Let HEALTH Be Your Motivation

The past month I took a little "break" from exercise and eating right.  Why did I do this?  I attribute it to not having the right motivation and goals.  I became discouraged because my goal was to have the perfect body.  But, day after day of working out hard and eating right and not having that perfect body I became frustrated and tired.  The thing that I came to realize is, I will never have the body of the women in the videos. I am going to be brutally honest here and get a little personal, so bear with me.  I have carried and given birth to three beautiful children.  My body has changed.  I do not now and have never been well endowed, nor do I ever plan to go through the pain or the expense to be so.  My tummy skin has been stretched from pregnancy and may never completely be the same (which I consider a small expense to have children), though this may be the part of my body that genetics has been good to me.  It isn't my hardest part to loose.  My bun and thigh area is where the fat likes to camp out.  It seems to not matter how long or intense I exercise or how healthy I eat I will not have the firm, tight, lifted buttocks that you seem to see in the magazines and workout videos.  After this past month's hiatus I came to a realization.  I realized that my goals and motivation were all wrong.  I realized that what really matters, why I should exercise and eat right is to be HEALTHY.  I realized that every time I exercise I am making my heart, my lungs, and my body stronger.  I am not saying that all is lost with looking good, on the contrary.  As  I exercise and eat right for my health I will get the BONUS of my body shape improving.  It will not look like some other person's body, because it is my body.  But, it can through consistancy and having the right goals, improve and be the best it can be.  What matters is that I am going to take care of my body.  To exercise to be healthy.  To try to eat right because that is what my body needs to fuel it. (I must say that this is the hardest part for me, curse the person that invented candy and sweets.) So, now that I have the right Motivation of being Healthy, I need to keep that motivation in sight and not get blinded by comparison. When we compare ourselves to others we are not being fair to ourselves.  No single body is the same.  We all carry weight in different areas of our bodies.  We all have different metabolisms.  We have different emotions.  We have different body shapes, different genetics and different lifestyles.  As with everything about ourselves in this life, we should not strive to look or be just like somebody else.  We can not compare the way we look or anything about ourselves with others.  What we should do is: Try to be the BEST YOU, YOU CAN BE!  So with exercise, try your best, help your body be healthy and be the best it can be.  That is what my new outlook is going to be.  Good luck, BEING HEALTHY AND BEING THE BEST YOU!