Find Your Why!!!

We have all heard statements like these:

“I lost weight on this diet, but I gained it all back.”

“Nothing works, I’ve tried them all.”

I think it’s pretty safe to assume that a large percent of the population has tried to lose weight at one point in their life.   It seems the failure rate is much larger than the success rate when it comes to losing weight.  Why is that? What are we doing wrong?

After many years of letting ourselves go and using every excuse possible to eat whatever we wanted, we had to make some changes before it became too late for us.  My husband’s health is already affected by his weight gain, and it wouldn’t be long until my unhealthy choices would catch up with me.

My perception of myself was that I wasn’t that bad.  I’m rarely sick, and I’m not on any medication.

I’m healthy, right? 

But that statement is not true.   I might be OK right now, but if I don’t take the necessary actions NOW, I would be following in my parent’s footsteps who both struggled with their weight and would be considered morbidly obese.  So as of June 27, 2018,  my husband and I started on our journey to gaining optimal health.

Like everyone else, we have tried several diets over the years.  We even started exercising at one point and saw some pounds drop off.  All these diets and exercising didn’t work out for us because we eventually gave up on that diet/exercise and the weight returned and even increased. To be honest, we were not serious about our health, and we had no motivation to make the necessary changes or put in the hard work to see lasting results. 

So knowing that we tried diets in the past and have failed miserably at them, what is going to be different this time around?

WE HAVE TO CHANGE OUR FOCUS

In the past, our focus was just to lose weight!  Now don’t get me wrong, that is a great goal, but what would happen once we lost the weight?  Would we be like most people who go on a diet with no behavioral change and gain their weight back within two years?  We’ve already been down that road.

We had to change our focus from losing weight to having a healthy lifestyle.  We started asking ourself questions like:

“What would our life be like if we lost a certain amount of weight?”

“What would we be able to do that we couldn’t do now?”

Instead of just focusing on losing weight, we are focusing on what our life could be like after we lost this weight. Once we realized this, we began to dream about our future!

Our Focus is NOW being a healthier US!

What will help us keep our focus on creating a healthier US?

Create a list of the “WHYS.”

Creating a list of the “WHYS” is helping us keep our focus.  When those hard days come, and they will, we can look at our list and remember why we are doing this.

Here are some of our WHYS! 

• We want to live a long life and enjoy our family.
• We want to be able to go outdoors and enjoy activities with our family.
• We want to be able to ride our bikes.
• We want to be off of high blood pressure and diabetes medications.
• We want to enjoy our future grandkids and be able to run around with them and have fun.
• We want to help others reach their goals of having a healthier lifestyle.

These are only a few of our WHYS.  Our list of reasons WHY to get healthier is growing each day!

We have our WHYS now and we are motivated to get this weight off and to start living the new healthier version of us.  To help us lose weight, we reached out to our health coach who got us started on the 5 and 1 eating plan with Optavia.  This plan is designed to help you lose weight fast.  Watching those pounds drop each week motivated us in the beginning.   At week 1, looking ahead to week 12 seem so far away and we questioned ourselves would we even last that long.   Two weeks is the longest we have ever stayed on a diet.  We were not disciplined at all, so lasting 12 weeks seemed daunting.

Fast forward to week 17 and I’m amazed at how we have progressed.  I’m not going to lie; there are days that it has been tough and we want to eat something unhealthy. The cravings are real!  (Check out our latest “Our Health Update” post to see how much we have lost and some before/after pictures.)

WE HAD TO REMEMBER OUR WHYS!!!!

On those days that were tough, we would keep reminding ourselves WHY we are doing this.

The reasons WHY is greater than this temporary state of dieting. 

At the rate we are losing weight we will reach our goal weight in a few more months.  So even though we may get tired of our eating plan and really want to eat whatever, this period that we are in will only last a few months, and the outcome of making healthy choices will last a LIFETIME.

I truly believe that for most people, you need to be purposeful in losing weight.

If you FOCUS on what you are GIVING UP, you WILL LOSE what you could GAIN.

A HEALTHY LONG LIFE

Before you start dieting or running to the gym, sit down, and think of your WHYS.

• Do you want to be around for your kids, grandkids, family?
• Do you want to be pictured with your family?
• Do you want to be off all medications?
• Do you want more energy?

What do YOU want?

Let this list be the driving force behind you losing weight and becoming healthy! Place this list on your bathroom mirror so it is the first thing you look at each morning. Before you get caught up in the busyness of today, remind yourself WHY you want to get HEALTHY!  Also, place this list on your frig and pantry and any other place that would be a temptation for you!

We are still in the midst of our journey and we know that we could easily fall into the trap of gaining all our weight back in the end.  So the struggle remains and is a constant reminder that we need to ALWAYS make sure that our focus is in the right place and not let ANYTHING (our cravings and temptations) try to derail us.