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I’m not talking about the Beatles’ song, but “The Biggest Loser.”

I started watching the show online as a matter of research for this blog. I mean really, how can I blog about weight control issues without knowing what this show is about?

Host Alison Sweeney introduces the fitness challenge with high drama.

It didn’t take long for me to form strong opinions about the advice and role models Americans are getting from this show.

Yet, I keep watching episode after episode.

Oh, I shed a tear when Sherry got voted off. And then I really sobbed when O’Neal and Sunshine had that heartfelt father-daughter talk. Then O’Neal walked up the steps to the scale, finally light enough to take pressure off the knee injury that has crippled him for years! Michael is showing real character, still shedding major pounds even while his Grandmother is dying. And wow, Sam is looking hot!

Oh yeah, I’m a loser all right. Reality TV has got me.

Here’s the stuff that makes my eyeballs roll back in my head. Bob, the trainer, takes aside one player in each episode for some serious health advice coupled with an awkward embedded product advertisement. As each player is voted off, it is foreshadowed with some melodrama that I suspect is incited by the producers of the show.

What I fear “The Biggest Loser” is teaching Americans is that it’s healthy and normal to lose 5-10 pounds per week (after all, Dr. H is on campus supervising everything, right?); that these intense workouts (“Last Chance Workout!”) are good for everybody, even the most obese; and that what makes good TV makes good practice for weight loss. I have serious doubts.

Yet, I keep watching. I’m a loser all right.

Last night, a Sunday, I went to a musical jam night where I was surrounded by singer/songwriters and their guitars.  I am a wannabe in this crowd, there is no doubt.  Despite a fury of practicing, I am not ready yet to play guitar in front of the cats, let alone other people.  But I sat there and sang along and held my guitar as a prop.  It was okay, but I did poorly.

Tonight I went back to yoga class for the first time in a few months.  Oh geez, did I ever suck.  I know yoga isn’t a competition, blah blah blah, but everything in my body was stiff and crampy and wobbly.  It felt good, but again, I was no superstar.

But it was then that I realized* that I actually, perversely, missed that feeling of doing things poorly.

When I was losing weight, I felt like this all the time.  It is a humble but satisfying feeling to know that even though I am doing something poorly, I can be proud enough of myself for showing up and doing it, and every time I do show up, I get better.  So whether it is weight lifting or balancing like a tree or playing the guitar, I can feel good even though I am performing the task badly.  At least I am showing up.  I am still doing the work.

I have been procrastinating coming back to a yoga class because I knew I would do it poorly.  But at some point I had to either get over that, or give up yoga forever.  It is the same with the guitar.  And maybe it was the same for losing weight–either get it done or give up on the idea.

So I challenge anyone who is reading this blog to consider something that you want to do well, but you doo poorly now.  Is fear of underperforming preventing you from doing the work at all?  Maybe you can take pride in your act of simply showing up and “reporting for duty.”  Do the work, and be grateful that you are doing that much.  The accomplishment of the task will come.

*Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City says this in every episode, I think.  Has anyone else noticed that?

Last week I blogged about losing my Workout Mojo–that I was violating my own rules (the rules from the Weight Loss Seminar) by losing touch with my people and doing the same thing over and over again.  OK, I see the problem.  Why is it so hard to fix it?  I know how to get my mojo back–why don’t I?

Dang, I’m tired.  At the end of a work day I just want to go home and eat a cheeseburger in front of the TV. So sometimes I do.  Fortunately, it’s a low-fat Bubba Burger with just a smidgin of cheese, on a bed of lettuce (no bun) with tomatoes and cucumbers.  But I digress.

However, there were a couple of days this week, when, after a particularly long and stressful day at work, I either had evening commitmentsor I made myself exercise.  And guess what?  I actually felt better after the additional non-work activity!

So I realized this week that I am operating on yet another one of my bad assumptions, and this this:

Myth: Fatigue is fatigue, no matter how I feel, or how I got tired.

Wrong!  Work fatigue is not the same as physical fatigue.  In fact, I personally tend to worry too much about work…and other activities help me to stop worrying.  If I rest after a long day at work, my brain actually keeps the work momentum going!  It takes an equal and opposite force in my mind to stop me from obsessing about my silly job.

Unfortunately, this week I am traveling, so my workout schedule will be catch-as-catch-can.  But next week I will put a new theory to the test and try to debunk what I think is a myth about fatigue and rest.

In January 2006, I started going to the YMCA regularly, at least once a week on Mondays with my friend Jill.

In May, I joined the Ladies Get Fit class, and was going to the Y at least 3 times a week.

Last year at this time, I was still going 3-4 times per week, minus days when the weather was nice and I did my hour of cardio outdoors.

Now I can tell I’m losing my mojo.

Today at lunch after church, though, someone asked me whether I played volleyball, and then later whether I played tennis.  [Now I wish I had an mp3 of Carrie Bradshaw/Sarah Jessica Parker saying:] And that’s when I realized…I’m in a rut.  The exercise has gotten boring and it is up to me to make it exciting again.

By going to the gym over and over again, doing the same stuff for 2+ years, I have actually violated–partially–two of my weight loss seminar tenets.

1. It’s About People. Now that I am no longer in a class, except for Monday (now it’s moved to Tuesday) night with Jill, I have lost the social aspect of the Y.  I don’t make any drop-in exercise classes often enough to get familiar with my classmates.  And, my activities are mostly anti-social–weights and cardio.
2. By doing the same thing in the same way over and over again, I am inadvertently subscribing to The Bowflex Myth that I can get results by doing the same thing repeatedly.

Instead of the mythical linear course, wherein I do one hour of cardio machines 3 times per week and 40 minutes of FittLinx (weight machines) two times per week for the rest of my life, I gotta mix it up.

In a few days I’ll post about why this is particularly hard for me right now.