A few days ago I saw a comment on one of our reels. It was from someone who said: "our community is built around gatherings and hangouts, so it's hard to actually stay flexible and eat what you want, because there are so many gatherings and every day you're eating what you feel like." That was roughly what the comment said.
It got me thinking. Gatherings and hangouts really are one of the biggest obstacles to weight loss, and one of the things women get most frustrated with themselves over. And the more I thought about it, I realized this is not just an obstacle to weight loss, it gets in the way of reaching a lot of the goals a person sets for themselves, and here I mean the goals that actually move you forward physically, mentally, and emotionally.
Let's Zoom In and Look Closer
Because some people, a lot of people actually, not just some, disagree with me on this, because from a distance gatherings look really nice, and can even seem genuinely good for you. But let's zoom in a little.
Family and friend gatherings, let's be very, very honest and realistic here, tend to involve all of the following:
- Comparisons
- Talking about other people
- Peer pressure
- Distraction
- Envy
- Oversharing
- Conversation that serves no purpose
- ...and so on
And by the end of the gathering, all of this adds up to feelings that are not great, which turn into actions that are not great, and a general outlook on life that is not great either. Which in turn leaves you in a state that is not the best one for actually doing what it takes to reach the goals you want.
Why Does This Affect Reaching Your Goals?
The goals worth your time and effort, the ones that genuinely add up to a great life, require you to be in your best mental and emotional state.
So it becomes very hard to become the best version of yourself physically, mentally, and emotionally, if you spend a lot of your time surrounded by things that drain your energy, leave you scattered, put you in comparison mode, trap you in a cycle of dissatisfaction, trap you in a cycle of guilt from other people's talk, and pull your focus in every direction.
The Bottom Line
Yes, gatherings are a real social structure, and most people take part in them and enjoy them. But if we look at it up close, we know that most of the time it does not happen in a way that actually serves the person or their real growth.
So if you see yourself and your goals as genuinely important in your life, you will choose to cut back on gatherings, and you will not use them as an excuse to not commit or to not make yourself a priority.
And over time, you will learn which gatherings you can comfortably be part of, and which ones do not suit you or serve you. You will know how many you can actually handle, and you will know when it has become too much. And that way, there is no way you fall into the exact problem that commenter described at the start of this article: too many gatherings, so we can't stay flexible.