A New City and a New Me

Last night at 9:41 PM I entered the state of Texas once again, but this time I am not just here to visit I am making this new home. Specifically I have just moved to the Flowermound/Lewisville area of Dallas, TX.

I am truly excited to be here. I love the optimism and pride of Texas. I love the history and independence of the state and it's people. As I was telling a friend, I was born a South Carolinian, I'm an American by the grace of God, but I'm a Texan by choice.

"I wasn't born in Dallas, but I got there as quick as I could." - Zig Ziglar

with this new chapter in my life I thought I would begin a new blog documenting some journeys I'm on. Primarily I'll be discussing my goals, progress, and ideas on health.

I've been fat all my life. I was a fat kid, a fat teenager and I'm a fat adult. I've done dieting and exercising on and off forever. My whole family is also fat.

Well about two years ago I weighed myself and I was at 330+ pounds on New Year's 2011. I was absolutely amazed at what I read on the scale. So I made a decision that day to change, but I needed an incentive to motivate me because apparently health wasn't enough. So since I am a family entertainer I made a promise to all my clients that if I didn't lose enough weight to weigh in below 300 pounds by June 1st that every gig I booked would be absolutely free. That would be several thousands dollars and I could not afford to lose that money.

So I worked at my weight over the next five months and I did manage to weigh in at under 300 pounds. I was quite happy with myself and looked forward to continuing to move down in weight.

Unfortunately, a few weeks after that I had a lump in my jaw area diagnosed as late stage Hotchkin's Disease. I was scared out of my mind. I immediately went back to eating horribly and justified it that if I was going to die I might as well go fat and happy (I was certainly fat, but I wasn't very happy). I joked with the doctor that at least chemo is good for weight loss. He didn't think it was funny either.

Due to a lack of insurance I had to wait for a while to get a full diagnosis, but I was finally seen at a clinic in St. Louis. Thankfully, the biopsy came back and they said it was a benign tumor. I was somewhat relieved and soon after that I had the tumor removed.

The surgery was fine (though expensive), but I developed a severe cough for a few months after that. I went to the doctor several times, but they couldn't find out what it was. So I would just lay around and eat because moving at all caused a painful cough.

Eventually the cough went away, but I had fallen back into some awful habits of laziness. I had also grown depressed and hopeless over my weight.

Well in May I decided to become a distributor of Amway Global. Amway Global is a direct sales business that has been around for over fifty years and according to Forbes is one of the top privately held companies in America. They have a huge range of products from vitamins to energy drinks to gift albums. They're also partnered with companies like Bass Pro, Best Buy, and Office Depot. I absolutely love being a part of such a great company.

Since Amway Global is a direct marketing business, you are working with a sponsor to help volume flow though your business from customers and finding others interested in making money. It is a system of people helping people and getting paid based on the volume your business creates.

Well I say all that because after I started my business, my sponsor humbly came up and confronted me about my obesity and asked if I was willing to tackle it. At first I was taken aback because of his boldness, but after thinking abut it I knew I had to do something. So with his encouragement, and using several great Amway products I started to eat better, take the right vitamins, and exercise.

I was amazed to discover when I weighed myself I was at 380 pounds!

That was in late May and in the last three month I've managed to lose about 60 of those pounds and I now weigh closer to 320. This blog is meant as a journal for me as I go through this to fitness. I also hope it encourages you and as I have found many of the Amway products amazing I would certainly love to find some new customers if they would improve your life as they have mine.

Each week I'll be updating this page with a new post of progress, some information I've been studying about health that week, some personal motivation, and a product I've found helpful. Of course as an Amway distributor I do make money when I see products, but that doesn't make the information less valid, just as someone from Texas saying that Texas is the best state in the union doesn't mean they're wrong just because they may be biased.

So I hope the information I share helps you. If I mention a product you think you can find more information and order at http://HigherHopePromotions.com. Should you discover it doesn't do for you what it has done for me then I'd encourage you to use the 180 day return policy.

So please make sure to check back here every week for what could truly change your life.

Thanks for stopping by and I look forward to your comments and questions.

Jason Vaughn

http://HigherHopePromotions.com