In a fit of frustrated desperation, I recently delved into a medically supervised wellness program. Much of the basic nutrition information I knew or was already familiar with, but going at it solo had only resulted in giving up.
Repeatedly.
I figured if I could get a well-rounded system of education and support for long enough to get the habits established, it might be just enough help to get me on my own feet.
Well, turns out my thinking was correct. I have managed to establish and stick with exercising on most days of the week, and have found a way of eating that seems to function best for me.
And, I know that two months is only a tiny fraction of the average time a person lives, but humans have a horrid sense of time. When you're in the thick of a situation, it's way too easy to think it'll last forever, or results aren't coming fast enough, etc.
This happens with positive and negative experiences. When you're in a depression, it feels like forever, never fading, that's just your life now. The happiest moments of life feel like the most fleeting, too. And what physical or physiological mechanism is to blame, I don't know.
That's where we need to engage our rational and logical brain as best we can. Check in with reality-based markers of time. Note the start date, or even the season, or use a significant event as a way to mark the time. Memories are faulty. Memories plus screwed up sense of time is a recipe for disappointment.
There's this weird thing, too, that happens when we read or watch things online that document someone else's progress where we no longer have a handle on our perception of time. Whether we follow along or see a recap, it somehow manages to ~look~ like it didn't take as long as it did. We develop a disconnect somewhere. There is an awareness that x amount of time was spent, but the perception that the results were obtained in a fraction of that time.
(All of this ends up playing into the horrible comparison trap, too. But, that's a different topic.)
All this to say that we all need to learn to exercise patience with ourselves, no matter what task we're working on. Everyone starts at the beginning, everyone isn't a master from the start, and the only way to really learn anything is to mess it up yourself. We can't really use other people's successes or mistakes to skip over the awkward beginning stages. Cut yourself some slack.
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