I am not just myself's worst critical, I am myself's awful critic. Even though I look in the mirror and do double takes not believing its me, I always manage to see something that I think I need to change and my happy mood changes to frustration.

About a month ago, I went shopping and brought some size 4 shorts, jeans and skirts and a couple of XS tank tops and when I got home all I kept saying was how awful I thought my abs and arms looked. Not celebrating the fact that I've never worn a size 4 nor XS in my life. So why didn't I celebrate that victory but instead focused on what I think was the negative. Did I mention that all the things I think look awful others do not see it like I see it. The reason I couldn't celebrate is sometimes I still saw myself as the old obese person and not as the new person who is smaller than I've ever been in my life and not to mention in the best fitness shape and health of my life.

A couple of weeks later it finally hit me how far I have come when I saw some of my old clothes that I have given to my sister and realized that those were the sizes I used to wear. Then I started looking at other things like the collection of fitness DVDs that I have amassed in the last 6 months and I do each and every one of them. And the new reality hit me that this is the new me and I look good. Not to be arrogant but when you put in a lot of work with working out and eating right you should want to proudly portray your progress. Now with the help of GOD I walk in confidence and do not dwell on the negative - I still am critical of myself, but I have learned to celebrate every victory no matter how great or small.

So whether you've lost 1lb or 100lbs whether you work out 10 min or 100 min celebrate how far you've come because before you started this journey if you were like me you were a junk eater and had inconsistent workouts (if you worked out at all). So lets Celebrate Sparkpeeps. The fact that you are even on this site is a victory within itself - it shows that you are ready to make a change.