I’ve written before about analogies between gardening and weight loss eg here, here and here , and again I’m reminded of the lessons we can learn from the garden.

The house we moved into in nearly three years ago has a lovely big garden. It’s one of the main reasons we were sold on the house. However, along with many other things in the house, it had been neglected for a long long time, and was very overgrown.

Piecemeal I’ve been cutting a bit back here, and planting a few things there. But this Sunday we had professional gardeners in to clear the sides of the garden. It took 3 strong men working hard for over 4 hours to turn this:

Into this:

It got me thinking. If your weight and healthy behaviours are so out of hard, you need more than a bit of DIY. You need to get the professionals in for some intensive intervention. Just to get you to a place where you can actually start working on it yourself.

I don’t know what this actually means for me personally. A personal trainer? Nutritionist? Both? Joining a programme like ww or sw? Something else altogether? I’m open to suggestions.

Because once you’ve got the professionals to help get you on track, you can do the fun stuff, the maintaining and improving yourself. (As exhibited by H, Y and I being able to start on the spring bulb planting today).

Which takes me onto the next analogy. Spring bulbs are the most incredible lesson in patience. You put them in the ground and… Nothing. The weather gets colder, it’s unpleasant and wet and even icy. And still nothing to show for your efforts. And then one day, when the conditions are right, all that effort pays off into a beautiful experience that lasts for weeks or even months, and can return year after year.

So to with becoming healthier. Sometimes it’s about laying the ground work (excuse the terribly and unintended pun), and then keeping going, keeping waiting for the results, not giving up. And then being able to appreciate the beautiful results when the time is right.

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