Now that I have lost 12 lbs since I started this program 4 weeks ago I noticed something really exciting when my husband and I took our dog Dexter on a hike yesterday.  We live in the mountains and always have great hiking trails to chose from.  This particular trail that we went on yesterday is Dexter’s favorite.  (It’s all about the dog, right?)  This trail is not one of my favorites because it is about 1 mile up the mountain and 1 mile down.  I’m fine with the second half, but that first half can be pretty grueling when you are carrying extra weight.  But yesterday I noticed it was much easier.  I didn’t feel winded, I didn’t find myself counting the steps to the halfway point, I felt great!  Because I like analogies, imagine if I did that hike with a backpack on that was filled with rocks.  12 pounds of rocks to be exact.  I could no more hike 100 feet up that mountain before I would have gotten whinny and asked my husband to carry it for me.  He probably would have said “you brought it, you should carry it”, and I would have said “Fine! I’ll get it on the way back”, and would have dumped the backpack right there. Well you can’t do that when that backpack is actually 12 extra pounds of weight you are carrying with you.  How do you hand that off to someone or leave it and come back for it.  Any amount of extra weight is an extra burden to carry.  And for those of us that have significantly more weight we are carrying around it is quite a strain on us.  No wonder we are worn out all the time.  Let’s do ourselves a huge favor and begin the process of letting go of that extra weight.  We will feel so much better physically and mentally.  We have enough in life that weighs us down.  We don’t need those extra LB’s too.