How Finding That Inner Desire Helped Me Lose Weight (Down 101lbs)

Seeing that I’ve lost 101lbs was one of those achievements and milestones I never really had my eye on.

I knew that I had a TON of weight to lose, but I didn’t have this goal specifically marked down. However, when the pounds started to come off and I started losing significant weight, I quickly zeroed in on the 100lb goal.

To see the scale hit 254 was pretty emotional. It’s a heavy commitment and requires an insane amount of dedication to lose that amount of weight, so to finally hit (over) 100lbs lost was noteworthy.

I have already covered the drastic changes I feel losing so much weight. The short version is that I feel more athletic than ever and I also feel more confident as well. At my heaviest, I hated the way my body looked and every time I struggled to find clothing that fit or struggled to do any task it destroyed me emotionally. Now, I am confident as HECK and want to help others feel the same way that I do.

Today’s topic is important because I want to talk about one thing that I will always keep with me from this weight loss journey. It can be applied to anything you do in life and is not necessarily related to weight loss in general. However, this mantra and mentality have helped push me through some tough times. To lose any number of weight, your heart and mind need to be in the right place and most importantly, you need to lose weight because YOU want to.

So, the one thing that will stick with me is that I wanted to lose weight because I wanted to. I am doing it for myself. I did not start losing weight because of snarky comments from family members or because some Tinder girl said she “didn’t like bigger guys.” I did it because I was unhappy with how I felt physically and I wanted to improve my body and have a better quality of life.

I won’t deny that comments about my weight took a toll mentally. I believe I can shrug off comments or not really give a heck about what people say. But then there are those comments that you can’t really brush off. When I sat at the Candian Tire Centre for a game, a fan beside me asked if I could switch seats with my friend because it was too tight. It’s instances like that (whether intentionally malicious or not) that can destroy you mentally and make you feel like a piece of shit.

I had been interested in losing weight for a long time, but never really knew how. During the start of the pandemic, I learned about counting calories and that helped fuel the fire to lose weight. Seeing the first few pounds fall off the scale was addicting and I knew I was headed in the right direction. Once you see that first ounce of success and results, it motivates you to work even harder.

Of course, I am not perfect. I made mistakes along the way. If I had truly stuck to my meal plan and never missed a beat, I would probably be under 200lbs. However, I like my current progression and I cannot complain about the weight that I have lost so far.

Circling back to the point of this post, no matter what it is in life: do it for yourself. I know, not all situations are the same. My intentions are to not make a blanket statement like that, but for the person that is struggling with their reason to lose weight, or is being told to, I want you to know that doing it for yourself will bring you an incredible amount of joy. Of course, there can be other motivators that will make you want to lose weight.

But for me, I wanted to lose weight for myself. And I hope that anyone reading this that wants to make a significant change in their life does it because they want to. If I had done it because a family member told me to (you know who you are), there’s a good chance I would have failed. Unless you personally have the desire to do something, I think you’re chances at succeeding is low. If you have that internal flame and desire to reach a certain goal then I think you have an increased chance at reaching your targets.

The same family member that I spoke about earlier said to me that they have been telling me to lose weight for years and I should have listened sooner. While they were right, I had to shut that shit down immediately. I had to reiterate that I did not lose weight to impress them or because of some comments about me in clothes, I did it for myself. And that is one of the biggest takeaways from this entire journey. Doing something for yourself (as long as it’s a positive change and doesn’t hurt anyone) is a healthy mindset when losing weight. As I have said before, this relates to me specifically because I cannot comment on someone’s life. There are a wide variety of factors and variables each individual deals with, so it would be rude for me to think that what I say here is the only way something can be accomplished.

‘Do It For Yourself’ is one of my new mottos and one that will stay with me. Its intention isn’t to be selfish, but it’s to remind one of why they are working hard to achieve something. In the end, I want to make sure that I did something because I wanted to, not because someone told me to. Yes, there are other factors — this applies to me and I hope it can apply to you. I will ALWAYS repeat that what I say here are thoughts in my head that are specific to my life. If you get something out of it, good. If you read this and think I am an idiot because what I typed doesn’t directly affect you, then I think you’re missing the entire point of my blogs.

I want to use my blog to help others lose weight. If someone reads this (or any other post) and can help connect it to their lives in some capacity, then I think I am doing something positive. I was insecure about posting my original weight at the beginning, but I think me being open about this entire process can help someone that may not know where to start. Posting your starting weight or your journey isn’t for everyone. I posted my original weight (and continue to write these blogs) for the people that want to lose weight and think it isn’t obtainable. If I can drop 101lbs, you can lose any amount of weight. I hope someone out there reads this and thinks that if I lost weight, so can they.

This wraps up my 100lb-lost blog post. It’s been a journey, let me tell ya. For someone that knew absolutely nothing about weight management, today is a pretty significant day for me.

As always, if you have any comments, questions or concerns you can write here or send me a response on Twitter @Patrick_Trudeau.

For those wanting to lose weight, I hope you do, and I hope that you do it for yourself.