I often use a phrase that I have come to dislike, and that phrase is ‘move the needle.’

At first glance it seems innocent enough, a phrase that should not really be causing anyone any harm or anxiety.

I believe I found it through media about basketball, such as when my favorite team made a trade but the package they received was not enough to make a real difference to the teams fortunes.

It didn’t ‘move the needle’ on the virtual meter of affecting wins and losses.

Today I find myself using it to gauge how much improvement I’ve made in the terrible life situation I’m still stuck in despite my efforts, usually out of frustration when I feel stuck, when I perceive nothing moving forward.

Sadly it probably is an instrument of self abuse, as I do make progress it just doesn’t change the main pillars of my life that seem most difficult.

For example: Since January I have lost thirty pounds or so, which although it is only a small drop in the bucket towards my weight goal is pretty significant for the time frame of just over five months, and also is a healthy amount of weight to have shed.

But as it does not ‘move the needle’ in making my body work like it did even three years ago or change my prospects for progression, I get upset that it doesn’t seem enough.

Often I ruminate over the fact that despite making changes to my mind, body, and even the soul there always seems to be more work to do, always seems there are more prerequisites I must acquire before I can have the things that would make me feel better about where I am and where I’m headed.

It’s a fools game to be sure, but when you are doing disciplined tasks, when you are going outside your comfort zone to do things like surgery, when you’re trying to be the best version of yourself to others but you still feel stuck in the same place with the same hunger in your belly, it starts to wear on your outlook.

Especially when you feel your wants are just really needs others take for granted or come by pretty easily.

Worse, it makes all the progress you do make feel pretty worthless and unrecognized, as if it was not worth doing in the first place, especially when it comes to the inner changes that should have made the biggest difference as I was always told they would…in time.

That’s where the real salt lies in the waiting.

Everything is on this timer and it just seems to tick on and on and it never seems to reach zero. It almost feels like someone keeps adding more time to it, the constant ticking getting in your head and wrecking havoc.

In the end, I know what I’ve accomplished and how much I’ve survived and endured through the past few years if not longer, but it still leaves my pockets empty, my heart feeling the same, and the sense that either my efforts are still not enough or that I myself am not enough.

I know the truth but that needle remains idle and I stare at it all the time.