Reason 41; Leap of Faith

Why I Hate Being Fat – 217 Reasons ~ 217 Pounds


Abstinence Watch – Day 1 to One Year


Prayer is not asking. It is a longing of the soul. It is daily admission of one's weakness. It is better in prayer to have a heart without words than words without a heart. ~ Mahatma Gandhi

My mind cannot help itself. I wonder about things, different things in my life. Like why do they happen the way they do? Lately, it has been a struggle. The struggle is not with food or with life; but with sweeteners – artificial sweeteners. I am an addict. I have made the realization that I am addicted to the white powdery stuff. I mostly use it with other substances, like with coffee with cream, yogurt, etc. It is not the white dust that bothers me; it is my mind. I don't like the way it has been controlling my life. My mind is obsessed with how things taste with the white substance. Even cheap coffee tastes better with the damn stuff once the half and half is added.

I had given up the white shit before, surrendered just like that (snap of the fingers)! Now it is freakin' difficult to give it up again. Even though I have not gone back totally to drinking cases of diet soda like before, clarity of mind, purity of heart (intention), abstinence from compulsion is blurred because of my obsession of compound properties; this means if I give up the white substance I will easily drop other substances I use with it from my intake.

It started with one diet soda. I was really dying (exaggeration of a feeling I was having at the time) of thirst. Mind you, I could have purchased a bottle of water; but that was not what I really wanted. I wanted the taste of the diet soda in my mouth. Like an alcoholic who yearns for a beer on a hot day, (I have had a few thoughts come and go in my almost 26 years of sobriety) I could taste the diet soda as my mouth watered at the thought. This is the moment I knew I had a problem.

Everyday I want to quit, yet I am hopeless at the thought of not dumping packets into my hot favorite beverage. I give up easily to the temptation. Am I stuck in a rut? Are the other ingredients keeping me at the weight of where I am at? Is my lack of surrender causing me to remain in “fat serenity” and not continue to lose the rest of my weight? Artificial sweeteners are kicking my ass! How far down and beat up do I have to be spiritually, mentally and physically before I surrender?