Many of my clients think eating healthy means deprivation. To them, it means being hungry and suffering through bland food until you meet your weight-loss goal and resume “normal” eating habits. This mindset keeps you stuck in the rebound weight-gain cycle. Suffering through a diet only to pick up your old eating habits where you left off is a recipe for regaining all the weight you just lost—plus some. To be truly successful, eating healthy has to become a way of life. You have to create a new definition of “normal” eating. And that definition can absolutely include delicious, and body- and soul-satisfying food. The primary shift is that you will be making different choices not only about what you eat, but also about what you think about what you eat to create and sustain a leaner and healthier you. Here are 11 tips for making healthy eating easy: Instead of focusing on all the foods you can’t eat, concentrate on all the foods you can. Fully appreciate the foods you are eating. If you are eating an orange, appreciate the farmer who planted and cared for the tree. Appreciate the sunshine, rain, and soil that helped that orange grow. Appreciate the people who picked, packaged, and shipped the orange to the store or stand where you purchased it. Appreciate the worker who put it in the display so that you could buy it, and all the people who keep that store open so that you have ready access to an abundance of food. Appreciate the color as you remove the peel, and the tangy sweet scent. Appreciate the wonderful burst of flavor on your tongue. Appreciate how it’s nourishing your body. Appreciate your body for fully receiving those […]
What You are Doing that’s Keeping You From Slim and Sexy
While I’m in Charleston, South Carolina, for a retreat, I’m sharing some of my favorite blogs from the past. “I’m doing everything right. Why isn’t my body responding?” “Being on a diet makes it really hard to enjoy life.” “I’ve tried everything and nothing works!” “Losing weight is a struggle every day.” “I’m so TIRED of being overweight.” “Why can’t I just have a normal body, and relax and enjoy myself like I see other people do?” “I’m already working so hard and I’m not seeing any results. I don’t know what else to do.” These are common statements that I hear women make. They feel frustrated, angry, and often think that their body is somehow faulty and that they are stuck with the body shape they have. And they desperately want something else. They yearn for a healthy, slim, and sexy body—sometimes more than anything else! What if it is these very thoughts that are holding you back? What if those feelings of desperation and yearning are like spraying yourself with healthy, slim, and sexy repellent? It’s possible that may actually make you feel worse. “How can I not feel desperate,” you might ask? “How can I not think dieting is hard when it bloody well is,” you might argue? This is not meant to make you self-critical, inspire you to explain to me why your situation is different (that just keeps you stuck), or to overwhelm you because you’re already working so hard to “fix it.” Honestly, I get it. I spent more than 35 years thinking some of those same thoughts and feeling that desperation. I couldn’t get a break. My body was somehow faulty, and actually felt like it was working against me. I tried everything and I couldn’t see any more solutions. […]
What’s the Best Diet To Release the Weight?
Are you searching for the one “right” diet? That perfect eating plan that will drop the weight and leave you radiantly healthy? What if that one magic diet that is right for everyone doesn’t exist? What if you actually have to tune in to your body wisdom to discover the best diet . . . for you? Maybe you think that’s too hard. You may want someone to just give you the answers. But the truth is that it’s much harder to continue to look outside of yourself for the answers. I just did a search on Amazon.com for diet books. There were 76,726 results. It’s simply not humanly possible to sort through all the information out there–much of it contradictory–to find that one magic eating plan. What this means is there is no one “right” way for everyone on the planet to eat—or to lose weight. Think about it. A piece of fruit may be the best food choice for you, but to a diabetic, it could be harmful. Thus the ancient saying, “One man’s meat is another man’s poison.” To lose weight, it comes down to the simple formula of taking in fewer calories than you expend. Unless your diet has been prescribed by a doctor, there are lots of ways to achieve that. I know women who are slim and healthy who eat a low carb diet, as well as some who eat a high carb diet, who are vegetarians and vegans, who eat only raw foods, or whole foods, the French way, the Mediterranean way, or the paleo way, etc., etc. So both the challenge and the opportunity is that you have to take responsibility to find the general plan for healthy […]
Are You Eating Too Much—Or Not Enough—To Get the Body You Want?
Let’s talk portion size. If you are struggling with your weight, chances are you are eating too much. But you also may not be eating enough! And in either case, you may be left feeling hungry and not seeing results—the two biggest reasons women give up on their efforts to create the body they want. Really? You can eat too much and still be hungry? Yes! If you aren’t eating the right foods. If you are confused about this, it’s no wonder. If you do a search on Amazon for diet books there are 71,727 results! Suffice it to say there are many different expert opinions about how you should be eating. So there is no way I can wade into this topic without ruffling someone’s feathers. But here’s what I believe. You have to find the right eating plan for you! I know it’s not sexy. It’s not the silver bullet you may be looking for. But until you begin to listen to your body and value its information above what any expert is telling you, chances are you will struggle with your weight or wellness. Now this doesn’t mean that I don’t value expert advice. I do! There is valuable information to be had that will help you find what is right for you, and I’m constantly reading and learning more. (And I can give you some referrals for some fabulous nutritionists.) But you still have to use your body wisdom—and a little trial and error—to determine what is best for you. What I really encourage you do to is to find a healthy eating plan that feels like you could make it a life-style and try it. And then listen to […]
What’s the Best Diet for You?
I just did a search on Amazon.com for diet books. There were 71,821 results! What this means is there is no one “right” way to eat for everyone on the planet—or you!–to lose weight. Think about it. A piece of fruit may be the best food choice for you, but to a diabetic, it could be harmful. Thus the ancient saying, “One man’s meat is another man’s poison.” To lose weight, it comes down to the simple formula of taking in fewer calories than you use. And there are lots of ways to achieve that. I know women who are slim and healthy who eat a low carb diet, as well as some who eat a high carb diet, who are vegetarians and vegans, who eat only raw foods, or whole foods, the French way, the Mediterranean way, or the paleo way, etc., etc. So both the challenge and the opportunity is that you have to take responsibility to find the plan for healthy eating that works best for you, that you will enjoy enough to follow consistently, and that is flexible enough to allow you to not only live your life now, but to change, grow, and evolve. Because what is a healthy step for you today, may be different tomorrow. For instance, if all you eat is potato chips, a healthier step for you would be a chicken sandwich. Is a chicken sandwich the healthiest choice? No, but it is progress from where you are. And as you get used to making that better choice, it is an easier step to the next healthy level of grilled chicken over salad. One of the things that trips so many women up is that they […]
Eleven Tips to Make Healthy Eating Easy
Many of my clients think eating healthy means deprivation. To them, it means being hungry and suffering through bland food until you meet your weight-loss goal and resume “normal” eating habits. This mindset keeps you stuck in the rebound weight-gain cycle. Suffering through a diet only to resume your old eating habits is a recipe for regaining all the weight you just lost—plus some. To be truly successful, eating healthy has to become a way of life. You have to create a new definition of “normal” eating. And that definition can absolutely include delicious, and body- and soul-satisfying food. The primary shift is that you will be making different choices not only about what you eat, but also about what you think about what you eat to create and sustain a leaner and healthier you. Here are 11 tips for making healthy eating easy: Instead of focusing on all the foods you can’t eat, concentrate on all the foods you can. Fully appreciate the foods you are eating. If you are eating an orange, appreciate the farmer who planted and cared for the tree. Appreciate the sunshine, rain, and soil that helped that orange grow. Appreciate the people who picked, packaged, and shipped the orange to the store or stand where you purchased it. Appreciate the worker who put it in the display so that you could buy it, and all the people who keep that store open so that you have ready access to an abundance of food. Appreciate the color as you remove the peel, and the tangy sweet scent. Appreciate the wonderful burst of flavor on your tongue. Appreciate how it’s nourishing your body. Appreciate your body for fully receiving those […]
3 Easy Tips to Create a Slimmer You in 2013
Over this holiday week, you may have found yourself eating, and eating, and eating! And you may be beating yourself up about it. But telling yourself how horrible you are truly is NOT helpful—and it could very well end up making you feel so bad about yourself that you unknowingly sabotage your future efforts to lose weight. It will probably go something like this: You feel fat. You may even feel desperate to lose weight. Every time you feel how tight your clothes are, all you can think about is how much you hate your body. You know you need to diet and exercise so that you can drop some weight, but it’s the end of the year, right? Why start now? You make a New Year’s Resolution to lose weight. You decide that on January 2nd you are going to start dieting and exercising. Between now and then you keep eating, and eating, and eating. You are trying to cram in every food you love to prepare for months of hunger and deprivation. You feel bloated, headachy, and slightly sick. And you hate yourself even more. You feel ashamed that you’ve let your weight get out of hand—again. On January 2, you force yourself to work out and you start a diet that drastically cuts the amount of food you’ve been eating. Each day gets harder and harder. Maybe your diet lasts for a day or two, or for a week or two, or maybe you are even successful at meeting your goal. And then you feel your control slip. You just can’t maintain the rigid diet and exercise “rules” you’ve set in place. You’re tired of being hungry. Your tired of feeling […]
Five Things I Learned From Diets
We headed out early this morning to go hiking with friends, so I thought I would share this blog from the fabulous life, career, and relationship coach, Nicky Roberts. Over the years I have read at least a dozen books on dieting and nutrition. I have also—both in my life coaching practice and in my personal life—observed friends and family try one diet or another. My father-in-law, bless his heart, tried even the most extreme diets in an effort to reduce the extra 100 pounds or so that he carried with him. Here are five life lessons I’ve learned from diets: You have to stick with it. Except for those diets where you only eat one food for days on end, most diets offer you the realistic opportunity of losing weight. But like with most things in life, you have to stick with it. You can’t give it a mediocre effort and expect outstanding results. Use your common sense. Yes, the cookie diet may help you lose 10 pounds in 2 days but really, should you? Be discerning about what you commit to. Following on from point No. 2, it’s also a good idea to really think about things like timing, how this choice might affect your health in the short- and the long-term, and how this will impact your life in the broader sense. For example, will you be able to eat out, or at other people’s houses? How will you make it easy for other’s to accommodate your food choices? Don’t just make commitments willy nilly. When you make a commitment and then break it because you really didn’t think it through, you set yourself up for disappointment and a belief that “you […]
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