Learning to see the bananas

Vision at 91.5 WCIC is always a fun time. The people, the excitement, the phones ringing, the chatter...and the food. Our fall fundraiser was record-breaking financially and healthy-habit crushing in other ways. But, it was not without it's moments of insight and growth in areas other than my waistline. A good and longtime friend of the radio station stopped by on the final day, after the big celebration. This friend is a true inspiration. He has turned his life around and lost over 200 pounds. He's done it with the help of surgery and and a painstaking, long process of learning all over exactly how to eat. Day by day for the past couple years he's had to overcome the strong urge to say, "What the heck...I'm just gonna eat what I want to today!" And, with each week and month the pounds have slowly melted away. Melted away...I've always disliked that wording. It makes it sounds so effortless. The reality is the pounds have been ripped away with determination, sacrifice, and LOADS of hard work. I'm in awe of my friend. And, he taught me something on Friday afternoon. When I asked how the journey's coming along he said it was going well. But, he admitted to giving in a little to weakness over the past couple of days. Right away, I thought it my duty to warn him about the plethora of tempting treats that lurked in our station break room. He assured me he had already looked in there and knew to stay away and avoid the almost irresistible pull of the cookies, cakes, breads, candies, and chips. But, he said, "I was really excited that the first thing I saw were the bananas." Now, that's impressive. I'm not sure I was even aware of the...bananas! After years of just eating whatever sounded good at the time, this friend has relearned decades old habits. He's trained himself to find the healthy among the horrible (but oh so tasty) choices. Kudos to my FABULOUS friend. And, thank you for the challenge. I want to follow in his footsteps. I'm going to learn to see the bananas!