Resilience is Not a Piece of Cake
think back to when you were a baby
and took your very first steps did you
stand up and confidently walk across the
room on your very first try
of course you did we’re a baby that’s
not what babies do
they stand up and they fall down and
they get back up
and they do it over and over again
sure they cry or they get frustrated
but if i had a guess i don’t think
there’s ever been a baby who has said
you know what this walking thing it’s
not for me
i give up i’m a failure and i’m not
gonna try anymore
now think back to the last time you
didn’t get something right on the first
the second or even the third try
what did you say to yourself did you say
you know what that’s okay i needed to
fail at that
so i could do better than next time or
did you say
oh that’s it i give up i’m a failure
i’m not going to try anymore
we all start out with a can do attitude
so why does it change i think it comes
down to three simple words
fear of failing
you see many of us set the bar
impossibly high in our own lives
we strive for perfection and anything
short of that
prompts us to say that’s it i give up
i’m a failure i’m not going to try
anymore
when we think about this idea of
striving for perfection
and falling short in no place is that
more evident than when we look at the
diet culture in our country
as a nation we spend billions of dollars
every year
on the latest diet craze and promise but
obesity rates continue to climb
why i’ve worked with over a thousand
individuals struggling with their weight
and i can tell you how much they eat or
how active they are
that’s not the core issue the common
thread that ties all of these
individuals together
is how perfect they think they need to
be in order to find success
the harder they are on themselves the
more they demand perfection
the more that holds them back that
desire to be
perfect that belief that anything short
of perfection is failure
is the exact reason so many of us
struggle to make change
i want to tell you a story so about five
years ago i met shelly
she was this really great woman she was
in her mid-40s and she was struggling
with obesity
and when she came into my office that
first day she looked
so nervous when i said to her
why have you come in she looked at me
and said
i’m scared i was just diagnosed with
diabetes
i know i need to lose weight i’ve lost
weight before but i always gain it back
just tell me what to do and i’ll do it
in speaking with her it was clear that
she had a history of making a lot of
changes
but she just wasn’t able to stick with
them so i said to her
you know what let’s try something new
how about you focus on making
one change that’s so small that you know
without a doubt
you can stick with it this week so she
thought about it for a minute and said
well i could walk for 10 minutes every
day
so that’s where we started a week later
she came back to my office and she was
beaming with confidence
she told me she had easily been walking
10 minutes every day
so with each passing week she would set
a small goal
achieve it and then set another one and
her progress those first few months was
remarkable
in the six months time she had cut
medication in half
by the year mark she had lost 100 pounds
and she resolved all of her medication
completely
she told me erin i’ve never been prouder
of myself
now if i stop the story there it sounds
like shelby solved her problem right
well you see there was one clue that
showed us she wasn’t going to be
successful
in all the time that we worked together
she never had a slip up
she never had one setback or even
regained one pound
who does that it’s remarkable
but it’s not realistic
just a couple days later shelley went to
a party
and she decided she was gonna have a
slice of cake no big deal right
not to shelly the moment that that kid
touched her lips
she completely transformed she went from
a confident woman who wouldn’t let
anything stand in her way of her
achieving her goals
to somebody who became completely
defeated
in that moment she became a failure and
she could no longer see the point in
continuing to try
unfortunately shelley’s story isn’t
uncommon the research shows there’s a
direct link between perfectionism
and disordered eating it tells us that
we have to address perfectionism
if we hope to prevent and manage
disorder eating but that rarely happens
as healthcare professionals we often get
so wrapped up in the numbers
that we forget to consider other factors
like personality
that can also impact health so what do
we do
we shame those who gain weight we preach
about calorie counting
portion control getting more exercise
being more perfect
but what if we thought about it
differently what if instead of focusing
so much on what we should do
we started to focus on how we should
think
what if a simple shift in mindset to
self-acceptance
and self-compassion was really all that
was needed to win the weight management
battle
and what if those traits became the norm
in our everyday life
wouldn’t we all be happier i think we
would
you know as i’m sharing shelley’s story
right now i can see a bit of myself in
her
i can relate with how she demanded
perfection from herself
and i can understand how her view of
success was either perfection or failure
there was no gray area allowed
but just like shelley i never viewed
myself as a perfectionist
i was just always trying to be better at
all things in all ways
and i’ve always fallen short
i still remember the first time i felt
like a total failure
i was in kindergarten and this
this right here was my nemesis this
cardboard shoe
this piece of cardboard with its little
yarn laces almost derailed my entire
educational career
because you see up until this day i had
only ever worn velcro shoes
so on that day when my teacher asked me
to tie the laces on this cardboard shoe
i didn’t know how to do it it was the
first time in my life that she asked me
to do something
that i didn’t know how to do and i felt
and i was mad i was so mad i went home
that night and i told my parents
that’s it i am quitting kindergarten and
i am never going back
now my mother didn’t make me go back to
school the next day
and i am happy to report that i did go
on not only to graduate from
kindergarten
but today as an adult i can tie my own
shoes
but you know even though i went back to
school that day that desire to be
perfect it continued to follow me
even as an adult when i became a
nutrition professional
i never wanted to admit to my clients
that i struggled with disordered eating
as a teenager
because what would they think i was
afraid they’d be as a fraud
or a hypocrite or worse a failure
but what i’ve learned is that the
struggles i had overcome they weren’t
failures at all
they actually gave me unique insight and
empathy to help others struggling in
similar situations
they made me stronger and they made me
better
and that’s the funny thing about failure
it can actually make us better
but sometimes we’re just too close to it
to see that
i never realized how much that desire to
be perfect impacted my everyday life
until i became a mother i remember it’s
right after the birth of my second son
and
i was struggling i was trying to juggle
a newborn and a toddler
run a business be a good wife and
everything in between
and i desperately wanted to look like i
had it all together on the surface
but inside i was falling apart
and i still remember one morning trying
so hard just to get out the door on time
it took half the morning just to
convince my toddler to wear a pair of
pants
and it took at least another hour to
change the baby over and over again
after a few poorly timed day for
explosions
and everybody was crying and i remember
crying to myself
and sitting down on the floor saying i
give up
i can’t do this i can’t be perfect
and all of a sudden this little voice
piped up next to me and said
but mommy you are perfect
and i still remember looking up at that
little face thinking
you know what he’s right
despite all of my many many
imperfections
in that moment i was everything he
needed
i was perfect it took the wisdom of a
three-year-old to point out to me how
ridiculous my ideals were
and to show me what truly mattered but i
knew in that moment
i had a change because once their
children growing up striving for the
unrealistic
and unattainable bowl of perfection i
knew i didn’t
but until i changed how can i raise
resilient children
so how do you overcome perfectionism
in my opinion it starts with a change in
mindset
you have to embrace failure learn from
it
and let those failures help you to grow
you see that was the exact mindset shift
that shelley needed to make
a year and a half after her inner
struggle with perfectionism
she had a breakthrough she gave herself
permission to fail
and instead of shaming herself over
those failures she embrace them
and learn from them and today she’s in a
much better place
she’s balancing her diet with foods that
nourish her along with indulgences
she walks every day because she enjoys
it and it makes her feel good
and she’s down 80 pounds and counting
but she knows the number on the scale
doesn’t define her and her self-worth is
no longer wrapped up in how much she
weighs
she’s practicing self-compassion every
day and ultimately that practice has
been the key to her weight loss success
so whatever your goals are for yourself
if you want to achieve them
begin by practicing self-compassion
embrace slip-ups learn from them and let
those failures help you to achieve your
best self
as i leave you today i just want you to
think about one thing
if you demanded perfection from yourself
from the moment you were born
you’d still be walking around in your
diapers today
the fact that you’re not you’re wearing
pants
that gives me hope because you didn’t
get through because you gave up
you’ve got here because you have the
will to try and to fail
and to try again so how much more could
you achieve if you embrace failure with
open arms
and learn from it because ultimately in
the end
it’s failure that helps us to achieve
our goals
failure is what creates muscle so don’t
be afraid to flex that muscle
every day thank you