A few days ago PastaQueen posted about the Butler basketball team. Despite the fact that I, frankly, couldn’t care less about the NCAA or basketball in general, there was something in this post that really got to me. It got me thinking about the things that I do and don’t risk. Trying to lose weight was such a huge risk and putting into place was even more risky. I’ve never lost any weight in my life, save the fluctuation of a few pounds from day to day.

It’s a risk I’ve never taken before, not seriously. I had plans and ideas but never a way to track it and keep myself accountable. There is something so amazing and fulfilling about seeing success in something that felt like such a big risk. Why is it, though, that with the things that really matter I can’t seem to take the risk.

It isn’t that the risk is bigger but that my emotion invested in the thing is so much more. I suppose that it is a bigger risk emotionally, then. Unfortunately, it’s the things that I want the most and the things that matter the most that I can’t seem to take the risk on. It’s where my emotions are invested and where I really dream that I can’t seem to take a leap.

The good news is that I did take a leap with my weight loss and that was one of my biggest fears as well as on of the things I am the most emotionally invested in. I didn’t think I could do it.

I know that I haven’t talked much about my life outside of weight loss on this blog and I didn’t really intend to, but it seems to intertwined on this subject. The thing that matters the most and the thing I am most afraid to take the risk on is becoming an opera singer. I was a music major in school before I was in the accident and left and I was taking the risk but I haven’t yet worked up the courage to walk back in the arena, if you will.

“I realized that they were setting themselves up for either major joy or major sorrow. Yet, they ran out there anyway and decided to take the risk of heartbreak for the chance at the joy of victory.”

This line in particular really got to me. I have to get to the place where I am willing to risk heartbreak, rejection, embarrassment, etc for the chance at my dream, what makes my heart pound, what makes my stomach leap, what makes me feel alive. It seems to me that to sing Zerlina, Suzannah, Giuditta, Violetta, Mignon, Ophelie, Musetta, Mimi, Elvira, Iphigenie, Jenufa, etc would be a life fulfilled.

Certainly other elements are important and other things play major parts in a fulfilling life, but this is what makes me giddy, just imagining playing these parts. Losing the weight is one step on a path to this.