All hills come to an end

Early this morning, with my clan still asleep, as a gift to myself on father's day I decided to jump on my bike once more and cycle the country side. Along the way, besides the sounds of so many song birds, the wind rustling through the trees, the happy lolling of cows I also encountered two long steep hills. How does one look upon these hills? For me, they are emblematic of my/our weight loss journey. When first we set out to make some important changes in our lives, it may appear that the road ahead is nothing but hills. "Oh man, that is one steep sucker.. I will never make it up, as a matter of fact I like it here in the valley... this will hurt and I do not need this..." these might all be thoughts running through our minds. But the reality is a different beast. So this is what I did this morning upon spying the first of the steep hills. First thought was " So what" . Yes this will take effort, Yes, I need to shift to a much lower gear and progress will be slow, but I am okay with that b/c this hills is steep and it is long. So, with gear set low I simply put my head down, refused to look up to see how much of the hill was left. After all, I have no control over the length of this hill, but I can control pushing that pedal down and down and down again, making progress all the time. Yes , my knees hurt a bit, but by putting my head down I was enjoying the fact that every pedal push brought me closer, best yet, the arrival at the top came as a lovely surprise. Too often we try to look way ahead where we want to be and get discouraged about how much is left to pedal. Point is, my journey is made up of one pedal push after the other. You might even be tempted to stop or worse yet, turn around, just to find yourself carried by momentum into an even deeper valley with an even more taunting hill to climb. DON'T do it.
But you know what the coolest thing is? At some point I/we realize that all hills must come to an end. On the other side lies the downhill part, the smooth ride, the wind in your hair, the whheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee moment. That is how I feel. Having conquered these two hills, not only did I get the reward of that wonderful sense of accomplishment, but found myself thinking: I might just look for a few more of those in the future, it is so worth.
So, my friends, where ever your journey starts, however steep the hill, however much you huff and puff, just remember every pedal push brings you closer. So grab that "bike" and go wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Be well.