___________ about myself because __________.

This, along with my #SheReadsTruth studies, will be the focus for journal entry Friday, September 21, 2012 today.

As women, we really need to love ourselves and our bodies more. If not for us, for our children (or in my case to set the example for my nieces and cousin’s girls) and young girls everywhere.

Okay, enough on that.

I’m so excited to introduce you to Brittany today! As you read her post, think about this: How old do you think she is?!

Meet Brittany….

What does it mean to be “gutsy”?

Full of guts? Well, that’s a given. I think that we can all have our own definition of “gutsy.” For me, it means going that extra mile, not just stepping over that limit, but doing a high jump right across it.

I try to be gutsy and challenge myself everyday. Monotony and I are not close friends. I challenge myself in the weight room, I challenge myself in school, I challenge myself in social atmospheres. When you get too comfortable with a situation, although you like the idea of the comfort you get, you need to be able to push yourself further.

I’ll take my example of the weight room to demonstrate this. When I first started, I used lighter weights to get into the swing of things. Since I was new to weight training, the light weights were still quite difficult for me and admittedly I struggled.

However, as I became stronger, those light weights were soon very easy. I felt strong that I could do these weights with no issue. I felt like I had mastered them. But at the same time, I developed a comfort zone with them and was unwilling to move up.

When my trainer handed me heavier weights, I felt weak once again. I felt like I had reverted to the beginning, and now I was just another weakling again, unable to do anything.

I felt useless.

Be Your Own Biggest Fan

Little did I realize that the point was for me to step further. I can’t lift the same weights each time. How will I see the change I want if I don’t try to stimulate that change?

The body is very smart; it will get used to the same things quite fast.

I  now understand the importance of being gutsy. I will sometimes have those ‘bad’ workouts where I don’t feel like I gave it my all or I felt like I was weak. But by keeping up with the hard work and pushing myself to perform the unthinkable, I can have a great workout. I do not fear moving up in the weights anymore. When I can actually lift it, I feel empowered. That is a much better feeling that being too comfortable and stuck in the position you are in!

The point is that being gutsy is something you have to work at. Continue to challenge yourself. Never believe that you can’t do something.

You won’t know until you have the guts to try. 🙂

Xox,
SKH