What About Those Obstacles and Unexpected Events?What about when you decide on a path to follow and something comes up unexpectedly? For instance, you decided you’re going to work out on Monday, Wednesday and Friday after work at 6:00 PM. This works great on Monday and Wednesday but Friday someone asks you to join them after work for drinks or dinner. Maybe that cute co-worker you’ve had your eye on. If you think about it, it’s likely something will come up often on Friday night.

What do you do? Do you say, “No, thanks, I have to work out,” or “No, I already have plans,” and sound like a jerk ensuring you’ll never land that date, or “Maybe some other time,” and you know there’ll never be another time, or “Yes, that sounds great,” and then berate yourself for being a loser and not following through with your workout plan? Either way you’re not going to feel good about your decision and you’re setting yourself up to fail.

Set things up so you will succeed, no matter what. Before you decide what you want to do, think it through completely. This is part of the “Creating a Compelling Outcome” process (taught in my 8-week course and used in private sessions).

When you decide what you’d like to do you must also consider everything else that will be affected and whether your plan is workable in the real world. Maybe Friday night workouts are going to be interrupted often. Better to choose a different day or time that will work.

If you thought about it, you may have realized that things would often come up Friday evenings, so you decided to work out on Monday and Wednesday evenings plus Saturday mornings. That makes better sense. Thinking about what might interfere is why many people do their exercise in the early morning hours virtually ensuring nothing else will interfere. No one invites you out for 6:00 AM except perhaps your running partner!

If you want to get up early, think it through. Are you a night person? Early morning hours probably won’t work for you, but some other time will. Do you have a spouse who’d complain loudly? Consider them as well, but don’t let everyone else’s preferences keep you from doing what’s best for you. Consider others and any objections they may have, and then decide in advance how to counter those objections. It’s basically a way to look at your plans from all the angles, figure out the danger zones, decide in advance on strategies to keep you on track, and then get started.

Once in awhile you won’t be able to keep to your plan and that’s just fine. For instance holidays interfere with gym hours. I’ve been annoyed when the gym was closed on Christmas Day! Sometimes despite your best efforts, things will come up, so must be flexible, while at the same time persistent to make sure you have scheduled a plan that can work the majority of the time.

Remember too, you’re creating a plan you can live with. Choose one small thing to change, one habit, one event. Then, when those special situations arise, you’ll know what to do, because you’ve already planned ahead, and even if you abandon your plan, for a vacation perhaps, you just get right back on track when you return feeling refreshed and excited to get started again.

Kathryn Martyn, Master NLP Practitioner, EFT counselor, Weight Loss Coach and owner of One More Bite Weight Loss is the author of “Changing Beliefs, Your First Step to Permanent Weight Loss.”

Learn to use Kathryn’s One More Bite Approach with The Daily Bites: Mini lessons in using EFT for weight loss http://www.OneMoreBite-WeightLoss.com/getnews.html

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Most of us realize that in order to lose weight we have to reduce our daily caloric intake and/or increase our daily caloric expenditure. The challenge for the average person is to figure out how to do this as simply and painlessly as possible. If we can do these things simply and painlessly, then we have a better chance of continuing to do them and being successful for the long term. So what are some ideas on how we can meet this challenge while keeping it as simple and painless as possible?

Let’s keep in mind that most sensible weight loss plans recommend losing no more than two pounds per week. In caloric terms that translates to a change of about 1,000 calories per day. That probably sounds like a lot, but let’s look at some simple things that will help.

Here are four ideas that I think meet the bill:

1. No matter what kind of weight loss plan you are on, you need to include exercise as one of the components. Why? Because exercise not only burns calories, it builds muscle. And muscle tissue burns more calories than fat tissue. In other words, you get extra caloric benefit by exercising.

A 175 pound person can burn about 10 calories per minute by walking briskly or jogging slowly. Exercise professionals generally recommend a minimum of 30 minutes on most days of the week of aerobic (walking, etc.) exercise to maintain heart health. Let’s do the math. Thirty minutes of aerobic exercise each day will burn about 300 calories. If we throw in 2 days of strength training (which is also recommended), we can be pretty confident that we will average a daily caloric deficit of 300 calories. And that doesn’t take into consideration the fact that the aerobic exercise will increase our general metabolic rate, which will help us burn even more calories.

There are a number of researchers out there now that are talking about using the concept of high density, low calorie foods to help us make major, positive adjustments to our diets. Using these concepts will help you to feel fuller, while eating substantially less calories.

2. Try cutting down on some of the high calorie foods that you eat. Remember that fat has twice as many calories as proteins or carbohydrates. Also, sugary foods and many white flour foods have a lot of calories and very little nutritional value. So try to cut down on high fat items as well as foods with a lot of sugar. Cakes and cookies usually have a lot of both.

3. Eat foods that have a higher moisture content. Try including more salads, juicy fruits, and broth based soups in your daily diet. Because of their high water content, these types of foods will add volume without adding calories. This will help you to feel full faster, and might keep you from eating the high calories foods mentioned above.

4. Make sure you include lots of fiber rich foods in your diet. These foods take up more room in our digestive tract, once again helping us to feel fuller. High fiber foods can also help reduce cholesterol and reduce the chance of getting things like colon cancer.

One of the researchers who have done several studies on items 2, 3, and 4 is Barbara J. Rolls, PhD. Her results indicate that following these principles can help a person to reduce their daily caloric intake by 700 to 800 calories. This, coupled with the exercise suggestions in item 1, will help you meet the 1,000 calorie per day target that will allow you to lose a safe 2 pounds of weight per week.

These are suggestions that anyone can follow simply and painlessly. So, give it a try. You may be pleasantly surprised by how easy it can be to lose weight and become healthier.

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Online fitness coach Tom Manfredi is the creator of the site “fitness-after-50″. He has a master’s degree in exercise physiology and over 20 years of practical exercise experience.

This site is designed with the mature adult in mind. There is a lot of information available on the site for anyone looking to start or restart a sensible exercise program. Learn more by going to fitness-after-50.com

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According to Dr. Rossi, in “The 20-Minute Break”, there are 4 types of overeaters. See if you recognize yourself.

1. Stress Overeater - You overeat and oversnack at any time of the day in direct response to the stresses of everyday life.

Solution: Recognize your stress limits and learn how to say no before you reach them. Break the stress syndrome by taking breaks, which will help you gain perspective on those situations you need to cope with more creatively.

2. Fatigue Overeater - In a futile effort to overcome stress and fatigue, you snack almost continuously after 3:00 or 4:00 P.M., even after a full meal, until bedtime.

Solution: Pace yourself better throughout the day with several breaks and a midafternoon rest to avoid fatigue buildup. Check in with yourself many times during the day so that you are aware of when you need to start restoring your energy level.

3. Addictive Overeater - You are a cyclic overeater or drinker who regularly consumes addictive substances, such as caffeine (coffee, tea, chocolate, soda) or alcohol. You may also use sugary foods for their mood altering effects to stave off depression.

Solution: Study the patterns of your addictive behavior. How long is it between when you indulge and when you need another fix? When you have the urge for these substances, use the 20-Minute Break to rejuvenate yourself.

4. Escapist Overeater - You often eat alone in an effort to escape unpleasant realities that you don’t know how to cope with.

Solution: Use the time that you would be eating as an escape to make an inventory of your life and what you are using food for. What is it you want to escape from?

Remember, it’s not food that is the problem.

It’s what we use food for.

Carol Solomon, Ph.D. is a psychologist and personal coach who specializes in helping people who want to lose weight and eliminate food and weight issues.

By going from food obsessive to charge neutral (i.e. Did I eat today?), she became dedicated to making it easy for others to step off the vicious cycle and live free of anxiety about food and weight.

She is the author of “Lose Weight Now Stay Slim Forever,” a practical “how-to” manual for learning to lose weight without dieting.

Sign up for her free email newsletter, Slim Forever at: http://www.lose-weight-now-stay-slim-forever.com

http://www.LoseWeightWithEFT.com

http://www.MoreMoneyWithEFT.com

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