There's really no purpose to this picture other than I wanted you to see that I once wore a tie while growing up in Hawaii.
My guess is that it was Easter time. The other thing you'll notice is that I was on the skinny side. As in "skinny-as-a-rail" skinny. Now, the locals where I lived tended to be the opposite. Hefty would be an understatement. This meant that I was often made fun of because of my scrawny appearance. I remember once seeing a guy in Intermediate School who had these giant veins sticking out of his biceps. Man, that looked cool. Life, I guess you could say, turned competitive. "I can look like that, too," I said secretly. Of course, I never did. Luckily, I didn't care that much. I was skinny old me. Plus, who needed big muscles to paddle out to Flat Island?
Reminiscing about this got me thinking about all the random stages of weight I've gone through during my 70 years on this planet. Oh man, how I "loved" seeing my love handles for the first time. You know how it goes. As time goes on you get careless about your diet and lack of exercise. In an effort to get fit, I began changing my eating habits. I never abstained from anything in particular. I just wanted to eat cleaner. Then I began running. Running to lose weight is all fine and dandy as long as you balance that with healthy eating and some very basic weight training. That's where things pretty much stand for me today about 58 years after that picture was taken.
The truth is, we all have to look in the mirror. My body type is large, which means I will never look the same way I did when I was a kid. All I can try and do is model moderation, balanced eating, and moving your body in a way that makes you happy. For most of us, we only have ourselves to blame if we are overweight or obese. You may be sick of hearing me talk about it, but I believe we have a responsibility to take care of the temples God has entrusted to us.
Major kudos to all of you out there who have quit making excuses and who wake up every morning thinking about how grateful you are that you get to move your body that day. Remember, what you do every day matters more than what you do every once in a while. Health is something to start caring about today. And maybe, just maybe, the only thing that needs to change is your way of thinking.