How do you want to look/feel this Summer?

21st March 2017

Every time you say "sod it, I don't care" and eat that huge bar of chocolate or big back of crisps, there's a 100% chance you'll care later!

We're now in week 12 of the year, spring has sprung, summer is roughly 12 weeks away, now really is the time to start caring now and stop thinking sod it!  

12 weeks to make a difference remember! 4 weeks for you to notice, 8 weeks for friends and family and 12 weeks for the rest of the world.  It only takes 1 day to decide you're worth it and start.

As my journal says at the start, are you ready to turn can't into can and dreams into plans?  See the thing about motivation is it needs continually topping up, so you may have woken up yesterday all fired up, it was Monday after all - everyone can stay on plan on a Monday!  But then by Wednesday when the mid-week slump hits, well you may find yourself having a wobble, then Friday hits and someone yells "takeway?"  Before you know it you're waking up and it's Monday morning again and you've had a "sod it, I don't care" weekend and now you feel dreadful because you really want to look great this summer, you want to feel good too, you want to be able to take off your cardigan and not stress about those arms or that stomach like you have been doing for the last month or so! 

Okay, how do you keep your motivation up?  Well to start with you get your end goal clear in your head, what do you want to achieve, more importantly ask yourself why.

Motivation is great but it's like bathing it needs to be done daily, which is why habit forming is far more function, work on building habits becuse they become automatic unlike willpower which is always a limited resource.  Small habits, like drinking water, have a water bottle to carry round with you all day, you carry a phone round all day, why not a water bottle.  My morning pint of water is now a firm fixed in habit, it's one of the first things I do, to show how easy it is to get into a habit, I've only had those wax warmers a couple of weeks but automatically I'm going downstairs when I wake up and turning them on first thing, it's already become a habit - possibly becuase the outcome is a pleasant one.  Maybe we need to constantly remind ourselves that if we keep our motivation up, make changes, get new habits the outcome will also be a pleasant one!

No pain - no gain!  I'm not talking killing it at the gym either, I'm talking saying no sometimes to something you want is necessary, welcome to being a grown up, it sucks sometimes.  Heck I didn't want to spend yesterday food shopping, doing the laundry, cleaning the house but unless I want to live in squalor for hte rest of my life, those things have to be done and the fairies ain't coming to do it for me.  Same with our healthy lifestyles, you don't get the body you want by wishing for it. 

How about you treat every day like day one, there will always be days when we dont' feel like doing anything, let alone eating healthy and moving more, but I don't want you to wait till you feel like doing it, just get out there and damn well do it.    Stay accountable week in week out, get to your Weight Watcher meeting, don't make excuses, don't book to do something else when you should be in your meeting, and if it can't be helped then you go to another meeting - stop with the excuses, it's 12 weeks till summer, we ain't got no more time for excuses - you hear me!

Ooo I'm in sergeant major mode this morning - can you tell ;)

You could make yourself accountable every day by checking in with your group, commit to report back daily, that'll keep you in check.  Every is easier with support and support from like-minded people, well it don't get any better than that, which is why I see success in my meetings week in, week out, because those memebers are sat there chatting and supporting each other and enjoying their meeting to the max.

How you going to chart your progress over the next few months?  There's the journals, they last 10 weeks and come with lots of motivation stuff to keep you going, or maybe you're more an app kind of person, you could do the blue dot challenge, whatever way you chose, make sure you do it.  It's okay that it doesn't look queaky clean, we're not after perfection are we.

How about rewarding yourself to keep up your motivation, an none food reward of course for every pound you lose, every half stone, every stone - you choose your milestones and your rewards.

STOP putting it all off, don't be the Annie of weight loss, "tomorrow, tomorrow, I'll diet tomorrow, it's always a day away", it's not a good look you know, we all have days where it's easier to say 'sod it' but look at the small stuff, break it all down into small goals.  Remind yourself that you absolutely can do this and of course if you have a day where you forget all of the above, give yourself a break, forgive your behaviour and move forward.

Now make sure you make your meeting this week, your coach is waiting to see you, I believe you can do this, now it's your turn to agree with me and prove it.

Remember all those benefits you're going to notice as the next 12 weeks passes,  visualise yourself this summer, what are you going to look like, how will you feel, what will you be doing?  

Let's do this then shall we?

Damn right we will BeYOUtiful, I'm in if you are!