Measuring your progress has the potential to be a valuable tool. It can be a great way to keep yourself accountable or to provide insight. But without a deeper understanding of how that data affects us, we are bound to get wrapped up in self-judgment. However, If we take a careful and eagled-eyed approach to measurement we can help ourselves to make more informed decisions on our journey.

Measuring Optimal

I am 16. I stare in the floor to ceiling mirror across from me, turning to one side and then the other, my face contorting with each turn, distress, panic, sorrow. Shifting from one enemy to the next, I step on my scale. For a moment, I see my self-loathing, held in its glass case, balanced by the idealized number in my mind, a fraction in either direction determining its banishment or its freedom. Of course, it is not my prisoner. This simple ritual proves that.

Numbers and data haunted me. I would compare my numerical proportions to others like stats on trading cards, ranking myself among my peers. I defined myself by the numbers. I determined my self-worth by my distance from what I believed to be “optimal.”

My relationship with my scale, of course, would become one of the most robust roots of my body dysmorphia. Today I am still tentative in approaching my weight and body measurements. The long term effects follow me every day. I recently admitted to friends, to some unease, another one of my methods: counting calories. It became so ingrained over the years that it is involuntary. I can look at a portion of food and guess within 100 calories how much it’s worth. It’s a neat party trick.

From the outsider perspective, it’s easy to see how insane this is. Why hinge your self-worth on a measurement? But we make this kind of value judgment all of the time — the difference between scoring a 95 or a 92 on an exam, being able to read 90 pages a day of one book but only 30 of another. Each of these comparisons contributes to how we value ourselves and our habits.

Intrinsically we know the size or numbers mean nothing. 72 is smaller than 160, but I wouldn’t feel any better measuring myself in Kilos. The urge to compare and cast judgment exists no matter the scale. What this shows us that we are contributing something else. It is something we can’t always control. It took another approach, another idea, to change how I viewed my weight and my calorie counting. Our unconscious contrast creates a story. And in the story lies the problem.

Overcoming The Narrative Fallacy

When we look at a set of facts or numbers, we, by nature, start to craft a story around them. Stories, unlike statements and data, are abstract, they ignore pieces of context or rationale to form a cohesive narrative. In some areas, this can be valuable. The consistency and approachability of stories help us to learn, remember, and internalize the ideas they contain. But this can often be a trap when it comes to personal narratives. When trying to change ourselves for the better and develop our resolutions, we need to be able to see the field as clearly as possible. We have to understand our faults and our environment without abstraction to see where we might make adjustments. The mask of personal narration clouds neutral judgment, placing unfounded value on facts that are nothing more than information.

The narrative of the “ideal body” clouded how I judged myself and put undue importance on my measurements. The negative associations with calorie counting made my friends uneasy. There is a story in every statement.

The Narrative Fallacy is something we will encounter every day. Acknowledging its presence does not rid us of it. We can, however, begin to notice its presence and counteract it. Or at the very least steer it in our favor. When we see ourselves drawing useless or irrational comparisons, we can start to form a new story around the clearer and more positive ideals.

Point the stories in the direction of our identity, and they will serve us all the better. I began counting calories around the idea of restriction and weight loss. Shifting the narrative, I took to observing nutritional value to learn what it means to be healthy. The first narrative focuses on the arbitrary, the latter on the identity. It wasn’t until I shifted the story that I understood the real value of the junk I was eating — using that I could make better decisions about how to be healthy, not just eat less. Only when we have precise data can we fully experiment with change.

The goal is to use measurement as a point of reflection. The comparison and narrative are inevitable. So make it work in our favor. Data can help to steer us in unfamiliar waters. Understanding the outcomes of our decisions and habits is the only way to refine them.

When we use our tools of measurement to clear the fog instead of creating it, we create a chart of our journey. We can better predict the waters while leaving a clear path for us to follow when the tides come to push us back.

Moving Forward

We are days away from the new year. By now, we have loaded up our toolkit with everything we need to set off. The only thing left to do is start.