Frustrated = F A T

I learned two things definitively today. Things I already knew on some level but put them into words. 

1. I'm an obliger. 

2. I'm fat because of frustration, and because I'm an obliger.

I'm not addicted to food. I can control myself around junk. I neither need nor necessarily want to eat at any time. But when I'm feeling frustrated I will eat anything and everything. It's not that I'm out of control, it's more that I need to feed the thing inside that is eating away at me. I need to satisfy the beast. 

Is there any other way to satisfy the beast? In the short term, I think yes. I can exercise, I can eat healthy food to my heart's content, I can eat small amounts of junk food to ward off a craving. I can write, I can pamper myself, I can lose myself in my work. When I'm really, unequivocally frustrated, though, only junk food will do. And a lot of it. 

An article I was reading this morning told me I am an obliger. Gretchen Rubin, the author of The Happiness Project, says that there are four main tendencies: Upholder, Questioner, Obliger and Rebel. In her article she offers several questions and the one you identify with the most is your tendency. I took the quiz because I was surfing through LinkedIn on the toilet and had nothing more interesting to do. I also love to learn about myself and ways that I can better myself, and there is no better way to better yourself than understanding yourself better. Huh?

Anyway, when I started the quiz I honestly had no idea where I would end up. I assumed that, as with most personality quizzes, I would identify partially with all of them and completely with none. An upholder meets their obligations, a questioner questions the world around them, an obliger does for others, a rebel doesn't do for anyone if they don't want to. But the thing that really got to me and put me square in the obliger camp is that I have absolutely no problem doing for others but it is a struggle to do for myself. 

I gave up my job to figure out what would make me happy. I gave up my home to support what made me happy. I moved across the country to test my happy. I moved home with my parents to share my happy. In all of that time, what I didn't do what keep the promises I made to myself about the little things. To exercise, to get to appointments on time, to get involved in my community, to find healthier ways to deal with my frustrations in a way that doesn't involve a hamburger, fries and ice cream. 

That's okay, though. If I can eat healthy the rest of the time, I'll allow myself a burger instead of pulling my hair out. I know without a doubt that exercise would help so much more but that will come. Maybe if I deal with the obliger part, the rest will come a little easier.  

And then I research each of the four tendencies in more depth and I am indeed all four. And more frustrated than ever. Always everything and nothing, everyone and no one. Always pulled apart. Always frustrated. Always fat? I don't think so. I just need to keep trying new things to figure things out. I'll get there. I always get there. I always take the longest fucking way around possible. But I get there eventually. I get there. I'll continue to get there. As long as I'm trying, I'm getting closer to succeeding.