Be patient with me people…. This is a long post and it is also therapy!

About my 1st bikini competition yesterday!!!

I have a lot of thoughts …..
First off… as a performer, one way I prepare to big events is with visualization … Visualizing here was not easy… You have to understand that I visualize to a teeth, what’s going to happen when, how, what I will say, the way to smile, the color of the walls… everything!!! And as much I asked questions and watched youtube videos about the subject, my visualization was not on point, but then again, I can’t control everything, right?
Then of course was the fact of being a novice …. Everything is new.. I knew nothing! How does it work with the tan, what should I do with my hair, what’s permitted, what’s not… That obviously did not help me visualize and also added a small stress factor that could be both exciting and nerve wracking at the same time! All this, I actually enjoyed… It was all new 

Then, once I got backstage I realized something: These girls in the bikini category are skinny!!!! At least in the APQ…. and me… I am not a skinny girl, nor I want to be…. I have curves, I have a bootie, I have hips… Imagine the Sir Mix A Lot Song: Baby Got Back, where he talks about two types of girls, well I am the one who will will always “Shake that healthy butt!”… LOL A few years ago seeing the other girls would have discouraged me, it would have made me feel insecure, it would have made me think: WTF am I doing here!!!! But not this time, because well, for once this shit is expensive, so I was going to make each cent count.
Then, thinking about all my progress and all the efforts I had been doing so far made me already feel accomplished! I knew the judges will not make me a winner and I really didn’t care, I was not there for that, I was there for ME! Because I wanted to wear that bikini and walk in my high heels! I wanted to walk on that stage and feel like a winner! 

NOW… listen to this: I AM HUMAN! And once you see the pic with you and the other girls on stage you can’t help it and you start comparing yourself and you go back to square one: WTF was I thinking? and then you add: I did everything I could, why oh why am I not as tiny as them? WHAT DOES IT TAKE FOR ME to get there? What is it that I need to do? Why did I not lose all the water? (if you are not familiar with this, this means that ideally the days before your competition you will lose all the water so that your muscles pop out more… it didn’t really happen to me… and we can’t figure out why) For a moment there all the positive thinking goes out the window and you just crumble and feel awful… you feel as if all of it was for nothing, you get a bit mad, you try to understand the facts and you can’t… you think: all the lifting and the sprinting, the low carbs, the sacrifices….. all of that and I still look like this????

So I was confused…. Moments ago I was proud of myself because I couldn’t care less about the judges, and because I was happy with my progress and my curves, and now, after seeing the ONE PICTURE of me with the other girls on stage I just crumble! It was simple: I AM MY WORST ENEMY! So a lot mental work went on there, internally, with myself…. because I DO LOOK GOOD to my standards! Because I like the way my clothes fit, I like the way I look in a bikini, I like how I feel, I like the way you can see definition in my body overall (but I specially love the way my shoulders and arms look!!)…and what I love the most is that I did not starve myself for months to get here, it was just a result of hard work and effort…. sometimes harder than the others, but always FUN.

So now my BIG dilemma, and this is where I stand TODAY a day after my first bikini show…. Should I go to the Provincial Championship which will take place on June 17th????? I earned my place last night – I needed to place in the top 5 – so I’m being given a chance to do this… But I seriously do not know what to do!

My mental process:

 Reasons why to do it:

 I have 4 more weeks to lean out a bit more and look even better for Provincials, 4 more weeks to practice my posing, to fix whatever needs to be fixed. if I don’t do it now, then when?

Because all my life I have had the tendency to quit at things I did not succeed at as a first timer… Example: riding a bike, I fell as a kid and said: never mind, not for me, and I refused to learn… I finally did it when I was 30! This is nice opportunity to actually show myself that not succeeding at first is not the end of the world and that the way to success is made out of a series of failures.

Because this will be a new challenge, and who doesn’t like a challenge?

The judges already saw me, now they know me… and I could make their jaws drop in 4 weeks if I show up looking leaner.

 Reasons why not to:

 4 more weeks of planning my life around my prep.

 I like working out and I don’t mind following up a meal plan but there were things I had to do that were a pain in the butt! LOL Do I want to go through it again?

 Will I actually be a competition for the skinny ones next to me? Will my muscles show as we want them to? Will my mind play tricks of me? Will I lose all the water? Will it work this time??

I will just leave that out there… we will see what happens!!!!!

Finally, I can’t end this post without thanking everyone who have supported me and have been sending me good vibes!!! Thank you!! Thank you!!!

Go check my recap video!!!!