It almost always starts with weight loss...

Welcome!
This is the first post of what I hope will be a long-lasting journal of my adventures in weight loss and running.  My goal is to chronicle everything I learn, so that others can benefit from my mistakes and set themselves up for success.

Fatty McGee to Forest Gunp
Soooo....yeah, both those guys are me.  Forty + pounds apart.  The first picture was taken on January 1, 2010.  The second was taken on April 16, 2011.  I would love to tell you that I am proud of the weight I lost, but I am not. Because I am not proud of the fact that I had that much to lose to begin with.  At the same time, had I not allowed myself to get into such poor physical condition, I most likely would never have found such a wonderful hobby in running.  If you are an experienced runner, this blog probably won't be for you, unless you just like to laugh at the rookie or you would like to add some comments or correct my mistakes.  Rather, this blog is for the begining runner, because I am still a begining runner.  My goal is to share with you my experiences and my journey as I learn and progress. 

Motivation
I believe anyone can lose weight, and anyone can run.  But a very relative few like to do either.  We see ads all over the place encouraging us to lose weight this way or that.  We look in the mirror, or squeeze into our ill-fitting clothes, fat dumb and unhappy, wishing we wanted to do anything about it.  All it takes is a little motiviation.  For me, it was my wife.  She will tell you that's no good, that you need to do it for yourself, and that is very true, in the end.  But in the begining, something's gotta get you off of the couch, and she was the one that did it for me.  There was no magic moment or anything like that.  She had just lost the last of her pregnancy weight, and I was so proud and appreciative of the work she did that I finally decided that if she was going to be stuck looking at me for the rest of her life, she at least deserved to have me look halfway decent.  So I started eating salads instead of chili cheese fries.  I started drinking water instead of soda.  I started having air-popped popcorn at night instead of ice cream.  And the weight started coming off, slowly but surely.  It dawned on me that if I started moving more, the weight might come off a little faster.  So I started walking on a treadmill, about a mile or so everyday.  After about a week of walking, my body started telling me it wanted to go faster.  So I went faster.  Then it wanted to go farther.  So I went farther, up to 2.5 miles at a clip.  And the weight started coming off faster.  After just 3 weeks, I was running.  At first, I had to force myself to get up and get going.  But soon, I had to force myself to stop.

Change of Perspective
My body was telling me it wanted to go farther and faster.  But even more than that, I started to love it.  I had to do it.  I ran and ran and ran, at least 5 days a week, ususally 6 or 7.  And I felt great.  But what was most amazing, at least to me, was that it stopped seeming like work.  It became a hobby.  I stopped caring about the weight loss.  I didn't care anymore about my weight.  I only wanted to run.  And even now, I refuse to say that I excercise everyday.  I RUN everyday.  It has become my single favorite activity.  And I hope that those of you who are thinking about losing weight realize that you, too, can get to where you want to be AND HAVE FUN DOING IT!  Because it is fun, and it is exciting, and because it's good for you.

Join Me...

This is a journey for me, and I would like to invite you to come along.  It's a journey that has taken me from being a slug to a rabbit (albeit a middle of the pack, average speed rabbit - but a rabbit nonetheless).  I will tell you how I got here, and everything I've learned, and I will share with you everything I continue to learn.  Because just as I've found that I have to keep on running, I've found that with running, you have to keep on learning!