Some days I feel I am moving mental mountains just to face reality.
Here’s a good example: for the last couple weeks I have being going up and down a pound without any real loss. Just hanging out around 211 or 212, then 211 again, then maybe 213, no big deal.
However! My bodyfat percentage has definitely gone down, from 44% to 42.5% since I started using the Physics Diet tracker last week. That is a loss of 3.28 pounds of fat!
I am having to FORCE myself to accept this as a victory. My instinct is to write it off as a glitch in the inaccurate scale. But hey, wait a damn minute. That’s a fancy scale! I spent $60 on it at Amazon! Not only that, but I have spent the last six weeks dragging my sleepy ass out of bed every morning and doing absurd little exercises for core strength. I have been building muscle, and feeling stronger! (But, but! A tiny voice protests inside my head. I’m only halfway convinced that this body is capable of change!)
Hey, self, you know what? You are doing good stuff and here is a result: measurable lost fat and gained muscle. Voila! You rock. Let’s rock it harder, and go for that walk after work you’ve got planned.
Pep talks aside, I have to point out here how useful Physics Diet really is. This is not just a chart — there is some seriously nerdtastic math hanging out in the background that creates a moving average that you can focus on. As they say, this cuts out the “noise” of otherwise small up-and-down movements over time. Instead of a simple trend, you have the Bigger Picture laid out nice and easy for you to see, in a simple black line that cuts through the noisy jags of change.
I love it and I can’t recommend it highly enough. Without the moving average of the Physics Diet chart, I might think I’m going nowhere fast. But thanks to paying attention to the trend of the numbers, and the important background numbers of bodyfat percentages, I can see change where before I might have seen just a hazy flat line.
The moral of this story is: Never underestimate the power of a visual aid! In my case, it really is moving mountains.
