Either you have fallen off
of the weight loss wagon or you are about to. It happens to everyone that
struggles with weight and it will happen to you, maybe not today, maybe not
tomorrow, but someday.
No one is perfect and losing weight is one of the hardest things you will
ever do. We all fall and we all screw up; the secret is to never give up-
always get back up and keep going; it’s never really as bad as it seems.
Let’s say you are doing everything just right; you are eating healthy and
exercising. One day you come home from work and you are graving Chinese food
and you head out to the local Chinese buffet and eat until the Chinese
waiter makes you leave. Now you think your whole life is over because you
over ate and you ate foods that weren’t great for you, then, since you have
already screwed up, why not have a big bowl of ice cream. That was yesterday
and since you did so bad yesterday, why not munch on some Doritos and maybe
enjoy a few Pepsi’s to wash it down with.
Here is where you screw up. The Chinese food really wasn’t that bad, you had
a moment of weakness and it didn’t do much damage to your new healthy
lifestyle, however, everything that happened afterwards made the situation
much worse.
Getting your mind right comes into this situation, just like every
situation. You have to understand that we all screw up and we all give in to
temptation, it’s natural. The key to successful weight loss is to start each
day like it’s the first day of your new healthy lifestyle, because it is.
Don’t worry about what you did yesterday, yesterday is gone and forgotten;
this also works even if you have done great. You may think that since you
did so well yesterday, you can pig out today and it will balance out;
doesn’t work that way my friend; yesterday is gone.
Take me for example, sometimes I find myself munching down a candy bar and I
wonder how I got to that point. It’s simple, I told myself that I had
already lost 100 lbs. and eating a candy bar wouldn’t hurt anything. Now I
have two choices; I can finish my candy bar and continue to think that way
or I can finish my candy bar and realize that I screwed up and act like it
never happened and keep pushing forward with my new healthy lifestyle. Don’t
waste a perfectly good candy bar, but don’t let that candy bar keep you the
fat person that you don’t want to be any longer.
You don’t have to be perfect when your trying to lose weight because it’s
not a baseball game- it isn’t three strikes and you’re out.
There will be times when you have done everything perfect all week and you
are feeling good about yourself and your happy and then you step on that
scale and you’ve gained a pound. I have been there and it will crush you. It
will ruin your day and you will feel like giving up and quitting. Why
bother, right?
Why work so hard only to gain a pound? If you hadn’t worked so hard, think
of how many pounds you would have gained. Gaining weight back doesn’t mean
anything. If you are feeling great and your cloths are getting smaller, then
don’t worry about that number on the scale.
I’m not saying don’t weigh because weighing yourself regularly is a huge
part of losing weight. Some people choose to weigh weekly, which I did for a
long time; some people chose to weigh daily, which I do now.
Weighing myself daily helps me keep track and not get too far out of hand.
If I have gained a few ounces, then I can look back on my day and pinpoint
why I gained and if I have lost then I can pinpoint what I’m doing right and
continue. Weighing yourself daily allows you to tweak whatever it is that
you’re doing.
I recommend weighing weekly for about the first 6 months, be sure to weigh
on the same day, at the same time and on the same scale; different scale
means different weight. This allows you to see if what you’re doing is
working or not. If you weigh daily when you are first starting then it
doesn’t really give you a good idea if what you are doing is working because
your weight changes so much throughout the day.
For example, if you weigh 200 lbs. and drink a 16 oz. bottle of water, then
you will weigh 201 lbs. The water has no calories, no fat and will be used
by your body but for now, it’s still a pound.
This is why weighing weekly allows you to keep
track of real weight loss and not weight changes that happen throughout the
day. Try to weigh first thing in the morning before you eat or drink, this
will give you a more true weight.
Once you have your eating and exercise down and you have lost some weight,
then start weighing daily and see how your weight changes from day to day
and change what you feel like isn’t working. Get to know your body and how
it works. Weighing daily will help you get to know your body and your
metabolism. For example- I know that if I don’t eat anything after 7pm and I
exercise and lift weights, I will weigh between 1.5 and 2 lbs. less when I
wake up then I did when I went to bed, that is just how my body works.
Losing weight is all about you and your body. This is why diet pills and fad
diets are useless; they try to tell you that you can lose “x” amount of
weight in “x” amount of time by doing “x”, which is impossible because
everyone’s body is different.
Use your weight loss journey to get to know yourself and your body. Try to
get to know the way you think and the reasons behind what you do, and then
you can work on changing them. You have to know how your body works and how
your body reacts to truly be successful with weight loss.
Never give up and always get back on track. How are you going to get where
you’re going if you’re not on the track that takes you there?
