I was walking through The Grove Hotel lobby recently, after scheduling a shuttle pick-up for my flight tomorrow morning to get my Tesla from the repair shop in Salt Lake City.

Some big conventions are going on right now at The Grove, so there’s a lot of people.

As Hazel and I walked through the lobby, a man who was clearly drunk, glass of whiskey in hand, stumbled up to me as I was walking out the door and said, “Hey, you were here last year at our convention!”

“Well, I live here at the hotel, so I have nothing to do with the convention,” I explained.

But he was already tuning me out because he’d spotted Hazel. “Hey, little guy,” he said, lunging toward her.

Immediately, I stepped between him and Hazel. “No, no no,” I said, putting my hand up.

“Oh, he’s not friendly?” slurred the man.

“SHE is very friendly. I just don’t want anybody petting her.”

“Oh, but I love dogs!” he objected, and spent the next sixty seconds trying to convince me of how much he loved dogs.

Then he lunged at Hazel a second time.

Again, I put my body between him and Hazel, with Hazel behind my legs, and told him, “No. You’re not going to touch her, okay?”

“But I really love dogs!” he said again.

“I can appreciate that, but no, you’re not going to touch her.”

Ignoring me, he lunged at her a THIRD freaking time!

I put my hand on his chest and pushed him back. “Hey, my guy, do NOT touch my dog,” I said more firmly.

“Oh, my bad, my bad, so sorry,” he said, finally getting the hint.

“Sir, is there a problem here?” asked the manager, who’d noticed the commotion.

“No no no, I just really like dogs,” he slurred.

I thanked the manager, and Hazel and I left.

In hindsight, I should have just kept walking.

By staying and putting up with his drunken antics, I was trying not to be rude (though I find it suspicious he was alert enough to recognize me from last year but not alert enough to listen when I told him not to touch Hazel).

Even so, I wasn’t gonna let some drunk stranger touch my dog. She counts on me to protect her and keep her safe from her own instincts as well as situations and people that might hurt her.

When you’re navigating your weight loss journey, you’ve gotta protect yourself the way I protected Hazel.

If some drunk party-goer tries to get you to have just one drink, and you tell them no thanks and they refuse to listen, walk away or leave the party.

If your “friends” insist it won’t kill you to have “just one bite,” don’t sacrifice your progress and cave in just to “not seem rude.” Stand up for your goals!

If you struggle to do those kinds of things, then it could be you’d do better with a coach, a community, and accountability.

What most people don’t realize is that when “life happens” and throws us for a loop, we don’t rise to the level of our circumstances, we almost always fall to the level of our training.

So if you’ve trained yourself to cope with food, guess what you’ll do when “life happens”?

Coaching and community can be there to help you develop skill sets and be accountable to someone outside of you while you figure things out.

It’s just another way to protect yourself as you TAKE YOUR LIFE BACK.