Exercise=free therapy

"I had a rough week" is an understatement. Anything that could go wrong, did. I still got my workouts in and at those times I felt my best. But have you ever had one of those "I feel fat. I feel ugly" days? It's like everything in your closet looks bad and your hair won't cooperate, you don't have the patience to do your makeup and just blaaaaa. Had that Friday night.

I woke up this morning determined to kick that feeling. I felt prettier when I was lifting weights and running than I did with my hair done in my "normal" clothes. 

Why is that? 

Because I can control my body. I am only in competition with myself. And even though there are bikini models at the gym, I need to stop comparing myself to them. 

They don't know or care that I just added to my upright row and squat weight. 

They don't know that I used to dream of this size yoga pants. 

They don't know I just ran my second fastest mile. Ever. 

They don't know I used to be near last to finish in grade school when we did the mile run in gym class. 

It is an amazing thing to push yourself to reach a goal and accomplish it. And I'm not talking a goal like "Running a marathon by age 40." I mean a small, tangible one like "I will get out of bed without pressing snooze, drink some water, and kick ass at the gym." You can do that. One day at a time. One water bottle. One workout. One choice at a time.

I've talked about body dysmorphia before 

and I really want to study it more. Last night I felt like a whale. But how I felt when I looked in the mirror today proved to me that working out is free therapy. Whatever the science is, I dig it. Because I hypothesize that I increased my confidence from shitty to WORTH IT this morning.