Gaining weight is so easy, and losing it is so hard. That says something about the fundamental structure of the world and our own constitution. I spent weeks of hard work losing weight this spring. I managed a few pounds, got down from 186 to almost 181. And then lately I’ve been very busy with work, stressed in various ways, not sleeping well, and a couple weeks ago I just decided that I was going to eat whatever I wanted for a while. I’m now almost 188.

That happened so fast, with so little effort. Actually with no effort, all it really took was to stop making an effort to not do whatever I wanted. And it crashed all my previous efforts so fast, so easily.

It’s so easy for one brief decision to stop holding yourself back and stop living on purpose and restraining your desire to take away everything and leave you feeling distended, distorted, unwell, and uncomfortable. I can feel the results. I avoided weighing myself because I was hoping that there hadn’t really been any long-term consequences from my lapse, that it would be fine and being fitter and healthier was just a natural outcome I didn’t need to maintain or strive for so deliberately.

That’s just not the case. I avoided the scale that would tell me the truth. But I felt it, in the way I moved, how I felt, how my clothes fit. So I finally faced the scale. And I’m unhappy with the scale. It’s just the messenger, the conveyance. All its doing is what it’s supposed to, telling me the truth. I’ve had a bad couple weeks. I fell off the horse of life in general. I let disorder creep in and destabilize one area after another. And it wasn’t fine. I didn’t escape unscathed. And the more of me that came apart, the more I was willing to let other parts of me go to make up for it and make myself feel better or distract myself.

As a substitute for healthy living, I fed myself indulgences and exceptions. And that only made things worse. Worse, I let it distract me and take me away from and endanger the really good things in my life that make it work. My health, my family, my wife, good sleep, good food. That’s the tragedy of life. The road isn’t wide and easy. It is narrow and hard. It’s not a hundred out of a hundred turtles that make it to the open sea or salmon that make it back to their stream, it’s only a handful. And that’s terribly painful.