Face your Fears Week 9

Every week of 12WBT there is a new Suprise weekly task - This week is all about facing your fears!! Here is the note from Mish.....

Face Your Fears!

Time to show me what you're made of!! The 12WBT is not just about nutrition and training it's also about re-training your mind and facing up to your fears! 

Those fears might be walking to your letterbox or jumping out of a plane!

What's the most inventive, exciting, thrilling, challenging activity you have done since you have joined 12WBT? It could be wearing a bright red frock to a party or climbing a mountain. It has to be something that has really push you out of your comfort zone and made you think twice about what you were about to embark on. 

Everyones fears are different - when I do this with my Biggest Loser contestants it really shows us what they are made of.

------

So yesterday I pushed myself right smack bang in the middle of that zone that is far, far from that zone named "comfort" and rocked up for my first tattoo!!

Did it make me think twice about what I was about to embark on??? Ummmm YES!!! It made me think 20x or more!!

I have been dreaming of this ideal tattoo, visualising it, focusing on it, planning the day when I would get it.  I listed it as one of the rewards I would give myself after this round of Lean and Strong - when I had a midsection to be proud of!! Because the tattoo of my dreams is one which wraps around my side. 

So the plan was to wait until I was ripped, had the 6 pack of my dreams and could lie comfortably in front of a tattooist half naked without being self- conscious of my body.  So when people asked to see my ink I could rip up my top proudly and show them my new body art and my new smokin hot abs and be proud to show them both off.......

So do I have a six pack?? No.

Will I feel 100% comfortable showing people my tattoo?? No.

Do I have a midsection that I am proud of? well........ yes, I guess I kinda do. 

It is far from the six pack I desire (focus on, dream about, trudge off to the gym 6 days a week to achieve), it is not even flat!! But it has shrunk a HEAP since I embarked on 12WBT and even more during this round of Lean and Strong. So I am not 100% proud of my shrinking Mummy Tummy - but I certainly am proud of how much I have achieved so far and evey bit of hard work it has taken mne to get here!!

And this week is all about facing my fears right??

I was terrified of lying half naked in front of a man I didn't know - no one sees my tummy!! NOBODY!!! I'm still getting about in my suction undies and leotards under my clothes, I am not confident to let them go just yet.  This is what I was so afraid of - being seen!!! Oh and the pain factor of course..... oh yes, the pain factor! I woke up yesterday morning and totally pushed the pain factor out of my head - I kept busy, I thought positive thoughts - I knew I could use my positivity to shove any thoughts of fear and pain down, I just wanted to focus on the positive "By tonight I will have my tattoo and it will be over"  Just like embarking on childbirth, "After this I will have my baby and all the pain will be insignificant" - then I remembered that the pain of childbirth is SO not insignificant!! but I pushed away the fear, down ....way down.....so far down that I gave myself quite the tummy ache - nervous toilet stops all afternoon!!(Too much information???)

I was so nervous I felt sick.

I was so so so grateful that my heavily tattooed husband was there to support me, to be by my side.  He's never in 10 years wanted me to have a tattoo, so his support and encouragement through the whole thing was priceless.  Although he was grinning, camera poised to take a photo of my face when the needles made that first contact with my skin....

I am so proud of myself!! I was so scared and I did it!! I was so freakin brave, I didn't flinch or complain during the 3 hours that it took to complete.  I was most afraid that I'd get half way through and decide I couldn't finish it.  I can honestly say it did not hurt as much as I thought it would and I really think my positivity and confidence in my mindset helped attribute to that.



There's that first moment - gripping the head rest much???



Little more used to it now

Another tattooist REALLY helped me through the last half hour when it was starting to get really tough chatting to me about random things. She did make many comments that I was insane for getting my first ever tattoo down my side, but pain is pain right?? I knew where I wanted it and I wasn't being talked out of it by anyone - I knew I could do it!

So the script you see is a quote from the inspirational Deepak Chopra - I stumbled upon it whilst searching for positivity and inspirations of strength before embarking on Lean and Strong.  I was wanting to put my energy into preparing both physically and mentally for the next stage.  He says

"I stand strong in my personal power - With true power that comes from within, nothing is beyond my reach"

I have focused on this, I have chanted this to myself over and over again since embracing it last December.  I made the first half the title of this blog and the second half is now inscripted on my body forever and ever, so I can always remember, no matter how low I get that I do possess a truck load of personal power and I truely believe that any thought, dream or desire that I have CAN become my reality. 

The butterflies, although very pretty, are to symbolise my transfortion and growth from a self doubting, self loathing negative, half empty person, to one full of self belief and the ability to turn any negative situation into one with a positive light!