Chronicles of a Late Bloomer

I’ve heard and read a lot lately about people in maintenance or on plateaus who are lamenting the gain/loss of the same 1-3 pounds. I’ve heard those pounds blamed, demonized, and credited for more malice and malintent than I ever thought possible. Before we beat ourselves up for “gaining and losing,” let’s consider exactly how arbitrary our system of measurement really is.

I mean, who was it that originally decided how much a pound weighed? Cubits and feet were once based on bodily measurements — and what if you were freakishly tall or long or wide? Early civilizations standardized a quantity of grain or rocks to get by in the measuring game. Like everything else in life, a pound is what you make it.

For instance, if you live in Europe, you can gain as much as 2.2 pounds and theoretically not notice any difference on the scale! That’s because a kilogram is 2.2 pounds. In Britain, you might weigh in stones, which equate to 14 pounds each! I’ll admit — I’m a little tired of letting something as arbitrary as a small unit of measurement freak me out.

For me, personally, I can’t let myself be grieved little gains/losses, plateaus, or other numerical nonsense. It’s all in the momentum you have and the direction you are moving. I think a 5-pound alarm will do. That is, I think that if I were to notice a 5-pound gain, I would attempt to step up my efforts. Why 5 pounds? Yes, it’s a nice round number. But, it’s more than that, to me.

5 pounds, which is the size of my second dog, is a substantial amount of weight in the perspective of my life. 5 pounds is how much a life weighs — a life that is very precious to me (though not necessarily so for everyone). My dog made a big splash when she arrived, and she would leave a big void if she were gone.

I’ve chosen 5 pounds as my measurement of choice. I celebrate 5-pound losses and I will pay attention to 5-pound gains. Everything else is just numbers.