The New Year is just around the corner and you’ve probably got a few resolutions on your mind. If weight loss or getting fit is on your agenda this year, here are some tips to get it done and never have it on the to-do list again. (You can apply these to other goals as well)
1. Set “active goals”
Goals often fall to the wayside because they are either to vague or way too narrow. Some bad examples: I want to lose weight. or the obverse, I want to lose 20 pounds by Valentines day. Try instead to set goals based solely on your actions. ie I am going to eat less and move more, sticking to calorie budget of x for 3 months. The point of this is to lay out actions you can follow, but not a specific set of results. Because we can’t control how fast our body lets go of fat and it’s easy to get frustrated and give up hope if we are not seeing the results we expected. But if you put in the work the results will come.
2. Outline the plan – own the budget
If you are training for a race, you need a schedule of miles to run. If you are trying to lose weight, you need a calorie budget to stick to. Within the next week, I will have a free budget calculator integrated into the site so you can figure out just how much your body needs to maintain its current weight or lose. But once you have that number, decide to stick to it. Chart your food intake everyday to stay under the budgets allowance. If you need more, go out an earn it. Go for a walk, do zumba, hit the elliptical or whatever floats your boat.
3. Take the no quit pledge and close the escape hatches
Quit being a quitter. Even on the little stuff. I was chronically promising to go to the gym for an hour, but leaving at 45 minutes. It was only a little bit early, but it set up a habit of taking the easy way out and giving myself excuses. I really had to learn to do what I said I was going to do. If I said i was going a mile, I would crawl those last few feet if I had to. It seems like such a small little thing, but what you are really doing is building self esteem and trust in yourself that you can do hard things and succeed at whatever you choose. This helps with the next step.
4. Shutting up the voice in the back of your head.
One of the biggest obstacles that kept me from succeeding, was me. More specifically that little voice in the back of my head that said “You suck” “The weight will come back, it always does”. This parade of negativity ran 24/7 through my mind. I could believe in myself. You’ve got to kill off the little voice. Early on, I would just sing over it. It’s hard to think bad thought when you are belting out Kelly Clarkson. But little by little, as I lived up to my commitments: following my daily calorie budget, staying at the gym the whole time I said I would (even though I really wanted to go home), I found that it became easier. I would tell myself “You’re awesome. You can do this. You never give up” and though for weeks I would just offer myself sarcastic eyerolls in response, soon I found it to be the gospel truth.
5. Pick the nuts out of the peanut gallery
Chances are, you have been on this ride before. I know over the course of my life I have lost hundreds of pounds and gained that and about 20%more back. And all my friends and family have watched me do it. I found some of my loved ones were really supportive, but even some of my closest family was skeptical that this time, the weight would stay off. Just like you did with you own little voice, tune them out. They can’t see inside you, where the bigger changes are taking place. They see you pants size decreasing, but they can’t see the confidence you building in your own head as you learn to finish and follow through. In time, they will come to believe but you don’t need them to. All you need is the secure knowledge that you never quit, never give up, and you will do whatever it takes to reach your goals.
6. Become a collector of finishers medals
When I ran my first race (after 30 years of not being able to run to the mailbox) I got a finishers medal. It was a tangible bit of evidence that I could look at and prove to myself and the world that I had done something that I once thought was impossible. You don’t have to run a marathon to get your own. Finish something everyday and make your own. It can be real things or imaginary. The look on your spouses face when you make a dinner that’s not poisonous for the first time. That degree on the wall after going back to college on weekends. Build up a mountain of finishes to stand on. Something to give you the height to look over the walls we build around ourselves telling us that we can’t. We absolutely can.
I learned these things and more, which are all chronicled in the book, Finished being Fat. As a reader you can count on being entertained for a few hours, but hopefully you’ll walk away with more than sore abs from giggling. Maybe, you can leave the pages with a new outlook on life and become a member of the “Fat Pack” and follow the Philosophy of Finishing.
“Not everyone can win the race, but everyone can finish it.”
