Welcome to Reaching ONEderland with coach Michelle, where I am all about helping you get to 199 and stay there.
Now over this last week, I had actually sent out some emails asking where your struggles were. And you know what a big part of what I saw, what kept coming back to me were two things, emotional eating and motivation.
Motivation is Created With Habits
And I really wanted to dig into this a little bit this morning. Let’s talk about this whole concept of motivation to start with. And how we can actually create our own motivation when it feels like we’re just completely overwhelmed.
Oftentimes we don’t have the motivation to lose weight because we haven’t built in tiny habits into our day. I am a huge one on habits. Which is kind of funny because for 42 years, I absolutely hated habits.
I would watch my husband do all of these things that he did on remote control. And I just didn’t get it, but he got so much done in a day and I was stuck in this never ending loop of trying to catch my tail. You know what I mean?
And when I implemented just teeny tiny habits and made some little tiny changes, I started to see this new picture in front of me. I went from overwhelmed all the time to knowing that there were certain things I was going to get done in a day.
Now, going back 20 years, I actually used to travel this website called FlyLady.net. And it was one of the best things I ever did because as far as my house went, it was all picked up. It was pretty organized and it was 15 minutes to “company ready” as she puts it. Love, love, love FlyLady.Net, because she also talks about morning routines and evening routines.
Healthy is NOT a Dirty Word
And I sort of had those, what they didn’t have and what I hadn’t implemented was healthy habits. So, my house was semi-organized, I had habits, but I didn’t have healthy habits because I thought the word healthy was a dirty word.
I really had no desire for healthy food, for healthy activity, for anything that even remotely resembled the word healthy, because I would actually scoff at the word healthy.
So this last time when I started my weight loss journey, I refused to do the magic wand quick and easy because I knew I could do that. But I also knew that if I lost a hundred pounds in four months going at 25 pounds a month, that I wouldn’t keep it off. There was no way I was going to keep it off because I had done that.
And it just didn’t stay off because I didn’t create anything in my life that was actually supporting that. I was just putting blinders on. I was not eating anything outside of chicken and broccoli basically, or I was actually back then it was the microwave meals.
I would have something microwave for breakfast, something microwave for lunch, and then something microwave completely different than what my family was eating for dinner.
And it was very specific. I had to buy very exact things and I spent a ton of money at the grocery store because you know, those microwave diet meals are not cheap, particularly not when you’re buying three meals a day, for seven days a week.
So yeah, I had like, uber control, I was eating exactly 1200 calories a day. I did not waver from that. And yeah, the weight came off because if you cut your calories back, the weight is eventually gonna come off, but to do this life sucking, eventual nature of losing the weight like that, it took a Herculean effort to get there.
Weight Loss That Takes Herculean Effort Is NOT Maintainable
It wasn’t maintainable because you know, I’m not going to go a lifetime without pizza, and I’m not going to go a lifetime without smothered burritos. And if I just returned to my normal week after that four months it was going to come back.
This whole concept of going from, either putting the blinders on and going full steam ahead or eating whatever you want whenever you want to it or building and motivation. How do these pieces work together to give you something that is not only maintainable at the end, but also something that you can live with forever?
Because the last time I lost weight, I had to find something that would stay forever because I looked at my husband and said, you know, honey, I’ve to get rid of this weight, or I’m not going to be around when Alex graduates high school.
I woke up on the morning of my 40th birthday and proceeded to fall flat on my face because I had vertigo so bad. It turned out I had Aspartame poisoning and it was just, you know, my health was declining.
I was dizzy all the time.
And, I was miserable all the time.
I hurt all the time.
And I had to get out of this spot.
I wanted to be around for that first grandchild. Just like that I wanted to be around for that I want to be around when the youngest who is right now, 14 has his first child. It’s Important and I want to be there for those life events.
I was not headed in that direction.
I wasn’t gonna make it to the point where my oldest graduated from high school at that point.
How to Make Change Forever?
I built in motivation by changing small things over time and creating habits. That’s what the women in the ONEder Sisters inner circle are doing also.
Now, does this mean that the overwhelm goes poof?
No, because building habits is not a put the blinders on only do this and do it perfectly. And it’s not staying perfectly on track and losing weight.
Building habits is learning how to create a lifestyle that works for you.
The byproduct of these new little wonderful gems that you’re creating is motivation because you’re actually building in automatic in your day.
Like right now, it’s, 6:00 AM. I have already worked out. I am already stretched. I am sitting here talking to you guys. And my actual day doesn’t start for work for 50 minutes. So I built in the motivation to wake up a little earlier every day and add in movement to my morning so I’m doing the movement before my brain knows what I’m doing,
Which is kind of funny because I actually really enjoy those moments.
Now they are my “me time’, but was it always like that?
No!
I was the kid that skipped P E all the way through middle school and high school. I was a straight A student that had an F in PE because I did not want to change clothes in the locker room because I was mortified and embarrassed.
And, you know, back in the eighties, when I was in middle school and high school, you had to change clothes for PE every single day.
And the kids teased me and I had no desire to change my clothes in the bathroom. So I was the kid that absolutely hated anything that had to do with fitness, but I learned that there are things that I truly enjoy doing.
Find the Movement You Love
It just took me 42 years to find them. So if you’re sitting there thinking there is no way on God’s green earth, I am getting up and I am doing any kind of movement that early in the morning.
Let me tell you, I was sitting in your seat, about nine years ago.
What you can do is use habits to reach your movement goal.
You can use habits for nutrition.
You can use habits for emotional eating, which was the other piece that you guys had.
And I know this works because I was an emotional eater, huge, huge, huge.
Did it resolve every emotion I have? No, but what I did was I broke the habit of emotional eating by using a different habit.
So when I say you can use habits for creating a new weight loss outcome that stays with you forever.
I’m saying that I used habits to get me to the point where I could start addressing some of the mindset issues I had. This included emotional eating, and talking horribly nasty to myself.
Do I always like what I see in the mirror right now?
No, but I also know that I am 300% further along now than I was when I started this journey eight years ago. So I want you guys to know that it is totally possible to create your own motivation, to stop emotional eating, using habits.
All of these things are possible when you decide to take bite off smaller chunks of the elephant, instead of trying to eat the elephant all at once
This is the reason why I always sign off with:
“You can do anything for five minutes. And it’s the small consistent steps that you take daily that will get you there.”
Because if we are trying to do and change everything all at once the journey doesn’t become a lifestyle and then we have no motivation.
And then that lack of motivation causes us to go eat.
And then we start hating on ourselves because we expect perfection all the time.
And it just becomes this great, big, huge, horrible feeling that we walk around with and it feels like Reaching ONEderland, can’t be done. But by using habits that are teeny tiny, so that we stop kicking ourselves so that we can actually reach that goal.
And on that note, I am going to send you off with Love & hugs. And that little reminder that you can do anything for five minutes. And it’s the small, consistent steps you take daily that will get you to your goal. And make those steps small ladies, make them small. All right. Have an amazing day.
