I've tried so many times and failed, why should I try again?

About 14 months into my fight to successfully resume Bright Line Eating, things got really depressing.

Every time I decided that this was IT, today would be the day I resumed, every time I printed out a new 100-day chart, posted a commitment in social media, joined with a friend to do a 60-day challenge, that annoying little voice in my head would begin:

"You’ve tried this so many times and failed, why do you think you’ll succeed now?"

"This will be just like the last time: a few days with squeaky-clean bright lines and then more bright lines broken."

"With all these failures, how can you trust yourself or this program anymore?"

Today I’m challenging myself to answer that voice. I want some ammunition to toss at that dang voice to make it shut up. Here goes:

n  Sure, I could fail again. But then again, I could succeed. I’ve failed at other things before I succeeded. Maybe this is just like that.

n  Don’t statistics show that people who quit smoking often make multiple attempts before succeeding? Maybe my food journey will be similar. (I wrote about this on another blog post HERE.)

n  Nothing really valuable in life comes easy. Remember going to college? Creating a strong marriage? Building a successful business? Giving up diet soda? Work, work, and more work. But in every case, the work was absolutely worth it, and I succeeded eventually. I've succeeded before, which shows I'm capable of succeeding.

n  I just need to figure out what will work for me in getting my lines bright. Trying again is exactly what I need to do to learn what’s needed to stay on track. If something in my BLE toolbox needs to change, I can change it.

n  I give in now, and decide I’m going to fail, that’s just what will happen. If I claim defeat, I’ll be defeated.

It might take you 5 or 8 or 25 failures – or more – but if you’re not willing to risk failure, you’ll never get to success.

Henry Ford said it really well: “If you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re always right.”

[Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Bright Line Eating or Susan Peirce Thompson. The opinions expressed in this blog are entirely my own.]