I am sure this is because of my age. I am 52, I am in terrific shape totally muscular and I work hard to keep my weight in check.
But the women that I see everywhere around me, at gym, Starbucks and with online dating if they were post children in over 40 it’s like 98% of them are overweight!
And I don’t buy into the bull**** that they never lost their baby weight. Most of these women had kids 20 to 25 years ago.
It’s gotten to where all I have to do is see a woman’s face picture with these online dating apps and I know if she’s overweight or not.
I just have no respect for it. I work my ass off and I eat healthy to keep myself in shape.
One major piece of the puzzle is Motivation, pure and simple. I'm becoming more and more convinced as I begin to understand myself and the landscape around me.
Much has been posted about the affect of abundance mentality from OLD, social media, starving betas, etc. With all that easy validation around them, what's the motivation to self-improve? Especially with something as difficult as weight loss. Losing weight and getting in shape is a high-activation-energy proposal that requires long-term commitment.
I've struggled with it most of my life. There was one sweet period where the initial honeymoon of going on anti-depressants were enough to shed pounds and that in turn motivated me to get more in shape. But after a year I was starting the long slide downhill again. Because while it was nice to be in shape, it wasn't getting me much in tangible returns.
Beginning of last year saw the finalization of my divorce (a good thing in my view), but then also in the spring the sudden breakup of a relationship I had duped myself into thinking would work. So there I was, mentally battered from two decades of toxicity, supposedly on the road to recovery. Then the hopes I had for the future suddenly evaporated, and oxygen left the room.
With a combination of fear and despair I more or less stopped eating, and got serious about resistance training that I had previously only been half-vested in. In three months I was down 25lbs, lean, and showing the beginnings of being muscular. I've kept with it for a year, maintaining the weight and slowly but surely building muscle. That journey helped my self-confidence flicker back to life, which
has had tangible returns, and so I'm motivated to stay on track.
So I totally hear you on looking around my age group (hell, even 10-20 years younger) and seeing an utter wasteland. You want to just scream out "what the hell is wrong with you!!?" But until someone
really has motivation to change and improve, it's not going to happen.