What's your dangling carrot?

Back in the days of our grandparents, (great-grandparents maybe?) mules were often used on the farm for plowing and such. " The mule possesses the sobriety, patience, endurance and sure-footedness of the donkey, and the vigour, strength and courage of the horse", according to Wikepedia. Mules are also known for being stubborn. In fact, the word mule comes from the latin "matule" meaning "stubbourn".

Sometimes during the course of farm work, such as pulling a plow or a cart, the mule would stop dead in his tracks, stiffen his front legs and and refuse to budge. The ingenious farmer (you know, Great Grampy Elmer), would arrange a pole that extended over the mule's head, and tie a carrot to a string and hang it off the end of the string; dangling it in front of the Mule's line of vision but just out of reach. The mule would then move forward to try to reach the carrot. This 'encouragement' ,of course, is cruel, unless at some given point the mule gets to have the carrot.

At mine and Arthur's first Weight Watcher's meeting our leader ask us to write on a slip of paper the answer to this question; 'What is your dangling carrot?' First of all, you must understand, all persons who are on 'diets' are similar to mules. We start out gung ho, ready to tackle that task, ready to get the job done. Then, somewhere down the line, we say, 'Wait a danged minute! Why am I pulling this cart? (excercising so much). Why am I plowing this field? (spending so much time and thought preparing meals). Why do I want to take one step farther? (denying myself to eat when and what I want to). And you just STOP. So, like the mule, we need a 'dangling carrot' to get us motivated again.

My dangling carrot is to lose the extra pounds that spill up over the waist band of my jeans forming the old 'Muffin Top'. (A lady in WW said that the 'muffin top' analogy was originated by Elaine on Seinfeld. Don't know if this is true or not, but an interesting little bit of trivia.) When I graduated high school I weighed 89 lbs. I was underweight. In the 29 years since I have graduated high school I have gained 33 pounds. I don't want to go back to 89 lbs., but would like to be someplace in between then and now.

Arthur's dangling carrot is to someday look really pretty in a wedding gown. Now, being her mom, I feel like she would be beautiful regardless, but I would like for her to lose weight for her health. She has lost weight before on WW, and she looked so much more healthier and her back stopped hurting.

We had our second meeting this week and I lost just over a pound and Arthur lost 4.6 pounds!!! I am so excited! Both of us reported less acid reflux which is a big plus! Now, when our 'muleness' comes out, we can just remember our dangling carrots and get motivated again.

What is your dangling carrot?