Help Yourself to Some Self-Help

I've never been much for self-help books, or the people that read them incessantly.  What a waste of time and money!  But then, over the last few years, I became one of those people.  Now here I sit, combing the internet day after day for the latest weight-loss tome.  You know the ones I'm talking about:  "You're Fat and Everybody Hates You, Now Change".  "Hug Your Weight Away".  "A Porker's Guide to Pill Popping".  "Jonah's Seafood Diet, Or 'How I Conquered The Whale in Me'".   I have been searching for an easy answer to my age-old question:  How did I get this big, and how do I get smaller?  I've spent so many dollars trying to find this answer in this psychiatrist's book, or that random doctor's book.  Guess what?  The answer doesn't lie in any book.  Know why?  Because the answer lies in a mere a sentence.  Not even a whole sentence, but a fragment of a sentence.

Exercise more, eat less.

Doesn't get much easier than that, does it?  "Exercise more, eat less."  So simple, yet so complicated.  Why complicated?  Because of The Demon.

In my early blog entries (I think, anyway...it's been so long since I read those early entries), I wrote about the demon, or monster, that lives inside my head.  The one that says "Go ahead, Joey.  Stop at Taco Bell.  Burrito Supremes are only 99 cents this month, and they are oh-so-tasty.  And they're good for you, too.  Sour cream?  DAIRY!  Flat, steamy iceberg lettuce?  VEGETABLE!  And the not-quite-red-ripe tomatoes?  FRUIT!  Add in the zesty half-beef / half-possum "meat" concoction, and you've almost got yourself a food pyramid of Pharaonic proportions, wrapped up in a low-fat flour tortilla!  Go ahead, get three of them.  You deserve to be healthy, don't you?"  That demon wants me dead, and won't rest until I'm six feet underground.  Or scattered ashes along the Outer Banks.  Or burning bright on a funeral pyre, my sword and shield at my side, while naked pagan girls dance around giving thanks to The Goddess for whatever the hell they usually thank Her for.  That last one sounds kinda awesome, actually...

Lookit, I know how I got this large.  I ate too much.  I didn't exercise enough.  Duh.  And I know how to thin out.  Eat less.  Exercise more.  Double Duh.  But what I don't know is how to control my food demon.  Some psychiatrist would tell me to look in the mirror, give myself a great big hug, and say "I love you, Joey".  Give me a break.  A doctor would call me "Sir Fats-a-Lot" and try to sign me up for gastric bypass surgery.  A preacher would say "Turn to God in prayer, my son" as he passed me a collection plate.  The truth is, all of these choices have some validity.  They have all helped one person or another get through some tough times, when their demon (alcohol, drugs, or in my case, food) came a-callin'.  But none of these choices have worked for me.

Why is that?

Because I am one hard-headed motherf*cker, that's why.  I haven't given any of these "answers" a fair shake.  I feel stupid looking in the mirror and saying "I Love You" to a reflection.  I'm scared of being told "You'll never eat Indian food again" right before I'm cut open like a piggie at a Farm Life hog killing and getting 3/4 of my stomach stitched up, never to be heard from again.  And at times I'm too cynical to believe that a God who allows such misery in His world would give two shits about my demon plight.  But if I keep shunning the many answers to my problems, how on Earth do I expect my situation to change?  It won't.  It hasn't.  And things are going to stay stagnant until I change my attitude.  Because in the end, the only way I'll survive my demon attacks is by changing my attitude towards myself, towards the food I eat, and towards the learned healers of the Body (Take your vitamins), Mind (Get all lovey-dovey with your reflection) and Spirit (Say your prayers).  Before a change can happen, I've got to believe a change is possible.  Otherwise, Change is impossible.

So where does that leave me?  With a bookshelf full of paperweights, er, I mean self-help books.  But I'm also left with a new outlook.  In the morning, as I stand over my sink and wash my face (and whatever other body parts I manage to find), I'm going to look in the mirror and say something along the lines of "I love you, Joey.  You're not such a bad guy after all.  You are definitely worth taking care of."  I'm also going to Church for the first time in many, many years, where I will pray with as much sincerity as I can muster:  "God, I don't understand you at all.  But I believe in you.  Please save me from the demon inside me."  And I'm going to continue to pray throughout the day, every time the demon rears his ugly rear and farts in my face (which he does with alarming regularity).  Finally, I'm going to drink my shakes, and take my vitamins.  AND I'm going to the gym and swim for an hour.  I'll be in full prayer mode as I drive to the gym and back again, because that's when the demon becomes belligerent, attacking me at every stop light.  "LOOK! A Burger King.  LOOK!  Taco Bell!  OOOOOooooo...pizza!  Couldn't we stop, just this one last time?"

Have I mentioned that my Demon is an asshole?

This isn't the first time I've stood here (OK...sat here) and written great prophecies of what would come to pass.  I have written many lies that started out as The Truth.  This may turn out the same way.  But right now I've got great intentions.  Tomorrow's going to be a very good day, I can't wait to wake up and carpe diem.  But before I wake up, I'll need to fall to sleep first, right?  But I'm not tired.  What should I do?  I KNOW!  I'll read a book.  Oh man...where the hell did I put all those self-help books?  Just when I could actually use one of them, too...