Posts Tagged ‘attitude’

Early New Years Resolutions Before Christmas.

Thursday, December 18th, 2008

Are you making your list of New Years Resolutions?  You probably are not doing it consciously, but how many of you are thinking, oh well I can start after the holidays.  Buy it now, pay later, Eat it now, lose it later.

While that sounds OK, it leaves you with two things.  Extra fat to lose and more debt to pay off.  If you are really serious about getting to your healthy weight, you cannot diet only when it is convenient.  There is no miracle pill or exercise that will take the extra pounds off over night, nor will it keep them off.

I generally do not encourage taking supplements to lose weight.  Truth is, there are some ingredients that do help you lose weight.  The key word here is helps.  It does not take off the extra weight, it merely helps you to take it off while you are changing your life habits.  Zinc and Chromium are two essential minerals that we do not get the minimum daily does of in our daily diet.  These are two ingredients in a lot of supplement.  Zinc and Chromium not only give your body what it needs, but also aides the body to shed the extra weight.

To lose weight and maintain weight you have to change your eating habits, your activity habits, and your thinking habits.  I am not going to list the eating changes as I have listed many of them in other posts.  Basically you have to eat less, eat smarter, and drink water.  You have to move more.  And you have to give yourself a break.  You have to change your attitude or relationship to food.

When you do get ready to make your New Years resolution, when it comes to losing weight I suggest that you make the resolution to improve your attitude about yourself, to increase your activity or exercise through the year, and to work on changing your eating habits.  Make a resolution to get a good nights rest each and every night.  But do not sabotage yourself by making a resolution to diet for three months to take off 50 pounds with the idea that after you reach your goal its over.

Weight maintenance is a way of life.  It becomes more and more important the older you get.  Just as you have to keep your mind active to maintain your mental abilities, you have to keep your body active to maintain your health, strength, movement, and weight.  As your life slows, you have to adjust your eating habits.

Habits are not made in a day, nor are they changed in a day.  We must work on them every day.  In fact, we need to consciously continue to practice our new habits more through the holiday season so that we do not practice our old habits.

I find the holidays are filled with tons to do and not enough time to do it, which leads to grabbing food at the fast food place to save time and because it is convenient.  The same habit that helped me to become overweight.  Food and goodies show up every where as co-workers bring treats to work to share.  Bedtime gets later and later, even though the alarm sounds at the same time every morning.  Exercise routines get tossed aside as I drop in my recliner exhausted from the day.

I cannot afford to wait until New Year’s to continue on my weight loss journey.  I have worked to hard to get this far.  How about you?

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MAGIC HELP Touchstones for Weight Loss Part 8 ‘L’

Saturday, July 12th, 2008

Touchstones - Magic help

Our ‘L’ touchstone is for language.  One of the stumbling blocks to our success in changing our lifestyle and habits is the language, or word choices, we use when talking and thinking about ourselves and our lifestyle changes.  These are the two areas I want to discuss.

If you have been reading my posts, you know I keep bringing up to be kind to yourself.  Most of us have heard or witnessed someone being beaten down by the words of another.  Sadly, we tend to be even harder on ourselves.

What names do you call yourself?  Fatso, loser, dumb, stupid, unworthy, unable, etc.  Or do you call yourself a victor, a winner, deserving, smart, persistent?  Do you tell yourself you can never get fit or slimmer?  Or do you honestly believe that you can achieve your goal and change?

Remember touchstone ‘I’?  If our self-image is bad, it is very hard to succeed.  In fact, we work very hard at proving that we can’t.  Don’t we have enough to deal with in this world without beating ourselves up?

I want you to write down some affirmations that you can post all over the house, your room, your car, your work, or wherever you spend a lot of time.  Write down things like “I can do it”, “I am not perfect, but I am getting there”,  “I am a caring person”, etc.  Be sure to include this one:  “I deserve to be a healthier, slimmer me”.  You will be surprised how that one helps when you are tempted to eat off plan or don’t want to do your exercise.

Let’s go on to the way you think about your diet program. Do you think of it as something you ‘have’ to do because it is expected of you?  Do you talk about how you ’should’ do this or that?  Or even ’shouldn’t’ do this or that.  How about the ‘can’t’ word? or the phrase ‘I don’t have time’?  Do you think – it would be nice if I could obtain my goal, but that’s impossible or improbable?

Instead, why don’t do this:

Change: “I should go for a walk today”

To: “I choose to go for a walk today because it makes me feel energized, less stressed, and good about myself”.

NOTE:  Always give 2 or 3 positive reasons why you choose it.

Change: “I don’t have time to prepare my snacks”

To: “I am going to switch my schedule around to have time to prepare my snacks and meals because I deserve to take care of myself, I deserve to succeed in my program, and it helps to eat on program when I have something I can eat ready”.

Change: “I can’t eat right this weekend because I have to go on a trip”

To: “I choose to find a way to stay on my eating program and go on the trip.  I will eat salads with low fat dressings; take snacks with me, etc.  I will plan ahead how to deal with the obstacles the trip makes in my eating program”.

Change: “It would be nice if I could obtain my goal, but that’s impossible or improbable?”

To: “I will achieve my goal because I deserve to be a happier, healthier, slimmer me AND because I choose to”.

Do you notice that when you use should and have to, that makes the changes you are trying to make an obligation.  When you use choose and will, then it makes it your choice.  Again, see touchstone ‘C’ Choices.

As with all habits, the change in your language will not come overnight.  You have to consciously change the word whenever you use it to a positive word.  As your language changes, so will your thinking.  As your thinking about yourself and your eating program changes, it becomes easier to change your eating and activity habits.  You are on the road to success!

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