Goodbye Yesterday

I've been pondering this blog post for a while now--wondering how best to approach this subject. I had a great conversation with a dear friend this weekend...she knows who she is...and this conversation helped me finish formulating my thoughts and get them down on the blog.

Yesterday is gone. Gone.

The choices you made yesterday have no influence on the choices you will make TODAY. I know what you are thinking..."Shamae you crazy fool! The choices I made yesterday most definitely impact the choices I will make today." But only to a degree. The choices you made yesterday (whether that is literal or a year ago or 10 years ago) might influence your choices today but they don't dictate them.

Yesterday is gone.

You have the power to choose. Deep thought for a moment. What do you think is the strongest word in the English language? Love? Hate? Family? I would say those are good ideas but not the strongest, they all depend on something else. I would argue, the strongest word we have is "choice." Simple, yes. Powerful, extremely.

Now maybe you are thinking, "Shamae, shamae, shamae not so. I've felt the sting of unreciprocated love before. That wasn't my choice." Yes...but we still have the power to choose our own path. Our own way. Our attitude--to help keep a positive spin on the things we can't change.

Examples:

Weightloss--It doesn't matter if you are 5, 20, 30, 50 or more lbs overweight. That was yesterday. Today you have power. Today you can choose. It doesn't matter what you ate yesterday. Or that you didn't make it to the gym. It doesn't matter if you've failed countless weightloss attempts before. Today is new. Today you have the power to CHOOSE.

Bad Decisions--It doesn't matter if 10, 5, 2 years or 2 days ago you made some decisions that were not the best. Today is new. You can't change your past mistakes--and we all have them--so move forward w/out the pain of guilt. Make your choices TODAY count. Because yesterday is gone. Write them down as some life experience and move on. You can't change the past. Don't try. Change today and let your choices NOW dictate your attitude toward YOUR future.

Diabetes--We can't get it perfect all the time. If it were perfect all the time, our kids wouldn't have Type 1 Diabetes. Yesterdays numbers are gone. We can't change them. We can only do our best with what we've been given. We can't beat ourselves up because numbers in the past were not good. It happens, it is IMPOSSIBLE to have great numbers ALL the time. BUT if you are doing your best, you can choose what kind of mindset you will have. Do your best. With a disease where so much is out of our hands, just do YOUR personal best. Savor the good days and have a good friend to lean on during the bad times.

All that matters are the choices you make today. Your previous choices and experiences have no affect on how today starts and ends. You might be discouraged and look back at previous weight loss attempts, poor decisions, and terrible blood sugar days and think, “I've messed up before, why would anything change now?” But what can change is you. Your choices. Your attitude. And I promise, it will make a difference. YOU matter. Your choices are important. Yesterday is gone. Today is a brand new day. Don't worry about the things in your past that you can't change....just focus on what you CAN change and then do it.