Don't let haters get you down

By Suzanne MacNevin

I want to apologize to every fat person I have ever made fun of. Including Rob Ford.

Historically I thought that my "tough love" approach with the obesity epidemic was my way of promoting fitness and motivating fat people to stop coddling themselves, get off the sofa, and start exercising / eating healthy.

I thought that obese people needed both positive and negative reinforcement in order to motivate themselves to change.

What I have since realized is that obese people have no shortage of negative reinforcement, what they really need is more positive.

Furthermore I have also realized I was being a hater.

Not that I hate fat people. What I hated was what you stood for. Laziness and gluttony. It was nothing against the people themselves, but an indictment of their lack of willpower and a society that feeds upon laziness and gluttony, turning people into food addicts.

I came to this epiphany while I was chatting online with a friend in Canada, a personal trainer who lives in Toronto who uses sports to help motivate his clients to lose weight.

What he said was "Haters are going to hate and you can't let haters get you down. You have to stay up, keep going forward, keep trying harder, because quitting will only let the haters win - and you cannot let them win. You have to take your own hate for the haters and turn that into positive action - but you are never going to do that unless you have the support of people who are not haters and tell you to 'go for it!' "

And that was when my brain just clicked. I realized that my brand of negative reinforcement wasn't very supportive. My mindset was all screwed up and my friend had opened a window in my brain, letting a flood of light in and suddenly I could see clearly.

So now I feel I need to spread three messages.

One, I apologize. I am very sorry for all the times I made fun of fat people. I know that isn't a very good apology, but it is sincere.

Two, to other haters out there: Please realize that your hate only drags other people down.

Three, to all the people out there who are feeling a lack of motivation: You can do it. I believe in you.

Note - I want to point out that my friend was speaking broadly about haters and motivation. He wasn't speaking about exercising, the conversation turned in this direction because of some jackass who hates him just for the sake of hating him (and is probably just jealous of his physique). If you have encountered this type of person you know what they are like. The hardcore haters will find any excuse to hate people - even perfectly likable people who can speak so eloquently about turning hate into positivity.

But what he said was truly profound because it applied to all kinds of hate and to many different activities - not just motivating yourself to exercise. It also easily applies to sexism, racism, and any of discrimination.

With that said I am going back to all my old articles and blog posts on the topics of obesity, exercising, etc and re-writing them so they are more supportive. It will take awhile but I will do it. So I apologize if you read any of my old articles in which I make fun of lazy fat people and defended my negative reinforcement. It will take some time and effort to re-write everything.

And you can do it too. You just have to set your mind to it and ignore the haters!