From Spark People for January 24th

“Do less. Bombarding yourself with too many goals can be stressful. The more items you focus on, the more each task suffers from a lack of priority, attention and accuracy. Whittle down your to-do list to focus on what is really important.”

And I can already hear you saying, ‘it’s all important” and yes it is; just not at once. When I first begin coaching a new client on weight loss, their tendency is to want to change everything they are doing – at once!

What makes me a good coach is I have been there and done everything each of my clients has and I know what works and what doesn’t on a long term basis. For example, a client may be drinking no water and set their first goal for 80 ounces a day. Our extra weight was not built in a day and neither was Rome. We will not lose all the weight we want, once we decide it is time.  It will take time to change our habits, one step at a time. I asked my client for one week to concentrate on drinking 8 ounces of water daily. When she said that did not seem like much, I shared it was 100% more than she was drinking right now.

We are on a journey to reach and MAINTAIN our ideal diet; not on a race to a diet finish line where we just go back to all of our old habits. Take it one step, one day, one pound or one ounce at a time.

Spark People for January 11th

“Practice saying, thinking and writing positive things about yourself.  Acknowledge and take credit for the things you have done well and recognize your abilities and talents.  Keep a list to add to, think about and read to yourself daily.”

I have heard we have as many as 60,000 different thoughts per day.  I also understand we can only think one thought at a time.  Why is this important?  Because each day we have approximately 60,000 opportunities to support ourselves in our weight loss goal or derail ourselves right off track.

Do you remember how you last referred to yourself?

~that was dumb

~I am so clusmey

~I can never remember anything

~I am such a dork

~I will never get this right

Etc., Etc., Etc.  Is it any wonder we find our selves struggling sometimes to stay motivated and positive about our efforts.  I challenge you write now to write down 10 wonderful thoughts about you.  I will start with a couple to set an example.

1.  I have cute feet.

2.  I love the color of my hair.

3.  I make myself laugh out loud.

4.  I am passionate about what I do.

5.  Dogs always like me which means I am a good person.

6.  I support others every opportunity I have.

7.  I am fun to be with.

8.  I have good ankles.

9.  I love my name.

10. I am quick to make a decision.

What are yours?

From Spark People for January 10^th

“Don’t expect perfection. You will mess up, make mistakes and forget along the way.   The key is persistence and a willingness to learn from your mistakes.  Focus on what you have done right instead of dwelling on the negative.”

Ah, the Perfection Expectation Monster will get us every time. Many of us who have been challenged with weight are typically smart and over achievers.  We do everything well, including overeating.  When we decide to do something about it, we expect to change 100% immediately and are failures once we have the first slip.

Perfection is not all it is cracked up to be and there is no opportunity to learn from your mistakes when you are being perfect.  About 10 years ago I did the Optifast Program and did not eat ONE BITE of food for 10 months.  I had five shakes a total and the total calories I was consuming daily was 400.  Now besides all the damage I was doing to my body, what I loved was it was a totally brainless way to lose weight.  I never had to think and in 10 months I lost 150 pounds.

When I reached my goal, I begged to be allowed to stay on the program forever and they told me no- you would die.  Now think about that.  If I kept doing what I was doing I would die; so how healthy was what I had been doing.

So I was back to eating food again.  I had learned nothing about portion control, food groups, calorie deficits etc.  I had learned how to make a great chocolate Optifast Shake normally mixed with a 64 ounce diet Coke.  The result was over the next couple of years I gained back every pound and found 40ish of their friends.  This is how I earned the title Queen of the Weight Lost and Found Department

It is ok to make mistakes.  NO!  It is great to make mistakes as long as you learn from them and don’t keep making the same one over and over.  When you make a decision you regret, use this as an opportunity to discover what you could differently next time.

From Spark People for January 9th…

“Create a motivational collage.  Find inspiring pictures, encouraging words and quotes or anything else which reminds you of your goal.  Glue it all together and place it where you can see it daily.  This is your vision a clear and motivating and energizing reminder of who you want to be.”

I love vision boards.  I do believe you are already who you are and it has nothing to do with your weight.  Who you are is not conditioned on how much you weigh.  The fun and power of a vision board is creating the picture of how your life will look when you arrive at and remain at your ideal weight.  Are there things you want to do and can’t right now.  Find pictures of people doing it and put on your board.  I have shared how I was not able to do the zip line and next time I will be ready~

Sports you would like to participate in, places you would like to go, clothes you would like to wear.  (One of mine is wearing again some of my very cute high heel shoes.)  You can put pictures of your favorite healthy foods or healthy recipes.  Make it your own.  Never underestimate the power of creating physical images of what you want.

“Visualize this thing that you want, see it, feel it, believe in it. Make your mental blue print, and begin to build.”
- Robert Collier

While the number of calories you take in each day is not the only determining factor of your success, it is one of the most important.  To lose one pound of fat, you need to burn 3500 calories and that is the math.  While not all calories are created equally, knowing what and how much you are eating is a must for long term success, at least until you learn what a healthy meal is and what are considered “normal portion” sizes.  Your calories consumed each day are individual to you based on your weight, activity level, amount of body fat versus lean muscle etc.  Invest the time to determine what is right for you and make that you calorie target each day.  And yes, things eaten while standing and on holidays do count!

When you decide to lose weight normally you have an idea in mind of how much weight you would like to lose.  Once we decide what that is however, we need to develop strategies to support and sustain to reach that goal.  One thing which has worked for me is creating mini-goals.  Very small, short term goals which you can reach in one day!  For example, I spoke to someone this week who was feeling badly becuase she was not drinking eight glasses of water a day.  Right now she is drinking two glasses a day.  I suggested to her for the next one week, she make a goal every day to drink at least three glasses of water.  She would increase her water intake by 33.3% and would be on the way to developing a habit of drinking more water.  It is when our expectation of ourselves is to go from 0-100 overnight we feel defeated and give up.  We are not on a diet; we are creating making small simple changes in our daily living which creates long term success.  What is your mini goal today?  If you would like support in being held accountable and cheered on a daily basis, join Healthy Again in 2010 with us.

From Spark People January 5

“Make a realistic time line to stay on track.  Deadlines turn wishes into goals. Give yourself adequate time to complete each action step and choose a date when you hope to reach your overall goal.  If you have not started working on your goals yet, today is the day.”

My timeline is one year for my personal goal to lose 140.7 pounds of weight.  I intend to reach my goal by December 31, 2010 or sooner.  To accomplish this, I need to burn a total of 1,095,000 calories this year; which works out to 3000 daily.  Having a daily goal is manageable and I can take it one day at a time.  That is realistic to me, even though 3000 calories a day is somewhat of a stretch at the weight I am.

I am also chunking my smaller goals instead of looking at the big number.  I have lost 46.8 so far and my next goal is the 50 pound mark.  I intend to complete this goal by the end of January or sooner and then I will set another one.

Remember this is not a race and I hope my final finish line is a long way out.  In the meantime I am retraining and reeducating my body.

What is your short term goal and by when do you intend to have it completed?

Helping Reshape the World,

Judi

TBB Founding Diamond Coach

From Spark People : January 4

“Develop an action plan for every goal. For example, a healthy eating resolution may involve: learning more about good nutrition, visiting a dietitian, finding ways to adapt your recipes, buying containers to pack lunches, learning how to prepare new foods, and planning extra time for shopping and cooking. Don’t overwhelm yourself with every action step at once, but focus on a few things each day.”

In the past I have set goals for weight loss in certain time frames and sometimes I made it and sometimes I didn’t.  And each time, although I was doing the right things I still felt like it was somewhat random.

With a goal to lose 140.7 pounds this year, I knew I had to develop a specific action plan or that type of loss would not happen.  I determined exactly how many calories I need to burn over the entire year (1,095,000) and that broke down to 3000 daily.  According to my GoWear Fit my basic metabolic rate is 2250 per day which meant I had to add a minimum of 750 additional calories burned per day.

Once I did the math, the light went off and for the first time I realized I could have control over my body.  If I was burning 500 extra calories of day, I would be in denial thinking I could still reach my weight loss goal.  This made it very black and white for me; either I do it or I don’t and the results are completely up to me!

When we were walking at Harbor Island yesterday,  I know I pushed myself harder, walked longer and burned more calories simply because I had the knowledge.  And from the knowledge I took action.  And my focus now is on those 750 calories and what I can do to burn them.

What weight loss goal do you have you can create an action plan for?  If you need help crafting one, let me know!

Happily Burning Calories on my way toward goal!

Judi

From Spark People for January 3, 2010:

“Post your written goals in places where you will see them often; on your computer or fridge, in a picture frame on your desktop, as a bookmark and in your wallet.  These reminders will help you stay focuses and on track.”

Goals are meant to be attained.  That is the purpose of setting goals otherwise it would just be daydreaming about things we would like to have happen.  Committing your intentions in writing create tangible accountability and a target!

Understand it is crucial to write down your goals if you intend to succeed. Show yourself you serious.

Three reasons it is powerful to write down your goals:

1.  You can clearly and succinctly express the exact outcome you expect and intend.  You get clear on what it is which causes events to happen to move you forward.

2.  When you have it committed to paper you can refer to it daily to keep your focus on the outcome over the long term.

3.  Just writing them down triggers your imagination and creativity of ways to reach the goals you have set.

I am pretty clear about my weight loss goal for 2010 and have written it down everywhere I can think of.  I posted here on my blog.  I created the Healthy Again in 2010 Facebook Group to be accountable.  Facilitate The Healthy Breakfast Club Call each weekday morning for daily support.

Several days ago I shared I even calculated how many calories I would need to burn daily to reach that goal, wrote that down and created a chart to track my progress.

Write at least your top weight loss goal down right now.  If that feels uncomfortable, ask yourself why.  Get serious and get healthy with me!

Helping Reshape the World,

Judi