Keep at it and change your life,  become that new person!

Do I still have to work at staying slim.  Yep.  Sometimes it is easy and sometimes it is hard.  I am still have the same obsessive nature I had 4 years ago but now it is controlled.  I do know that I am never going back to fat. There is no free lunches,  for everything there is a cost.  The cost of me being slim is that somethings have to go.  My things and your things will be different, but rest assured that if you don't figure out what those things are and be willing to let go of them, you are going to continue to be their slave.  A slave to food.  Always be willing to go back to the 5 & 1 quickly if you don't lose a LITTLE excess within a couple of weeks.  If you don't, it will continue to go up and up.  Have a number in your mind that is rock solid that you absolutely can't go above without going on the 5 & 1.  Have a range of weight you want to be at, if you go over then you need to cut back and reign in.  If that becomes an issue you better look at what you might need to take out of your life.  This program is amazing, it works but it is the tool and you are the craftsman.  You will get out of it what you put into it.  If you are wishy washy and go at it half heartedly that is the kind of losses if any you will see.  If you go at it like your life depends on it, because it does,  do it even if in the beginning you don't understand why, you will get amazing results.  The longer you stick with it 100% the stronger you will grow!  The easier the journey becomes.  If in your mind you say, nope, that isn't what I am going to have today, soon the argument doesn't even start but if you begin to argue and you start to give in, then like a spoiled child the argument becomes an everyday thing.  Draw the line in the sand and say no more.  Tell yourself there will be no excuses, there is always a way to not eat off plan,  just don't allow any excuses, even if you have to watch others eat, or be hungry for a while.  Hunger really isn't an emergency.  You can wait.  You are worth the wait.  Well, anyway,  I think I have started to ramble,  I just wanted to mark the occasion of 4 years in.  I do still eat 2-3 MF meals a day and I still have my favorites and they are NORMAL food to me.  Keep going, never give up and point that scale towards skinny!

Generally speaking when people begin a diet program or exercise program they do it for negative reasons.  Meaning they are doing it to correct a problem, such as they feel lousy or they want to lower their blood pressure, or the doctor has gotten on to them about something, maybe something embarrassed them.  These are negative reasons, meaning you are doing them to correct a problem.  These are all good reasons to lose weight but they are generally speaking, emotional reasons.  Once you have lost a little weight or you feel you have corrected your eating issues your motivation is gone.  As soon as the blood pressure begins to go down and you feel some better,  no reason to say no to your favorites any more.  This may have been the reason you started but it is not enough to carry you through a life time of healthy eating.  You were trying to correct a health issue.  Now is the time to change your goals to positive reasons.  I would like you to make a list of where you are right now.  You are going to have to be brutally honest with yourself.  You need to know where you are so that you know where you would like to be.  How is your blood work,  how fit are you, be specific how far up hill could you walk without being winded,  You might need to test yourself, how much do you still crave nutritional pollution,  (high fat, high carb, high sugar foods)  meaning just how much progress have you made in this journey.  What is your BMI,  not just is it within your range of healthy but  is it high or low within range.  Is that a healthy BMI, or is it overweight, obese, or morbidly obese.  Be brutally honest with yourself,  what is your chances of disease.  Are you at risk, high risk, or doomed.  Don't kid yourself people, a LITTLE fat increases your chances.  Once you know where you are, then you can assess where you would like to be.  Make another list of why you would like to be healthy.  What does healthy mean to you?  How much do you want that.  Is health what you want most?  Do you want to be as healthy and free of pain as possible all throughout your days.  Do you want to achieve your optimal health. Your optimal health and my optimal health are two different things,  if you have something that limits you and diet nor exercise will completely correct that doesn't mean you can not still be at the best that you can be.  YOU CAN BE not what I can be.  Get it.  Be the best that you can be.  Control what you can control.  Make no mistake people you can be in control of most, of your health issues.  Bad choices, unhealthy lifestyles lead to most of adult disease.  Not all, but most.  So make your list, be specific, such as I want to weigh. . ., and I want to be able to climb this mountain behind my house and not be winded,  like that,  write down exactly what you want.  Or I want to fit into a certain size or pair of pants, be specific.  Then set a reasonable time to achieve these goals.  Check yourself often, not just to see if your are there but to see if you are progressing!  Once you reach your goal, look at it,  was that goal my best, can I do better, what needs improvement. 

 

With that done,  you know where you are and you know where you want to be.  You have chosen to CREATE health, not to correct a health issue.  You began at a place where you were not healthy and you are working towards a healthy place so you are CREATING health.  You have taken back control.  This is the major separation in our wonderful program and all the rest.  WE are taking control and making the decisions with POSITIVE goals and not negative meaning simply to correct a issue. 

 

Ok now you have your goals and you are cruising along and all of a sudden you are confronted with a major temptation.  Somebody brings in some deep fried ooeey gooey high fructose corn syrup that makes the sweat on your upper lip pop.  Humm you have to make a decision.  In your mind you say,  I sure do love deep fried. . . .  But it is not in line with the goals that I have set,  I would really like to have just a small 12 inch piece of that ooey gooey . . .  Hey! what if I can afford the calories,  oh wait though this isn't about calories IT IS ABOUT MY OPTIMAL HEALTH  humm,  I want the ooey gooey  but I want optimal health,  which do I want more?  Ahhhh  Which is more important to me?  My goal of being my best or ooey gooey that lasts roughing 5 minutes.  Humm.  Now this is where you choose people.  I want you to lay it out to yourselves,  I am choosing instant satisfaction over a lifetime of health.  In order to choose Optimal health we have to start where we are, and make choices that we don't like!  I do not like to sweat like a hog for an hour each morning but I CHOOSE to because I want the results,  I want to LOOK, I am not ashamed of that,  and feel great.  I can only be the best I can be.  I have to work at that, and I have to make the hard decisions.  Sometimes what I want at the moment is in direct conflict with what I want for long term.  How silly and immature would it be to go out partying the night before a big final, that you have to pass to pass a key class.  Pretty stupid, but wait, what if I really wanted to.  It doesn't matter it would still be pretty stupid.  You have to choose.  Choose not once,  not just when you make the list,  not just when you get out of bed each morning, but all day long every day.  Life is full of choices, we make them all day long,  we USED to choose bad and immaturely.  Lets grow up!  Lets make the hard decisions,  lets be our best right where we are right now.  If you weigh 250 lbs, you can't choose to be 150 today, but you can choose to make the decisions that will get you to 150 tomorrow, and that makes you the best today that you can be.   

 

Ok so lets say you didn't do so hot and you chose the ooey gooey.  Now what?  You get out that list,  look it over,  are those the things you really want or was ooey gooey more important.  Think it through,  over think it, ponder on it,  keep your goals in mind,  don't be emotional about it, be intellectual,  it is just a piece of ooey gooey.  You made a bad choice,  now learn from your mistake,  make a plan for the next time,  does this issue get in your way frequently,  make a plan for how to get around it,  educate yourself,  ALWAYS be prepared to pull back, think, analysis, and regroup.  Learning, becoming wiser,  this is a journey,  we are on it for life,  we are making mistakes, scraping our knees but we get up and we continue on toward optimal health!  The key though is to not continue to make the same mistakes over and over!  Make a plan,  address the issue and move forward.  Cut through the bull.  We are really good at handing ourselves a line of bull.  It is simple, it is either moving us towards our goal of optimal health or further away. 

 

Emotional eating.  Sigh.  Most of us have been guilty of this some time in our lives.  What is the answer.  It is simple, not always simple to live with but a simple answer.  Recognize it for what it is,  recognize that food does not heal, cure or change,  it only nurtures your body.  Used for anything thing else and it is a disease causer!  You must stop when you are desiring to eat at a time not normal, or a food not normal, or when you doubt that you could be hungry, and THINK,  center yourself,  take deep breathes, ask yourself what is going on here.  Why do I REALLY feel the way I do.  Give yourself time,  find something to do though,  don't just sit around and think about the food that you don't want to eat.  Clean something, call a friend,  exercise,  go for a walk,  kick the dog but don't just sit there and think about what you DON'T want to eat.  (Don't you dare kick the dog)  Begin right where you are!  To break the chains of emotional eating.  It is one choice at a time.  That is how you CHANGE a habit,  one choice at a time,  one decision to not give in.  Because today is the day,  this is your time,  there is no better time and tomorrow never ever comes. 

 

Ok lets choose today,  right now to be the best that we can be today.  Which means I gotta shut up and go sweat. . .  Ugggg.