Imagine for a moment that you have already achieved your target weight and are maintaining it successfully. Imagine how you look in the mirror and to others, what it sounds like to get compliments from people around you and the sound of your voice filled with confidence about your new self, and how good it feels now that you have achieved the goal you set yourself. Once you can see all the benefits, and hear yourself saying that you can and will achieve this, how good does it feel knowing that this is in your future now?
You often change items in your house, you redecorate, buy new furniture and so on. You may also change jobs, training, holiday ideas; in fact you may change many things. But it often surprises me that people don’t often think about changing the way they think, and yet this is critical to achieving the goals they set themselves. And it’s easy and can be a lot of fun too.
The way we believe and our values in life define how we go about achieving our goals, and it’s important to update these values and beliefs from time to time as we grow and change, otherwise we may still be held to a past experience which no longer is true. Our values are defined around the age of seven, so they get more out of date as time passes by. Some values and beliefs will continue to be fine, but some may need adjusting. Imagine trying to drive to a location on the far side of the country, using only a map that was created in 1890, compared to one that was created this year.
Take for example losing weight. This is a common activity these days. The easy formula is to make it so that the energy expenditure is greater than the energy intake, so the concept of eat less and exercise more seems simple enough, but in practice this may not happen for a number of reasons. Let’s call one of them limiting beliefs.
If you believe you cannot lose weight then it is less likely to happen than if you believe you can. If you think you’ve tried everything and nothing works, then it may be harder to achieve the target weight than if you believe you can and will do it. And there is a process I go through with people that helps redefine such beliefs easily.
Here’s a useful concept to consider on your journey. There is a basic equation which has cause on one side and effect on the other. If you are on the effect side then you may believe that you can’t do anything to help yourself lose weight, that you tried everything, that it’s too hard and many other reasons for why it is like it is. Once you get yourself over to the cause side, you realise that everything is a choice, and you have control over what you choose. Therefore you can change anything, with effort. This opens up a doorway to new possibilities, new understandings, and new strategies for achieving what you want.
You actually choose everything, even if you never considered this before. You choose which side of your teeth you brush first, the order of which clothes you put on, the route to work, what you eat and how much and when, in fact everything. You have strategies for all these things, and you can improve the strategies over time.
In order to achieve and then maintain your target weight, you will have to make changes to your strategies. You will change what you eat, how much you eat, when you eat. There are lifestyle changes to be made too, maybe this starts with a walk round the block each day, and progresses to eventually joining a gym or going swimming. It also involves changing the way you think about food, exercise and your self. When you have achieved your target weight you will be thinking differently, so why not begin by thinking differently and allow that to help you achieve your goals quicker and easier. Start by doing what I suggested in the first paragraph and build a really clear picture of the goal you are setting for yourself
