Discipline - The Link Between Debt and Fat
I’m a fatty.
According to Discovery Health’s BMI calculator, I am obese and need to lose 60 pounds. I have gained about 10-15 pounds a year since I met my partner in 2003 - so that sounds about right. The weight snuck up on me, just like my consumer debt. Every year I make a resolution to lose the weight, and clearly, every year I fail. In the past I’ve just chalked it up to good food, good wine (and beer), and good old fashioned laziness - and gone on repeating the same bad old behaviors.
This year has to be different, for two reasons:
- My health is being negatively impacted by my weight - I have acid reflux, and last week, my doctor warned me that my blood-pressure is edging upwards towards the “high” range.
- Vanity.
As I have mentioned before, I am getting married in October. My fiance has chosen a ridiculously expensive photographer (he’s a former photographer himself and had very strong feelings about this particular element of our wedding - I’ll be writing about the financial ramifications of this choice in a future post - that’s not the point here). I want to be able to look at our photos and feel good about how I look in them. I want to be able to share them with my friends and family and possibly future children with joy and pride.
Last Monday I began a 10-week “extreme” cardio kick-boxing class. Six days a week I wake up at 5:15 am and drag myself to a nearby martial arts studio and sweat my tail off for 50 minutes. I am not a morning person, and I hate working out just for the sake of working out - but after just one week, I feeling good - sore, but good! I am sleeping better, standing straighter, and I have more energy.
In my kick-boxing class, I am a part of a team, and my team is depending on me to be there every morning. I am accountable to my team, and if I don’t show up or if I don’t give 100%, I am letting my team down. At BankerGirl, if I were to buy a $2000 refrigerator, I would be letting my readers down.
This whole experience has got me thinking about discipline. As demonstrated by my load of debt, I don’t exactly have a history of demonstrating a ton of personal discipline. I need the peer pressure (which I often call “accountability”) of this blog to act in my own best interest.
Clearly, I am a person who responds well to peer pressure - both in fitness and in finances.
Lately, I have been considering the connection between financial discipline and physical discipline. A lot of personal finance bloggers out there admit to not being at their ideal weight. A couple of examples:
- Fat and Finance tracks Eden’s financial and physical improvements
- JD at Get Rich Slowly launched a companion site, Get Fit Slowly last fall.
Why do otherwise smart, reasonable individuals make bad food and financial decisions? Are emotional eaters more likely to be emotional spenders (or vice versa)? If personal discipline is learned in one area of one’s life, does that carry over to another? I’d love to hear from other’s struggling with debt and/or weight out there about a possible connection.
Stumble it!
January 14th, 2008 at 5:38 am
I’m not overweight, but a couple of pounds have snuck up on me since last summer. But I don’t exercise enough…hardly at all.
I’d say that in my case it’s inertia that keeps me from wanting to exercise. Not wanting to get up, potentially go out (or stay in) and disrupt my free time for a period. I’m working on that… It’s just so much easier NOT to. Add a chronic sleep deficit that I can’t seem to fix and I’m always feeling tired so even more reason not to work out. *sigh*
However, I’ve got a plan for working out on the two days Micah teaches and for taking more walks.
January 14th, 2008 at 7:30 am
Funny, it seems the pounds began to creep up on my once I started focusing on my finances. For me too much time obsessing over spreadsheets and credit cards means not enough time moving around outside. Its partly about discipline, but its more about balance for me.
January 14th, 2008 at 11:27 am
If you approach your health in the same manner as ou are your finances, you will hit your goal in no time.
Just like with money though it is a marathon, not a sprint if you want to keep it off. I have all the faith in the world that you can do it!
January 14th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
I’ve only gained weight since I began taking a medication — about 4 years ago. Last week, I began drinking “Yogi Tea’s ‘fasting’”. It’s natural & doesn’t have caffeine. It helps to combat the medicine’s side effects of extreme hunger. Just a thought, I love the stuff.
January 14th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
The Discovery Health site said I should lose 15 lbs…which I already knew! It’s always worse to see it in writing, though
January 15th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
Funny enough, I’ve worked in both finance and nutrition (and other aspects of health). The individual isn’t solely to blame, our environment doesn’t help much either.
That being said, discipline is a tough task to master. It’s not just food and finances, time management is another major issue too…
My weight never got away from me… maybe I can thank metabolism? Finances on the other hand…
January 15th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
Hey Heidi, great post and thanks for the link.
I don’t think there is necessarily a link between the finance and fat problems, but for me they are definitely both symptoms of complacency and lack of long term thinking. If you only live for today, it’s easy to eat poorly and spend too much money. Once I started thinking about where I want my life to be in 5 years it became clear that I needed to address these problems NOW.
It sounds like you are off to a great start. Committing to 50 minutes of exercise is great. Even though I have made some decent progress I have to admit that I’m not working hard enough yet. I need to commit to something daily and make it happen.
Best of luck!
January 16th, 2008 at 3:28 am
Thanks for the comment today. I don’t know if I would say there is a link between finance and being a fatty or if we decide to take a strong hold of our weight issue after we start to get a hold on our finance issue. Then we know that we can handle something bigger
You are well on the right track. And, even if you slip up and don’t make it, you will still love your wedding pictures! I still like mine
Have a good day girlie.
January 17th, 2008 at 9:55 am
Losing weight and saving money often go hand in hand. Eating out is one of my biggest expenses… has been for awhile. And my increasing waist-line showed. Cutting back on the fatty / high calorie foods that I eat at restaurants will A) save me money and B) help me lose weight.
January 24th, 2008 at 7:20 am
Looks great