Having a goal

You can't rely on strong genes, some machines or some expensive diet program to keep you fit and healthy. And you most certainly can't rely on someone else to keep you healthy. You can't even blame someone else for your bad health. It isn't your mothers fault if you have always been obese. She didn't make you obese on purpose. She would be happy to see you do something about it. 

Having a goal is extremely important. Some definition of how you want things to be. Something you actually are able to do some time. A clearly defined goal. Like being able to run a whole marathon on august the 18th. Or like weighing 65 kilos or less at a given date in the future. A vague goal like "loosing weight sometimes" is useless. Or "using the car less". What are you going to do instead? Clearly defined goals and clearly defined methods to get there are my mantra. Oh well. I am getting a little too carried away here. Let's try again. Think about what you want. 

I know that I want to be fit, reasonably slim and in good health. That is probably my goal for the future. And it isn't just something I want to last for a week or so sometimes. I want to be like that for the rest of my life. I don't mind the hard work I have to do in order to get this goal. Seven years ago I was in reasonably good health apart from my elevated blood pressure. But I most certainly was not slim. And I don't really know how to define the word "fit". But at least I didn't think then that I deserved that description. This wasn't a good goal because it was hard to know exactly when I would have achieved that. The definition of those words is too vague. To be able to run 42.2 kilometers in less that 5 hours on a given date is clearly defined goal. You can show that you can reach a goal like that. But fit and slim varies. No two persons would understand those words in exact the same way. 

So, in order to get fit, reasonably slim and in good health I was going to train running and watch my weight until I was able to run a whole marathon. The date for this marathon was to be august the 18th 2007.