Walking in the Light

I have a confession:

I am a Belieber.

I know, I know. I hang my head in shame. I myself have tried ceaselessly to deny it, but I cannot ignore it anymore. The facts speak for themselves. I have been struck by the Bieber Fever.

I submit in defense of this statement three articles of evidence:

Exhibit A: Last week’s episode of Glee. It was masterfully done AND they rocked the Biebs’ music in a way that made me actually listen to it. I had spent so much time and energy avoiding the Biebs on principle that I never actually gave him a chance. And I learned, last week, that his music is pretty much everything I like in a song: light, fluffy, catchy, and irrelevant.

Exhibit B: Despite what you may think, I learned that Justin Bieber is an incredibly courageous kid. He spoke out against abortion in a recent Rolling Stones interview, even in cases of rape. (cf. http://www.newsmax.com/Hirsen/justin-bieber-rolling-stone/2011/02/21/id/386850)

Despite the fact that this was a grossly inappropriate question to ask a little teen starlet, Justin Bieber was strong enough to take a stand even though he surely knew it would be an unpopular one. You don’t have to respect him for his music (and, really, I don’t), but you do have to respect a kid with so much gumption.

Exhibit C: I had a dream about him last night.

Let me explain. My dreams are always really vivid, and really, really interesting. I love sleeping because I love the stories my subconscious creates in my dreams. It’s almost like there’s actually another whole world that I live in, with consistent characters and everything. For example, I have a group of regular dream friends who are NOT people I know in real life. It’s always kind of fun to visit them.

Well, anyway, last night I was hanging out with my dream friends when we stumbled across Justin Bieber – frightened, battered, beaten, and on the run from someone or someones who was/were hunting him down. We took Justin into our protection, tended to his wounds, and assisted him in fleeing from his pursuers and ultimately, taking them down.

That’s right. I rescued Justin Bieber.

Now I know this isn’t your typical tweeny-bopper Justin Bieber wet dream we’re talking about, as mine involved guns and multiple lacerations as well as an explosive gang fight, but the fact of the matter remains. I had a dream about the Biebs.

This last exhibit puts it beyond question. I love Justin Bieber. And I am ashamed.

This week has been a pretty brutal beatdown, all things considered. Without getting into too many details, these last few days have left me pretty much totally drained. I keep waiting for a break to come, but it never does – literally every day brings some new difficulty for either myself or one of my dear friends. One thing after another. It’s been relentless.

Throughout all this I’ve really fallen off the fitness horse. You might recall how gung-ho I’ve been about it from some not-so-distant posts. And after a lot of hard work, I’ve finally been making progress. I lost about 15 pounds, put on some muscle, and was generally feeling good about how I looked. Granted, I’ve never been totally satisfied, but I at least felt satisfied to be on the right track.

Recently, though, it’s been a huge struggle to stay on the ball. I cheat more and more often on my diet, and I put off working out until it’s too late in the night for me to do it. This has only been going on for about a week, so I know I haven’t done like irreparable damage or anything, but I’m still just kind of disgusted with myself for losing sight of the prize. I have to redouble my efforts and throw myself back into my fitness regiment, between working out or running every single day and following my diet really strictly. I know it doesn’t make me feel better or happier to break either one of those – my workout regime or my diet. Really, it just makes me feel like crap, and pretty immediately.

I’m hoping this revelation today helps to get me back in gear. I’ve made the following rules concerning dieting that I’m hoping to stick to:

1) I’ll eat eggs, turkey bacon/sausage, or a smoothie for breakfast. Period. Eggs are preferable, but if I don’t have time to cook them, one of the other options will have to do.

2) If I forget to bring my lunch, I’ll have a smoothie and some ostrich jerky from Smoothie King. Both of these are pleasant enough to not feel like a punishment, but lunch is the great killer for me – I just forget to bring lunch and then go off my diet when I eat out. It was so bad today – I actually bought and ate chocolate. I felt like crap afterward. If I have this rule, hopefully it’ll be easier to stick to it. No options – I bring something diet-friendly from home, or I have a smoothie/jerky. No margin of error. Done.

3) At home, I will eat dinner all at once. Usually, I just kind of snack for about an hour, eating a tablespoon of peanut butter here, a cup of beans there. From now on, I’ll decide when I’m eating, sit down, and eat right then and there. I’ll eat until I’m full, but it’s going on my own, premeditated terms, not subject to a moment’s will.

4) Late in the evening, I’ll have another smoothie – preferably muscle milk after I work out, but regardless of what kind, that’ll be my 4^th meal. I’ll consume that at least an hour before I go to sleep.

I’ll let you guys know how it goes. Hopefully this will help respark my motivation and make me feel good about myself again.

And to all of you guys who’ve been beaten down along with me this week, stay strong. I’m proud of you all.