For adults, losing ten pounds of unwanted fat may be difficult, but it is not as life changing as losing 30 or more pounds and trying to adjust to the new body. Most people can lose weight using one of the thousands of diets readily available, but then they must quickly try to figure out how to live a totally new lifestyle. This traditional weight loss technique is backward. Turn it around and walk the weight loss journey like the goal has already been reached.
Any diet requires a drastic change to the lifestyle that caused the initial weight gain and allows for its maintenance. Choosing to make major lifestyle changes in order to lose a significant amount of weight requires some very powerful motivation. That very motivation will usually be a hindrance at the halfway point, however, because some of the original negatives will have disappeared by then.
Lifelong Motivation
The skill of projecting that original motivation to the new body that will be achieved when the desired weight is reached is the key to ensuring that those motivating emotions last all the way to the goal and beyond. This also creates the habit of using weight management techniques rather than short term diet ideas.
Here are some examples of weight loss vs. weight management motivation:
- Weight Loss - "I want to lose 30 pounds of baby fat to be able to keep up with the my baby who is now a preschooler."
- Weight Management - "I want to feel great wearing the cutest clothes dropping off and picking up the kids, and I want to have enough energy to learn 5th grade math all over again when I need to."
Being able to keep up with the kids when not carrying around three ten pound sacks of potatoes with every step is a worthwhile beginning motivation. But, what will that mean, and how will that feel when those pounds are gone?
- Weight Loss - "I want to lose 40 pounds to get off blood pressure medication and get healthy."
- Weight management - "It will be so fun to participate in the new bike club that treks through a different country trail once a month, and I will love having the energy to enjoy the ride and the challenge."
Again, getting off the medication is the initial motivation, but what then? What will be different about daily life when those medications are gone, right along with the weight?
Weight Loss vs. Weight Management
Since most fad diets cause such quick weight loss with drastic changes to food intake and exercise, real adaptation to a healthy new body and food attitude is rarely reached. At a minimum, the same amount of time spent gaining and maintaining the unwanted pounds should at least be spent losing that weight and maintaining the new physique before success is declared.
Again, walk the weight loss journey like the goal has already been reached by asking these types of questions:
- How will my choices in clothing change when I'm living in this lighter, more fit body?
- How will my clothing lay on my body?
- How will I feel while climbing a flight of stairs?
- What will I do with my kids/spouse/pet that I can't do or don't feel comfortable doing now?
- How will I feel walking into a room full of people that I don't know?
Remember to keep the questions and answers positive. Lack of a negative is not a motivation. For instance, saying something like, "I can't wait for my legs to stop rubbing together when I walk." should be changed to "It will be great when I am walking, and there is a space between my tighter, more fit thighs." This fundamental shift in thoughts will bring about the same shift in behavior if you keep applying it.
If a short term motivation is required to stay on track, then use it, but don't loose site of the long term changes being made. Remember to walk the weight loss journey like the goal has already been reached, and the "fake it 'till you make it" idea just might stick.
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