Time for a re-start

Hello all,

I guess I don't have to tell you things haven't quite gone to plan recently. The first 4 months or so of the journey was pretty smooth really. 20 or so kilos gone and it was all looking pretty simple. Well the next four have been very tough. It started with a plateau in the weight loss and has slowly become a trip in the wrong direction. At one point I managed to get within a whisker of a 30 kg loss but at the moment I've headed back closer to 110kg.

So what does this all mean? Am I giving it all away?

In short no!!

I always knew this would be hard. I'd hoped this type of collapse wouldn't have occurred but alas it has and now I just have to start again.

The good news is I'm starting again from a much better position than December 31, 2010. So here we have it. From tonight I will blog every day for the next week. With any luck that may help me maintain my focus and the responsibility I set myself eight months ago.

I'll weigh in tomorrow to give everyone the new starting point and with some luck, focus and lots of hard work I can begin heading in the right direction again.

I think the major reason behind my recent fall from grace is stress.

It's not a cop out, it's simply a reality of my current state of mind. This is a big year for me. I'm now entering the final stage of my degree. Essentially I have 14 weeks to go, after which time I will be on the open market, qualified but unemployed. That is of course unless I manage to secure myself a job before that 14 weeks is up. Until about April this year I hadn't really thought that far ahead but the realisation that the moment of truth is fast approaching has added a fair bit of stress to my life.

Journalism at the moment is a very tough field to break into. Most news organisations are downsizing rather than hiring so the competition for jobs is very tough. Those close to me know what I've committed to this goal in the last two years (particularly this year). I've spent almost 1 week in three this year working at news organisations this year (as an intern). The idea is you just keep working for free until a job comes up. The difficulty is sooner or later everyone needs to be paid for their work.

So after all this work for more or less two years, I often feel no closer to a job. Now I know this can't be the case. I've built a reasonable network of contacts now and I know I've impressed a few people but the reality is that until a concrete job opportunity comes up the stress will remain.

But enough of the whining and petty excuses. Life is full of challenges and they can't be excuses for not looking after yourself. So from tomorrow it's back on the horse and back on the road to better health.

So tune in for the next seven days and hopefully by next weekend there's some better news to report.

Until then,

P