Morning Reflection: My reactions are my responsibility.

My reactions are my responsibility.

It took me a long time to learn this truth, but my reactions are not reflexes.

A reflex is an action that occurs without conscious thought, like the way we pull our hand away from something hot. A reflex carries no judgment, no decision, no initiation of thought. It just simply occurs.

For the longest time, I thought of my reactions this way. Why…because it made things easier. If my reactions were in fact more of a reflex, then I didn’t have to think about them, didn’t have to control them, wasn’t responsible for how I acted and what I said.

After much thought and meditation, it occurs to me that I thought this way because it allowed me to evade the responsibility of choosing my reactions. It allowed me to act as a child, rather than an adult.

As I have grown through my journey, I have come to realize that my reactions are actually responses, that occur as a result of the way I see and feel about the world. But in truth, the way I see and feel about the world is a representation of my own inadequacies, fears, needs and aspirations.

My reactions are, in truth, a reflection of my perceived place in reality.

Since my reactions affect others, I feel that upon me falls a heavy responsibility, that of making sure that my reactions are congruent with the way that I would like to treat the world.

Where I could choose to react with anger, I hope to react with kindness. Where I could choose to react with fear, I hope I may react with faith. Where I could choose to react from pride, may I instead react with humility.

My reactions are my choices, and it would be wise for me to consider them carefully, and learn from them.

Because the reactions that I don’t ‘think about’ are in fact a roadmap to the deeper nature of my soul.

If I would learn to master my reactions, I must first learn to understand myself.

-- Dr. Alan Barnes

@maddrbdc

In the service of others...

One of my favorite quotes by a man I greatly admire goes like this…

“Serve a cause greater than yourself or you will lead a one-man army.” -- Richard Marcinko

A passage from a book of Scripture reads...“For how knoweth a man the master whom he has not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and is far from the thoughts and intents of his heart?”

All around us are incredible examples of service. Most acts of service are quiet, personal, and never make the headlines. Service from a parent to a child, a sister to a brother, a child to an aging parent or friend to a friend.

Even greater is the service to a stranger, because when we serve someone who we don’t know and with whom we have no relationship, we are no longer serving within the bonds of the relationship, we are serving within the bonds of humanity.

I get a chance to serve every time a patient walks into my office. It is an honor and a sacred trust that I take seriously.

I long for the day when I can serve as a doctor without having to charge for it.

Service uplifts us. It takes us out of ourselves and allows us to serve a cause greater than who we are. When we serve humanity in general, we find a greater sense of connection, a greater sense of identity and a greater sense of whole.

Service doesn’t have to be great or loud or noticed. Service allows the one who serves to forget themselves and to give of their best.

However and wherever you serve, always try to give the very best of yourself, knowing that you are made better by your service as much as the person whom you serve.

Look for opportunities to serve everywhere, and you will be amazed at the possibilities before you...and you will know peace.

The Next Journey

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The next journey.

When I started my weight loss journey in May 2016, I didn’t really have a time frame. I just knew that I wanted to lose weight and eventually get back to 180 pounds.

Around November I started realizing that I could achieve 100 pounds of weight loss in approximately 8 months and I got excited. What can I say, I like round numbers. :-)

So I set myself a goal of weighing 230 pounds on January 1 and by pushing myself really hard I managed to achieve it. It was amazing to realize I could do this.

But once I reached my goal I realized there was something missing. I was still slowly losing weight, but I didn’t have the drive and the focus the same.

Because I didn’t have a goal.

Don’t worry, I still haven’t cheated or eaten anything that I haven’t planned to. I just haven’t been as mentally focused.

And it struck me again how important the mental focus aspect is.

So now I have a new goal. 130 pounds lost in one year.

My new goal is to weigh 200 pounds (or less) on May 1, 2017.

That would give me 130 pounds in a year. Not too shabby. :-)

To get there I’m going to have to change things up a little bit. Until now, exercise has never been a significant part of this program, but it is becoming so.

I’ve realized that I don’t just want to lose weight, I want to feel fit.

Growing up and always being overweight, fitness was always something that was a negative for me. But over the last few weeks I’ve started to become more and more interested in the idea of fitness, not as an aesthetic, but as a way of life.

Losing weight has made me realize that I can do more things. That my life is not limited. That I have wasted so much time not becoming all I can be, and I’m sick of that.

So now it’s time to strike out for a new destination. Now it’s time to become more, to do more, to serve more and to give more.

Fitness is now going to be a more significant part of my life. I’ve realized I can do this, and now I want it.

So here we go. I’m currently 226 pounds and there are approximately 12 weeks. So I have to lose approximately 2 pounds a week to get to my goal.

So bring it on.

Bring on the focus, bring on the drive, bring on the intensity. Bring on time in the gym, time spent in meditation. Bring on soreness, tiredness and achiness.

Bring all of it.

I’m ready.

An unexpected miracle…

I wrote last week about my unwanted Christmas present, when the scale showed me that I had gained weight. I was pretty sure it was water weight – but it still wasn’t what I was looking for.

When I started losing weight, I wanted to be at 250 lbs by Christmas. At the time, it seemed like a crazy goal that I could never reach.

Until I got there way earlier.

Then it was 240 by Christmas, but I achieved that early as well.

So then I wanted the big one – 100 lbs in 8 months.

When I started this journey on May 2, I weighed 330 lbs. To lose 100 lbs in 8 months, I would need to weigh 230 lbs by January 1, 2017.

It seemed impossible, but then it started to look like I could make it…and I got really hopeful..

Until last weekend. The scale showed me the bad news on Christmas day – there seemed to be no way I could reach my goal.

But I didn’t give up – I kept going, and going, and going. All through Christmas Day. Through a very stressful week at work, and through a weekend that was changing my life.

And then came the scale on Sunday. The moment of truth.

I knew there was still a chance that I could make it. When you are losing weight like I have done, there are things we call “stalls and whooshes”. A stall is when your body refuses to lose weight, hanging on as hard as it can to the weight…until it finally lets go.

And let go it did.

I stood on the scale, watching and waiting…would it work, had I made it, was I going to be rewarded for all my hard work and sacrifice...

Yes. Yes I was.

When I looked at the number I could see a 2, then a 3, and finally a 0.

I had done it.

100 lbs lost in 8 months – I weighed 230 lbs.

I can’t really tell you how it felt. It’s too hard to put into words. For just a moment, I felt at peace. I felt like a weight had been lifted from me. For one moment, the clouds had parted, and the sun shone through. I felt like I had achieved something unexpected – something magical.

Part of me wanted to cry, part of me wanted to shout, but the rest of me was at peace.

I realize weighing 230 lbs doesn’t make everything better. I am still facing huge challenges in my life as I try to move in the direction of my dreams. There are many hurdles to overcome, there is much work to be done.

Next up – Onederland. That’s the name we who have lost huge amounts of weight call that moment when the scale no longer starts with a 2, but instead begins with a 1.

My goal right now – to try and achieve that by May 1, 2017.

130 lbs in a year – 140 down from my highest.

That’s something that will require a lot of effort and a continued desire to improve.

I have come a long way, but there is still so far to go.

To all of you who have helped, supported and uplifted me – thank you. This is your victory too.

100 lbs – 8 months.

I never thought I could do it…

So what else can I achieve.

I wonder.

This post has been edited.

The Christmas present I didn’t want.

I guess I will have to settle for losing 95 lbs in 8 months and not 100. Oh well.

Seriously…Of all of the days for the scale to show me that I was up, Christmas Day was not the day I was looking for. I can honestly say that I have been “perfect” on my diet for the last 200 + days. I have not had a “cheat meal” or eaten anything that was outside of my parameters.

On Christmas Eve morning I was working with a weight loss client (yes, I am starting to do weight loss coaching) and told her how she shouldn’t base all of her energy on what the scale reads, but in trust in the process.

Those words came back hard on Christmas morning to me. Of all of the days, when there is going to be food all over the place, when no one would “judge me” for eating off of my diet, on a day when I could really use motivation, the scale shows I’m up 2 pounds.

Thanks life, good shot.

I’m happy to report that I didn’t buckle. I ate perfectly on Christmas day. Not one thing wrong. Not one candy, not one cinnamon roll, nothing. I ate exactly as I was supposed to eat. Sure, the scale doesn’t reflect it yet, but I trust the process.

When you have faith in the process, the results can’t hurt you as much. Sometimes you just have to walk in the direction of your dreams, entrusting you are doing the right things.

I think it was Thoreau who said that, but maybe he stole it from somebody else as well.

I don’t think I’m going to reach 230 pounds by New Year’s Day, which was my original goal. I would love to, but it doesn’t mean I’m going to stop. This process isn’t over until I weigh 180 pounds. Do I have to tweak it along the way, obviously.

But I know that the supposedly 2 pounds that I gained over the last week is nothing but water weight, and that as long as I am true to the process, everything else will work the way it is supposed to do.

For now, I have to be a good example for the people and coaching, and continue to fight even though the scale took a shot at me. Like Rocky said, "it’s not how hard you hit, but how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forwards."

Because the reality of it is…I only lose if I quit. All I have to do is keep working and I’m winning.

Wherever you are in the world, I hope you had a wonderful Christmas day or Happy Hanukkah or whatever you celebrate, or not. Hang in there, stay strong and eat well.

Your life deserves it. :)

This post has been edited.

Struggling through the Season

After losing 100 lbs, you'd think that I was on cruise mode. You’d think that I was locked in and safe.

Honestly…no.

Yes, I have eaten “clean” (not off my diet) for 232 consecutive days. That’s right – 232 days. Only twice have I gone over my calories. Once on my son’s graduation, and once on my birthday. Even then, I still ate the foods that work for my eating lifestyle, just in a little larger proportions.

People who have talked to me about my weight loss tell me that they couldn’t do it, and how proud they are of me for being so strong.

Truth is, I thought by now it would be a little easier. But it’s not...

Making changes in your life is never easy. It affects those around you in ways that is easy to overlook. My wife, who loves to cook, has had to endure 232 days of not cooking the kinds of foods that she loves. I think she feels like she is being forced into a ketogenic diet by default, and I know she is struggling with that, even though she tries not to show it.

And the holidays don’t make it any easier. Thanksgiving was especially tough. Being surrounded by family who were eating foods I love, while I ate turkey, ham and stir fried broccoli, was hard.

Now, moving into the Christmas season, I’m faced with even more temptation and pressures.

How do my choices affect those around me…should I have one meal that is not the best for my weight loss…what do we do with all the food that kind people invariably bring as gifts?

One meal would not change anything. Realistically, I could fast the whole day and eat one meal of anything and it wouldn’t significantly change my life.

But I must confess that I am incredibly reluctant to do so…because I am afraid. I am afraid that if I break one time, it will be easier for the next time. And the next, and the next and the next.

I think I’m getting some kind of an idea of how an alcoholic feels. One coke would be too many, and two would never be enough.

I’m trying right now to get to 230 lbs by new years day. That would be 100 lbs lost in 8 months, and 110 lbs overall.

It still feel weird to think of how much I have lost. How much I have changed physically.

And how much I am trying to change mentally.

Truth is, I’m still that 340 lb guy, desperately trying to lose weight, afraid that one wrong move will screw it all up. I’m still ashamed of how I look. I get that it’s better than it was, but it’s still not good enough, and I tremble to think that it may never be.

I have so many goals left to reach – so much of a life to change. Losing weight is only a step on the journey. An important step, a critical step, but it’s not the destination, it’s just a toll booth on the highway.

So I struggle…every day.

I struggle to fight against the negative self talk and the fears that drove me to use food as my drug.

I struggle against the angry teenager who still haunts my soul with his feelings of never being good enough, never fitting in, never feeling whole.

I struggle with the burdens I place on those around me as I try to become the person I feel I owe them.

Mostly, I just fight, because it’s all I can do right now.

I fight for my self esteem, for my hopes for the future and for my dream that I can feel like a “whole, complete and accepted person”. I fight to achieve the life I owe my family. I fight to find a pathway into the future that is better than the past.

But honestly, I think I fight most of all for peace. Peace in my soul, for I have known so little of it lately.

Tony Robbins once said that fat people were just people who were wearing their pain on the outside.

What I’ve found is that as the weight comes off, you have to deal with the pain and struggles that you were suppressing.

And that’s not easy.

But I struggle, and I fight and for today, that has to be enough, because it's honestly all I have.

To those of you who have supported me on this journey, I thank you. I couldn’t have done it without you.

While I have to fight this myself, it’s easier with good people in my corner.

What does it mean to you?

Recently I was teaching a small group of 14 year olds about how they can learn to analyze a situation more intelligently. While I don’t know if they got the concept I was trying to get across, I hope that somewhere in their minds they stored this simple phrase…

“It’s never the event – it’s always the interpretation”.

I hope that it will come back to them at a time when they need it most in their lives. I sincerely believe that’s why we teach youth – it’s not that they will understand it right now, but at some point in the future they will see a situation and interpret it as we have taught them to do. Life will provide the example, but how we interpret that example makes all the difference in our lives. We teach kids so that the interpretation is loaded into the subconscious, so they can make the correct interpretation of the event when it occurs.

However, even knowing this truth, as adults we still jump to a conclusion when something happens, not realizing that we might have an option to redefine what the event means to us, so we can make it more empowering.

To some people, the idea that you can redefine your interpretation of an action or an event seems ridiculous. These are the kinds of people who I think of as “reaction machines”. They perceive an event or a situation, and they react to it (either emotionally or physically) without thinking. Have you ever done that on occasion – my guess is that you have, because we all have. Especially in a tense situation, or with someone whom we have an emotional relationship, or just a professional one.

I’ve been married for 20 years now. I can honestly say in that time, we have had very few arguments, and we have never had a “fight”. I define a fight as “when two people who love each other try to hurt the other person rather than come to an agreement about a problem”. I saw too much of that as a child, watching my mother and father fight endlessly about my father’s drinking.

My mother chose to interpret his drinking, and his struggles to provide financially for his family, as an affront to her and to her children, and felt hurt and angry. Imagine the possible differences in her marriage had she been able to interpret his actions differently.

As a child, I was too young to interpret his actions with any perspective. As a young man in my 20s, I too chose to interpret his actions as those of a selfish, immature and cruel man who cared more about his own pleasure and enjoyment than he did about his family’s welfare.

Now, as a 46 year old, I have chosen to interpret his actions differently. As I have learned more about people, and they way our minds work, I have come to interpret his actions as a desperate attempt to self medicate his own pains and grief. Himself a product of a dysfunctional childhood, he struggled with his own demons, and was trying to survive as best he knew how. Did he make great choices – no, but I choose to believe that he was trying to do his best.

I don’t think how I chose to interpret his actions as a young man made any great difference to him. I’m not sure that he would care how I choose to interpret them now. We haven’t spoken in years – and I don’t expect we will ever have a meaningful conversation about it in the future, if any conversation.

But the change in my interpretation has affected me profoundly. For years I carried around anger, hatred and repulsion for him. Thoughts of him would frustrate me, cause changes in my psychology and affect my life in negative ways. When I thought about him, I felt abandoned, rejected and minimalized, like my worth was so insignificant because he didn’t care enough to be there.

I carried, and to some extent still carry, those kinds of feelings. The scars of those emotions still haunt me to this day, and I can see how the interpretation that I chose, and the emotions that came from that choice, still impact my life, and that of my family.


Imagine the changes in my life that could have occurred had I chosen a different interpretation, seen from another point of view the actions of a man who was trying, and failing, to do the right thing. Imagine if I had felt like collateral damage, rather than someone who wasn’t worth caring about. What could that have done to my sense of self worth, and to my confidence and attitudes.

As a child, you are always trying to find an answer to a situation, some kind of logical connection to make sense of the world. For me, since my father treated me poorly, I subconsciously chose to see his actions as a rejection of myself, not as a symptom of his own issues. No child wants to see their father as damaged, so I chose to think that he was trying to do the right thing, but I was somehow unworthy of his affection and his concern.

Was he trying to do the right thing, or was he just being a jerk like I described earlier – who knows? But my choice of interpretation is the greatest control I have over the situation, and it forces me to re-examine all my actions.

A mind that is awakened to the possibility of situational redefinition is a mind that has left reaction, and the dark abyss of being at the mercy of other people’s actions.

The mind that is awakened to the possibility of choosing how to redefine a situation is a mind that has struck out on a journey for that greatest of realities – a universe full of possibilities, no longer chained to the actions of others for meaning.

The mind that is awakened to these possibilities is a mind that can change the world.

And it is a mind that can know peace.

How do you know when you are ready?

How do you know when you are ready?

Life has a way of changing on us. In the musical Jekyll and Hyde there is a song that contains the lyrics “The Only Thing Constant Is Change”. Never were truer words spoken.

But how do you know if you are ready for the change that is coming? I recently had a friend become a parent for the first time. Before the birth, I shared with him my philosophy that you are never truly “ready” for parenthood, because you have no idea what life is going to throw at you.

I certainly was not ready to become a parent. I was not ready on the day of my son’s birth to be confronted with the harsh reality of congenital heart disease. I certainly was not ready for him to have open heart surgery at six days old.

You are never ready for something like that.

But to go even further back, was I ready to be a husband? Coming from a dysfunctional family, I had no experience of a happy family to be able to base my decisions for the future. All I had were my own theories and ideas and principles that were forged through a childhood of listening to my parents fight and scream and cry.

Even before that, was I ready to change countries and start a new life with a woman who I had not spent much physical time with at all? A long-distance relationship is a difficult way to get to know each other, and yet I was prepared to walk away from family, friends and country to start a new with nothing more than two suitcases.

I was prepared, but was I truly “ready? No – we never truly are.

Does your fear of “not being ready” hold you back from doing the things that will make you happy? I have written recently about the value of time and the importance of spending or investing time wisely. One of the things that often holds us back from the proper investment of our time is a feeling that we are “not ready”. That somehow we need more experience, or a better understanding, or more resources.

Most of that is our own fears. Can you be underprepared…sure. Could you be more experienced…of course. Could you have more resources…of course you could.

But you can also spend your entire life hiding behind those reasons. At some point you have to make the decision to go.

From the first time I watched it, Apollo 13 has been one of my favorite movies. There are so many moments in the film that give me goose-bumps but, without fail, every single time I watch the scene where they are giving the go/no go for launch, and as the flight controller is calling out to each of his team leaders for their go/no go, I feel that same thrill of excitement, as the combined knowledge, skill and experience of so many people converge at a single moment when 7.5 million pounds of thrust is unleashed on a Saturn V rocket to hurdle three brave men into a rendezvous with danger that they had no concept about.

Were they ready for the explosion to happen? No. Had they prepared? Yes.

They did not know that that exact failure was going to occur, so they could not have been ready for it. They were trained for many other failures, but nobody had even considered such a catastrophic explosion that destroyed so many of their spacecraft’s systems.

However they had drilled and prepared and studied and learned as much as they possibly could about their spacecraft and their mission before they left. Their training, and the skill and training of the entire flight control team got them through a situation that they should not have survived. They came home despite overwhelming odds when they should have been breathing their last moments in the vast expansive unforgiving space.

They were not ready, but they were prepared.

All of us go through life with different experiences and different situations. Sometimes we come up against situations that we are “not ready for” because we have not been there.

Do not let the fear of that stop you. Prepare, but then do. There comes a time when you have to trust your skill, knowledge, experience and training, and then just do.

Whatever it is in your life that you are preparing for, set your deadline. Make your decision. Prepare, prepare, prepare...

And then do.

And you will know peace.

Perfection is deadly, but deadlines are perfect.

Perfection is deadly, but deadlines are perfect.

How many times have you looked at something and found fault with that which is "good enough"?

How many times have you been stalled in your pursuit of a dream, a desire or a passion, simply because you thought your efforts were not "perfect".

How often have you walked away from something you could be great at, because you were afraid you would get things wrong?

Stop it now.

Resolve instead to set deadlines, and do the best you can until that time.

Will you make mistakes - yes.

Will you have days when you feel like you have failed - yes.

Will you have times where you feel like the world is crashing down on you, and you feel like you have lost your way, your truth and your self respect. Probably. Just do.

Do it as a way of living, a commitment to yourself to give yourself over to your passions, your dreams and your desires. Set deadlines and apply yourself at whatever it is you want to do until then. Screw up, evaluate, change approach... whatever.

Don't stop.

They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I say the road to paradise is paved with imperfect actions.

Do, learn, adapt, overcome and succeed.

And you will know peace.

Faith in the Journey

One of the psychological problems in trying to lose a lot of weight is that you eventually find yourself in what feels like no man’s land. It is like you have lost sight of the shore and while you have faith that there is land across the ocean, right now all you see is water all around you and it’s disconcerting.

At this point I am down almost 60 pounds since starting a ketogenic diet (Keto). In another 10 pounds I will actually be down 80 from my highest of 340. 80 pounds is halfway between 340 and my goal of 180. I thought getting halfway would be mind blowing, but it is kind of anticlimactic.

I feel like I am in the middle of the ocean sailing the ship in the right direction, because if I don't, I will drift back to where I came from. But it is hard sometimes, when the days are long and stressful, to keep my eye on that shore that I know is there but I cannot see yet. I have faith and belief in the journey even when the journey is hard, the seas are unfriendly and there does not seem to be a lot of enjoyment where I am at.

I knew this wouldn’t be easy. One of my favorite comments that I have heard is that "desire fades, but discipline remains". For me, part of this now is the discipline to stay with the process. I can’t imagine what it is going to feel like when I step on that scale and see that I am under 200 pounds. I cannot remember the last time I was, except that I have a horrible suspicion it was somewhere around 1997. 20 years of being overweight is hard to comprehend. It is frustrating to realize that I could have done this any time had I only had the information that I have now. To quote Eric Thomas, "information changes situations".

In the back of my head there is still this voice tells me that I am going to lose all the weight and then put it back on again. I have lost a lot of weight before, only to put it back on, but the last time I lost this much weight I was not eating, and the lifestyle was not sustainable. This time what I am doing appears to be sustainable. What I must find is balance. I need to find the balance between eating for fuel and occasionally eating for enjoyment. Finding that balance has never been easy for me, but this time I am determined to do it.

Once I have reached my goal, the question becomes what to do with the knowledge I have gained. I am wondering if I can use my talent for public speaking, my education as a physician and my experience as someone who has lost a lot of weight to make a difference in the lives of other people.

But for now, I just have to keep the boat pointing forwards and sailing on. I have faith that there is a shore out there where I can fit into a 34 inch waist, smile and feel like I have accomplished something quite spectacular.