It’s that beautiful time of year again! Things are blooming, the days are getting longer, the beaches are filling up (as places start to open up), and many of us are wanting to spend time outdoors!
We want to look good in front of our friends and family and feel good and confident with our bodies. I do want to make it clear that you should never base your self-worth on your weight or your looks. Let me remind you, you are beautiful, you are worthy, and you are enough. The journey of setting a goal to lose weight while in the process getting healthier, however, can really spur proud feelings.
I know that it did for me. I used to be 180 pounds, and that wasn’t in muscle. Through my weight-loss journey, I dropped to 135, then put muscle back on to 160 and have remained stable at that ideal weight for me. For me, losing weight was a huge boost to my self-confidence and it showed me that I can truly achieve any goal I want. Everyone is going to have a different weight loss journey (if you want to read about mine, check here), but no matter where you are coming from or what your goals are, this post will help get you started.
Why do you want to lose weight in the first place?
On of the biggest reasons most people’s new year’s resolutions fail is become there is no real reasoning behind the goal. Especially for weight loss – we default to shallow reasons. To look good and feel good isn’t good enough. You need something that fills you with emotion. My reason behind wanting to lose weight was honestly because I didn’t like myself at the time. I wanted to change that and you bet when I thought about that reason it made me emotionally charged. That’s not a glamorous reason but it doesn’t have to be. Nobodies journey is the same and nobodies journey is perfect.
Before you even begin to think about diets or exercise programs, you need to get clear on your reasons. What’s motivating you to get in shape? Is it to prove something to yourself, or to others? Is it so that you can live longer to see your grandchildren grow up? Maybe you want to participate in some content or event. Or maybe you just want to be able to show up vibrantly in your every day life. Whatever it is, you need to figure it out, and you need to write it down.
Smart Goals
Once you have your reason, you need to dial in on your actual goal. Those who fail to plan, plan to fail. If you go into weight-loss with the goal of “losing-weight”, you probably won’t see great results.
When formulating your goals, use the S.M.A.R.T method:
S – specific
Get specific with your goal. Don’t just say you want to lose weight, specify how much weight you want to lose and by when do you want to have lost it.
Related: 13 reasons why you aren’t losing any weight
M – measurable
Your goal needs to be measurable. You need to be able to track your progress on a daily or weekly basis. I’m not an advocate for counting calories, but if your goal is to eat under 2000 calories a day, get yourself a calorie counting app. If your goal is to lose 5 pounds over a course of one month, make sure you have a means to measure your weight every single week.
Related: How I lost 45 pounds without calorie counting or exercise
A – actionable
Make sure your goal is actionable. Do you have the tools available to achieve this goal. What are the steps that you need to take to make it happen. Write a plan down as to how you are actually going to achieve this goal.
R – realistic
Your goal needs to be realistic. It’s great to shoot for the moon, but don’t get to crazy. You know your limits. Once you achieve your goal, you can re- calibrate and increase the difficulty. You don’t make it to the moon on your first try – you get there by achieving milestone by milestone.
T – time based
A goal must be time-based. If it isn’t, you’ll let yourself off the hook and drag it out for an indefinite amount of time. Set a time table. Enter it in your calendar as “goal achievement day!” and put on that little bit of pressure to get the work done.
The first step towards losing weight this summer
SMART goals and motivation are not actually the first step towards losing weight this summer. They are crucially important, but come second to this one thing – developing a resilient mindset.
Your mindset is huge when it comes to achieving any sort of goal. Most of the times we feel held back in our lives is because we don’t actually believe in ourselves. We don’t believe we have the potential. We don’t believe we have the power. We don’t believe we can change our reality.
But we can. Each and every one of us has the power to radically transform our lives. We just need to believe it. Once we remove our self-imposed limitations, we can take massive action. Remember, the body achieves what the mind believes.
Developing a resilient mind
There’s no one way to strengthen your mind, but like any muscle, it can be trained with consistency and use. Here’s a few tools that you can use.
Practice mindfulness. Forcing yourself to sit down for meditation for just a few minutes a day works wonders in creating more discipline, not to mention the numerous health benefits that come with it.
Create routines. Train your brain to follow a schedule with everything you do. You don’t need to be eating the same salad everyday for lunch, but you should set consistent bed times, wake up at consistent times, eat at consistent times, etc. The more structure you create and stick to, the more disciplined and resilient your mind will become.
Face your fears. Take one uncomfortable action everyday. It could be as simple as saying hi to a neighbor. If your mind stops you right before you can do this, accept it as it is, and try again tomorrow. Never give up on it. Keep trying and trying and prove to yourself that 1) failures don’t mean I suck, they teach me something and 2) with enough consistency, you can force your mind out of the way and achieve what you want to achieve.
Practice gratitude. If you have something to be grateful for every single day, limiting thoughts are going to lose their space in your mind. What you focus on grows.
Take action.
You’ve got your motivation, you’ve got your action plan and goals and you’ve developed a resilient mind. Now, it’s time for you to take action fully knowing that you are capable and deserving of whatever it is that you are after. You have got this and I’m rooting for you on the whole journey.
Take a moment to visualize what life could be like if you achieve your goal. Think back to your huge reasons filled with emotion. Close your eyes and feel the feelings of what it would be like to have those things, to have achieved those things, to have the body you want, to have the health you want, the thriving relationship, whatever it is, take a few moments to just sit with those feelings.
How did that feel? Amazing, right? Those feelings aren’t something far away, as you just realized, you can experience them right now. Use these feelings to turbo-charge you on your journey. Make this the best, most healthiest year of your life!
Are you ready to start your journey!?
Let me know in the comments if you’re ready to start your weight loss and health journey and be sure to share your successes!
