Posts tagged "lose weight"

Water For Weight Loss, Emotional Eating Turned To Healthy Hydration (Rejoice If You Have An Adequate Water Supply)

WATER FOR WEIGHT LOSS, EMOTIONAL EATING TURNED TO HEALTHY HYDRATION (REJOICE IF YOU HAVE AN ADEQUATE WATER SUPPLY) (ISSUE 61)

By Diane Gold

Everyone knows that water is great for weight loss. And this would be helpful because there is so much emotional eating going on. Why? It helps hydrate our skin, our membranes, our very cells so that we can get the food (oxygen) to the blood effectively and the nutrients we ingest to absorb into our intestines. And it curbs food cravings.

Water ShortageDid you know that a huge amount of our world population does not have enough water or has to walk to get it? According to Kathleen Parker’s article, quoting Charles Fishman’s The Big Thirst (on my pending reading list), we, Westerners, use 18.5 gallons a day flushing our toilets while there is only 1/100th of 2.5 percent fresh water on the planet or, if the oceans were broken down into mass, 2.5% of the Earth’s mass. Not a lot.

So, the first thing to do is to hail the Universe if you have enough water to drink and to consider being frugal with it so that we can make money with it and fund sending workers to third-world countries to create water infrastructures so that everyone can live more easily with water.

Next thing we need to do is to consider this simple concept: drinking 2 cups of water before every meal has been clinically proven to reduce calorie intake by 75-90 calories per meal and to increase actual weight loss by 33 or so %, according to Brenda Davy’s study in the clinical trial reported to the 240th Meeting of the American Chemical Society (August, 2010) by Davy of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA.

PRELUDE TO HABIT

Food CravingsLet’s look at what happens when we start to feel the twinges of hunger. These urges might be immediately after eating, 10 minutes after eating, an hour after, 3 hours apart or more. The amount of time between cravings is a non-judgmental number. The craving begins as an itch, which shows up when it shows up. If we don’t judge ourselves, we won’t be judged! Its intensity determines the level of self-control we need to master it.

Of course, different proteins (histamines and newly found proteins) cause the nerve fibers that control itching (apparently, there are itch grids on our skin where these fibers connect) to be stimulated. But, I was speaking about itching as an analogous to cravings. As we sometimes, automatically scratch, often times, we automatically eat to satisfy our hunger.

ACTION STEPS: THE ANSWER

As soon as we feel that twinge of hunger, we have to continue to notice it exists so that there are fewer and fewer times we are already eating food before we realize we have had a craving.

Once we start to notice the urge, it will be easier and easier to pick it out of our urge line-up. We won’t push it away, thinking it will go away as we quietly walk to the kitchen. We will acknowledge and embrace it.

1) And go get water, 16 oz. worth.

2) Drink it (2 cups of 8 oz. each) at a gentle speed. If we slow the process down, we can maximize the effect the drinking process will have on our appetite.

Water In A Glass3) Taste the water as it is going down. Since water has no taste, we will have to be mindful of its subtle flavor, created by the minerals that accompany the water, itself.

4) Take a moment to realize that we can single-handedly change our actions to our food craving, by ourselves, with the power of our minds. The sensation that goes with food can be directed. How is different for everyone, but we can alter our actions. By the act of noticing, drinking and tasting!

Happiness

 

5) Take a moment to jump up and down with happiness that we can be instrumental in changing our hormones so that they work for our health, not to put us in a position of weakness.

 

EPILOGUE AND FUTURE CRAVINGS

SneakAfter we begin, it will be get much easier for us to recognize and acknowledge it when we have a food urge. Whereas before, we might have felt we had to sneak to eat, we will no longer have to sneak, since our first line of food defense can be healthy, wonderful water. Whereas before, we might have felt guilty for eating mindlessly, we can feel pride because we are eating as part of a technique.

We can take a giant step toward hydrating our body, being the master of our urges and setting our bodies up to lose weight, in the process.

CONCLUSION

Noticing Food CravingsThe act of making change takes time and effort. That includes water for weight loss. The biggest effort is in training the mind (changing a habit) that when we have a food craving, we need to embrace it. We need to drink 16 oz. of water, slowly. This is great in theory, but…

What if we consistently find ourselves eating before we remember to drink?

We will work to remember the next time and be twice as grateful for the opportunity.

What happens if it’s not possible for us to drink 2 cups of water at one time right from the start?
We can drink what we can drink. The more we drink, the more we will be able to drink more. The more food cravings turn away from emotional eating and towards drinking water before eating, the happier and more self-confidence we will be. The more weight loss becomes our personal reality, the more we will become iron-clad believers.

What if we don’t have a supply of water to our home?

We can walk to get it and get happy exercise along the way.

Abundant WaterFor those of us in the United States and some other countries, we can be extra thankful that we do have water readily available. 2/3 of world families do not (National Geographic Society Geography Awareness Week, 2010). They have to walk to get their water; they have to transport it on shoulders, backs or holding buckets.

No need to feel bad that we have it; let’s use the water that is right in front of us: for weight loss, for hydration, for detoxification, for balance. And let’s be thankful for every sip.

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DIANE GOLD, AUTHOR

Diane Gold, Founder of Warriors of Weight, Moms For Healthy Daughters, is a mentor in tai chi, kung fu and meditation, a music, fitness and stress expert and a dedicated mom.
She feels fortunate for having grown up with an adequate water supply. She says,

“Feeling a food craving is something we’ve felt from childhood, since we have to eat to sustain. Emotional eating shows up after that. What’s new for us now is that we have the ability to change what we do with those cravings.

“We can tell ourselves to take an action. We can adjust the command we give ourselves. Even if it is as small as immediately taking a sip or two glasses of water. Any 1 step is monumental toward changing a habit. When we take a first step, as when we are babies, it is foreign, scary, difficult. Step 2, as Jaren, 1 of the big connections in my life used to say, may be scarier because we know what lies ahead.

“Step 3 and beyond are more and more familiar and possible to achieve with less difficulty. We are swaying our emotional eating into healthy drinking, 1 step at a time. This is how we change an ineffective habit to 1 that is beneficial to us.

“We have learned determination in life and in satisfying our food cravings. We are able since we have made to here. Now, we have to begin.”
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Dedicated to the memory of Gertrude Gold, whose birthday would have been January 16. Once retired from entrepreneurship, she supported theater, music and arts, many international causes, worked at Planned Parenthood, typed Braille books for the Library of Congress. Mostly she was the great family giver who taught me always to stand up for myself and forgive. Miss you, Ma.

Why Green Tea Can Help With Teen Weight Loss And What’s In It

WHY GREEN TEA CAN HELP WITH TEEN WEIGHT LOSS & WHAT’S IN IT! (ISSUE 50)

By Diane Gold

All teen groups have social rituals where they meet at the park, outside the school, on the street corner, in detention, at the local food mart, at after school music and art, sometimes, even in their homes. This custom is for the purpose of gathering and unwinding from their prescribed day at school.

Likewise, every adult society has some type of gathering ritual where the group comes together to sip some sort  of tea or break bread.

 

 

Tea Time By Cherie Bender

Whether we are speaking of the sacred healing rituals of South America, the tea ceremonies of Asia, tea time in England and her former colonies or the relaxing meeting among friends at the local restaurant in America; having tea as a group is a common activity.
What if we could apply the socialization part of the tea ceremony with the gathering habit of teens who want to lose weight? What if the next fad were sitting down to have a tea moment?

WHAT HAPPENS FROM DRINKING GREEN TEA

•    we take time to sit down and stop the mind’s race.
•    we focus on the moment, rather than on past or future events.
•    we have a drink that is pleasant to taste and smell.
•    we supply our body with healthy antioxidants.
•    we can promote weight loss.*

*WHAT’S IN GREEN TEA

•    Catecholamine, or catechin, a polyphenol in many teas, can increase metabolism, which helps with weight loss. There is research considering whether high polyphenols disrupt mineral absorption or vegetarian sources of iron.
•    Catechin absorbs and blocks bad cholesterol.
•    Antioxidant properties in green tea protect the body from free radicals. According to Green Tea Lovers, a cup of green tea has higher antioxidants than a serving of broccoli, spinach, carrots or strawberries.

Teens At Tea Table•    Caffeine in tea speeds the metabolism. Theanine, another antioxidant present, has a relaxing effect on the body, which counteracts the caffeine. Therefore, the stimulant effect of caffeine is mild or not noticeable to most, yet, it increases metabolism, which is great for weight loss.
•    CCK, or cholecystokinin, a peptide hormone, that, along with aiding in digestion, tells the body the brain that the body has had enough food. Therefore, it suppresses appetite.


 

THE BENEFITS OF TEA DRINKING ALONE, NOT IN A GROUP

Very often, teens who are struggling with weight issues are also not part of a social group. They may like to keep to themselves, may not like the idea of other people’s comments or may not want to put themselves in a position to be around food.

Alone can be wonderful, as long as we look at it that way.  So, here’s the great news about tea drinking.

•    It is a fantastic opportunity to smile with ourselves.
•    It is quick to, easy, fun prepare.
•    It is tasty.
•    It is not the least bit fattening.
•    The experience of making it and drinking it is meditative.
•    It builds focus and increases metabolism. The focus makes us feel great. The enhanced metabolism makes us feel like moving and becoming active.
•    It is expressive, as we begin to choose a favorite tea.
•    The process is invigorating, stress-relieving and is enacted by all socioeconomic levels.
•    Most importantly, the idea of drinking tea builds a sense of pride in being part of this meaningful ritual, that is healthy and reduces appetite. This may be the very reason tea rituals continue to be as popular now as they always were.

Green TeaCONCLUSION

Taking time out to have tea can be a great way to start building a positive attitude in a teen who is working on her body weight. The very nature of the tea ritual is to slow down the process of drinking. The very reason for this has to do with the spiritual element to tea drinking, that of contemplating the current moment. The act of drinking tea correlates perfect with the zen tradition, also noted as the yin/yang theory of being in the present, not thinking about what just happened and no thinking about what is about to happen, but being contented in the here and now. Very satisfying!

Teen Tea DrinkingACTION STEPS FOR TEENS

Here are some action steps to begin this relationship with drinking tea.

PUBLISHER’S NOTE: For those who cannot or don’t choose to take caffeinated tea, herbal tea is a great substitute in place of green tea. The properties are different. However, the drinking of the herbal tea, itself, suppresses appetite. And the herbs used in teas have a whole other set of benefits.

1)    After school, set aside 10-15 minutes when you get home (before or after dinner), when you will sit and have tea. If you are in an after-school program, ask the room teacher if tea drinking is allowed in class. You might get the whole class interested. If you are at work, find another time to do the same ritual.
2)    Keep a journal that mentions how you feel about the whole drinking tea process.
3)    Plan this tea time as quiet time for yourself.  Once you are comfortable with the process, you can invite another person in, or not. Come to terms with how upset you will get at criticism
4)    Continue drinking tea as a ceremony/celebration for at least 7 days.
5)    At the end of 7 days, choose whether or not to continue for another 7 days.
6)    Email us at 1 [at] warriorsofweight [dot] com for congratulations and support after 14 days.
7)    Send us a photo of your tea drinking that we can post, and ENJOY!

ACTION STEPS FOR MOMS

1)    Show the action steps to your daughter.
2)    If she decides to make her own tea, respect her space.
3)    If she does not decide to make her own tea, clear the table yourself in preparation.
4)    Ask your daughter to help you make tea.
5)    If this works, drink tea in a quiet atmosphere with no pressure from you to ask about your daughter’s day, life, feelings, weight. Make this time exceptional.
6)    If your daughter says no, ask her if she would make tea for you.
7)    Be gracious and accepting of the tea with no criticism.
8)    Offer for her to sit down with you. If this doesn’t work, just emulate the action steps for daughters and enjoy drinking tea.
9)    Repeat the process so your daughter sees that it is not just a 1-day activity.
10)  Ask her to join you, from time to time.
11)   Enjoy the tea drinking.

WarriorsofWeight Consulting
Click the image below for a helping hand.

If you need a hand, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Help is right here at https://warriorsofweight.com/2012/07/warriorsofweight-consulting .

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DIANE GOLD, AUTHOR

Diane Gold, Founder of Warriors of Weight, Moms For Healthy Daughters, is a mentor in tai chi, kung fu and meditation, a music, fitness and stress expert and a dedicated mom.
She always looks for old traditions that apply to modern day situations. Diane says,

“The art of tea preparation and drinking could be the very custom that is missing from our busy lives. Think of all the stress it would relieve if it were part of everyone’s day. As it is, people are so stressed out, they ritually drink alcohol, teens and adults. What if we standardly drank tea? I am absolutely adding it to my day. And you?”

For help, check out 1-Step Consulting.

The O Word And How Education Develops Sensitivity In Speaking About Weight Issues

THE O WORD AND HOW EDUCATION DEVELOPS SENSITIVITY IN SPEAKING ABOUT WEIGHT ISSUES (Issues 16)

by Diane Gold

This article is written about the concept of extra weight and obesity in hopes that we will consider kindness and education for health and for to be kind, not because of what’s in it for us, other than wisdom (unless we value having it), but because of what we can give if we have a greater understanding.

But, wait. We can use our selfish nature to benefit ourselves, if we only think back to that one embarrassing moment when it all fell apart. Let’s think about the time we had a bathroom accident during the school assembly and our thoughtless classmate sitting next to us yelled out loud and exposed us to the whole auditorium or if we think about the time someone in our family passed away and the kids down the road laughed about it and said they were glad the person died because she was ugly or, when I was young, there was only one girl in the whole elementary school whose parents were getting a divorce. Everyone was talking about her because we were unfamiliar with the concept, thus we were ignorant. Now, divorce is as common as marriage, so its stigma has gone away. But, in the 60s, divorce had a stigma and my classmate was ostracized with whispering, gossip and pointing. No one was thinking about this girl’s loss of the privilege of living with both her parents under one roof.

STATISTICS AND MEASUREMENT

Girl Pinching FatOne way we measure our weight is by using the Body Mass Index. A great way to measure what this index defines is to feel whether or not we can pinch much excess skin around our body.  If we can, we are probably carrying extra weight (which scientists have deemed is unhealthy for our organs, our body systems and emotionally), and we have just used a less clinical, simpler method of defining whether our body mass index is high. There are suggestions below as to what to do should we find this in ourselves. The result of this index is what people usually see when they look our way.

Technically, Body Mass Index is a measure of the body’s weight in relation to the body’s height. Overweight refers to people with a Body Mass Index between 25 and 30, 20% or more above one’s ideal weight. The O word refers to people with a Body Mass Index over 30. There is a BMI calculator at our main website  homepage on the right hand. It may be helpful for our goals. And it’s free to use.

According to the 2012 update of the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association, around 1 in 3 kids between 2 and 19 carry too much weight, 1 in 6 having a body mass over 30. Compared to comparisons from 1973-4, the 2012 figures are 5 times higher. Why have we in the United States increased our weight? Is it abundant life style? Is it food scarcity where we are forced to eat the wrong foods? Is it the thought of scarcity? Is it our consumption-driven society, where we care more about selling product that teaching the correct paradigm for healthy eating? Is it that the stigma of having extra weight has skyrocketed? This seems to be the case, and due to the growth in this population, we notice more people who distinctly buy larger sizes and more advertising to address these consumers. There is a small group of 1 in 12-15,000 kids born with Prader-Willi Syndrome, a disorder of chromosome 15, which presents as insatiable hunger for life, but this condition does not apply to most people with more weight.

PREJUDICE

Both those who are large and those who are thin seem to show prejudice toward those who are large. This may come from lack of education and lack of sensitivity, fear of a situation not fully understood and self-deprecation. In 2012, we in the United States are legally protected against race/ethnicity, color, national origin, sex, disability, veteran status, or age prejudice at work and at school. (This does not stop the sadness from bullying when people violate this code and the victim does nothing, as happens most of the time.)

Although we know it’s not “nice” to reject people because of their looks, we are human and have reactions. Usually, we no longer call people with developmental challenges anything but developmentally challenged. Usually, we no longer call little people anything else.  Usually, we, in the United States, no longer call African-Americans, colored. So why are we still using words not based on human kindness for people who have more to love (MTL) in the O word category?

According to Richard Conniff, a writer for Men’s Health Magazine,

“prejudice comes from ignorance, and learning about [this] problem may be the only way to solve it in our society and ourselves.”

EDUCATION AND ACTION STEPS

In order to educate others, we must understand ourselves. If we take a small amount of time, we may find some enjoyment in the knowledge that will come from the following mental workouts. Here are some action steps that may help us to understand external prejudice, prejudice toward ourselves, personal options, group options, educating others, helping others and ourselves.

1.    Take the time to understand why our bodies gain weight, meaning where does the craving that drives us to eat come from. Is it a lack of a particular hormone such as leptin, one of the proteins that helps regulate when we stop feeling hungry? Or are we sad because of a particularly recent loss? Or are we doing no physical movement but eating more than we were because we are not moving and have nothing else to do?

2.    Take the time to consider why we would have an unkind reaction to someone with extra weight (even if we, ourselves, are more than our ideal weight). How kind are we in other areas of our life? Are we being understanding in all things or do we have some prejudice of our own to reduce and remove?

3.    Take the time to study our own bodies and how we feel about food and with food. Through deeper understanding, we can make more informed decisions about how we want to live and how we want to proceed.

4.    Take the time to discover whether we have made a personal choice to be large or whether our biology needs monitoring and whether we are happy with and proud of our weight and why. This is a truthful meditation we can do with ourselves, with a coach or with a network of people doing the same thing.

5.    Take the time to learn about eating well and evaluate whether we need more education or assistance. There is always more to learn. And there are always people to help.

6.    Take the time to consider seeing a food advocate or joining a support network to help implement the actions we choose to take, for ourselves or to help others by sharing our discoveries.

UNDERSTANDING

OstrichCraving food is like any other urge. It is physiological, (1) sometimes set off by emotions which activate chemicals and (2) sometimes set off by chemicals which trigger emotions and reactions. We must become educated and sensitive to our situation, instead of taking the ostrich approach. What I mean is that we can feel great about ourselves with a little book knowledge and a little self-love. Knowledge truly gives us the power we need not to bury our heads in our pillow in hopelessness the same way as the ostrich in this graphic is burying his head in the sand. There is a prejudice about the ostrich from which this image comes. He does not bury his head in the sand. The male ostrich digs such a deep hole for the protection of the ostrich eggs [5-6 feet] that it looks as if his head is buried in the sand. It is not. To avoid making judgments without full awareness, we need to educate ourselves.

 

CONCLUSION

Clinically, there is no issue with the word obesity. Scientists, who look after the truth, do not judge the condition in research and don’t point fingers. They only study their subject. It is we non-professionals, even if we know about the burden of extra weight, first-hand, who put a social value on it, through lack of education or through irrational (as all emotions are) emotional reaction.

It is said that calling an extra weight person a name is the last socially acceptable form of prejudice. When we are kids, we claw up the pole of life and hurt those in our path, until we gain understanding and nurture compassion. As adults, we usually don’t tease each other for having cancer, for losing a limb, for having ADD or for being a different color. The operative word is usually. Yet, the trend of tolerance and sensitivity has yet to reach people who judge the community of around 75 million people whose BMI is over 30, and the derogatory words of the last century are still being used with ignorance.

It would seem that the current generation is more compassionate than the last four as it is more exposed to technological speed and fresh and uncensored truth, there are multi-national cultures in all major areas in the United States and it is clawing up a new ladder to adulthood where its generation members typically have a network of 1000 international friends as part of their every day life.

So, tolerance for difference is built in. It is up to all of us, especially the moms and the older generations, though, to take a look at our own humanity, acknowledge our own prejudices, make an effort to dump them in the corner garbage can or, at least, put them in the closet in front of our children until we can delete or temper them, educate ourselves and then go out and educate others as to what we have discovered about body weight and what we have learned about being sensitive to our fellow humans.

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DIANE GOLD, AUTHOR

Diane Gold, Founder of Warriors of Weight, Moms For Healthy Daughters, is a mentor in tai chi, kung fu, fitness and meditation, a music and stress expert and a dedicated mom. She believes that doing slow, consistent physical work will build foundation of the mind that will maximize our happiness and health, even in the most difficult of times. She says, “As we are coming and going in our daily activities in life, we might as well exercise during the times we are transporting ourselves.”

I Don’t Have Time For Weight Loss: 7 Steps To Get It!

I DON’T HAVE TIME FOR WEIGHT LOSS: 7 STEPS TO GET IT! (Issue 14)

by Diane Gold

No TimeIn the past weeks, I have been hearing over and over again how people don’t have the time in their busy lives to work on their weight. I am going to talk about weight loss, but the same applies to weight gain of any kind. It also applies to many of life’s weights such as feeling sad, angry, bullied, alone or misunderstood.

Two weeks ago, I had a plumbing issue in my house. I became defocused because of it. I was fairly consumed about the hygiene of my house and whether the issue could be affordably resolved. Of course, I had to move rugs and furniture, clean floors multiple times and make multiple arrangements with plumbers. What I didn’t have to do was to choose to allow this issue to live in my head when I was not moving rugs, cleaning floors and talking to plumbers.

Part of what snapped me out of the plumbing crisis was the fact that my daughter, who lives near her vet medicine school, came down with the food-transmitted, week-long version of salmonella (intestinal bacteria) which included hospitalization. Thankfully, she is OK, and the plumbing pipes are fixed but too old to last long.

My systematic approach to time and creation management is in place most of the time. As we say in the martial world, we show our true selves in adversity, how balanced and prepared we are or are not.

I realized how fortunate I am that I follow my own program most of the 365 days a year for most years. It has brought me to want to share these seven steps that give us time for weight loss.

Waking Up1)    GRATITUDE. The most important part of the day occurs as it begins. We get a chance to rejoice, to jump up and down with glee, to fill our hearts with warm happiness. Why? Because we awoke and have another shot at growing, creating something great, helping someone out and getting help ourselves.

This might sound like hype, but the alternative would be that we didn’t get the chance to get up and go. So, yeah, be happy about it. When we are happy, our focus is better and so is the way we use our time. This should take 5 seconds.
2)    SELF-RECOGNITION. Now that we have awakened, we can take 10 seconds to stretch and recognize how lucky everyone else is that we have arrived in the conscious world and are here to do something brilliant and creative, help someone or call on someone. It is our job to be productive, so we might as well recognize ourselves for it. When we root ourselves through self-recognition, our actions become streamlined and time economical.

3)    POWER WAKE UP (aka meditation or chi wake up). Once we stand up (or sit up in our wheel chair or sit up in bed if that’s how it is), let’s feel the power of our body. Let’s take 30 seconds just to stand (or sit or lie) and feel our blood supply coursing through our veins. This action will wake us, allow us to pump up without anything more. We get emotional power from physical power. Powering up daily will increase and sustain our power. When we feel powerful, we act at peak performance. When we are at our peak, we treat time as the preciously valuable dimension that it is.

4)    CHEERLEADING. As we are doing our morning routine, we should take 15 seconds to pick out our goal for the day. It could be to wash two loads of laundry, take the first step to doing our taxes, make 50 phone calls to tell people about our business, call the girl we talked to from last year’s gym class that we promised to call. Whatever it is, those 15 seconds will bring us to laser focused attention. We will commit ourselves to one task (this exercise is in addition to longer term goals, if we have them). This cheering ourselves on will methodically lead us down our path. We can use the cheering behavior for the rest of the day until we have reached our target.

Imagine we are on a treasure hunt, and we know we are close to finding the treasure. The time that we spend in looking for it is so energetic, proficient and precise because we are highly motivated to find the treasure. We are internally cheerleading. This enables decisive time economy and allows us to find more time for weight issues.

5)    REACH OUT TO ONE. No matter what kind of day we are having, no matter how busy we think we are, no matter where in life’s journey we are; we should take one minute out to reach out to someone and say hello. This could be on the bus to work or school, while putting the trash can outside, while going to the mini mart on the way to play volleyball. If we don’t know anyone we can call, if we work or school from home or if we can’t go out and don’t have anyone who lives with us; we can say hello to our neighbor or to the first person we see riding a bicycle near our front door. If no one rides by, we can call the phone company and ask about our bill. If we have an internet connection, we can reach out globally to half the world.

What does this have to do with time management? When we communicate with another person, our perspective modifies itself, often in a positive way. We realize we are an integral part of the world as we know it and that people have something to offer us and vice versa. With this realization, we can become more productive and motivated and can use our time more efficiently.  Then there is more time for weight loss.

Schedule For WarriorsOfWeight.com Women6)    TOP OF THE AGENDA. When we want to do something, we usually schedule it in, right? Think about what happens when we feel like eating a particular food. Funny how we have no problem scheduling that in. Yet, when we want to remove some pounds from our stomach by doing some tai chi or fitness activity that would take less time than it would take to go get the food we craved, we don’t have (make) the time.
Looking from a different angle, when we see that our daughters are having weight issues, we bake a cake. Or we encourage them to make sure to have a big appetite when visiting grandma and grandpa. Or we think we are being generous when we decide to buy our daughters’ clothing when they are four sizes larger than they want to be. What are we thinking? Where’s our agenda then?
By keeping the weight loss goal (or weight gain goal or emotional weight goal) on our calendars, we keep it fresh in our minds. If it’s scheduled in, we have already made the time.  15 seconds.

7)    WRAP UP MEETING. When it is time for bed, let’s have a small 30-second meeting with ourselves. No matter what else is on the agenda, let’s review how we managed with the other six items in this plan. The program takes two minutes, 45 seconds a day. It should bring us one extra minute for each of these seven steps because we get stimulated after we eat good food, see good friends, succeed at creating something great, lose a pound. That totals seven minutes. Subtract two minutes, 45 seconds from seven and get four minutes, 15 seconds.
This meeting gives us more time because it keeps us accountable to ourselves for weight loss. It shows us how easy it is to make time through scheduling, focus and the positive effects of infrastructure. We begin to save time in other areas of our day, which we can add on to weight loss time.

CONCLUSION

When we carry extra weight, it consumes us. We wake up knowing it; we go to school and work knowing it; we go to sleep knowing it. Spending time on the idea of extra weight uses up our time in a way that doesn’t benefit us. When we take an organized approach to our objectives, whatever they are, we have less time to live in our negative, overweight thoughts. We might even have time for an exercise or two from the WarriorsOfWeight.com inbox magazine.

When our lives have so many things pulling at them that we think we are about to break AND we carry extra weight, it is almost too much. Tension from other weight issues often drives us to eat. It also tends to create a funnel-like image in our minds, not unlike a tornado, in which all the problems that ever were and ever will be are floating around above our heads clouding our thoughts.

Extra weight makes us feel bad; not like our looks; shorten our life span and the time we could be with our grandchildren. We choose to have time for ourselves. We choose to have time for our favorite people and food. We don’t find time for people we don’t like just as we think we are in control if we walk away from food we don’t like.

We can start now by picking one of the seven steps to do for a week. Once we complete one of the steps for seven straight days, we should continue to do it for another seven days and, at the same time, add another step.

Every two weeks, we should add another step until, in 13 weeks, we will have time for weight loss and we will have adjusted our minds to lose it.

FEEDBACK

Please leave your comments in the comment section below. Your experience and feedback can be very helpful to others in the community.
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DIANE GOLD, AUTHOR

Diane Gold, Founder of Warriors of Weight, Moms For Healthy Daughters, is a mentor in tai chi, kung fu and meditation, a music and  stress expert and a dedicated mom. She believes that we are the masters of our fate as long as we get the chance to wake up successfully. She says, “If we put half the effort into advocating for ourselves as we do in caring for others, we’d spend lots of time on ourselves.”



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