What is the deal?

Afraid?  Scared?  Worried?  Unsure?  Hope you succeed but petrified you won't?

Stay on plan TODAY.

Overwhelmed?  Discouraged?  Sad?  Angry?  Disheartened? 

Stay on plan TODAY.

As you stay on plan TODAY and only TODAY, several things will happen.  Your body will, because of a physiologically engineered calorie deficit, release some of your stored fat and use it for energy.

This happens whether you are "feelin' it" or not, whether you "feel LIKE it" or not, whether you are thrilled with the process, mad at the process, mad at your Mother-in-Law, disappointed at your job, "totally in to the program", reading Dr. A's Habits of Health, going to the gym or NOT.

It will happen because it is a mathematical certainty that if you remain on plan today, 100% on plan with no modifications or tweaks, you will burn MORE fuel than you have consumed.  Of course if you are in the first three days, that fuel may be your glycogen stores as you get IN to the fat burning state.  But, regardless, you are burning more than you are consuming.  FACT.

Behavior modification is all about DOING.  It is the DOING no matter what you are FEELING.  That being said, you CAN made it much, much easier on yourself by changing your MIND about this process, early on, so that it is not as great of a struggle with yourself.

How do you do this?  Well, I did it by making myself accountable to my Health Coach, and reading and implementing the principles found in Dr. A's Habits of Health.  I do it DAILY by continuing to implement these habits into my life.  Am I perfect?  Define perfect.  I dare you LOL.

What I can tell you is that I am not in the HABIT of eating off plan.

Are you in the HABIT of eating off-plan?  If so, your outsides will always reflect that fact.  Even if you end up losing the weight, if you do not feel like it is necessary to adopt HABITS of health, then you will likely be part of the 85% of people who do not maintain their weight loss.

I was, that first time, back in 06/07.  I had no idea WHAT the Habits of Health even WERE at the time.  I did not adopt them, out of ignorance, and I gained all my weight back in 08. 

So when I began this journey again in 2010 I had to decide what was going to be different this time.  I decided EVERYTHING would be different.  I decided I would be different.  Everything WAS different and I WAS different because I made it so.  Not because of chance, outside circumstances, pressures of life, anything like that.  I've been through an accident and surgery this year.  And yet I've maintained. 

Because I adopted the Habits of Health, and am in the HABIT of being ON PLAN.  Whether that plan is the 5&1 Phase for weight loss, the Transition Plan, or my Maintenance Plan, I have developed the HABIT of remaining ON PLAN, it has become so ingrained in my routine that it is NOT a struggle. 

When does it BECOME a struggle?  When I consciously MAKE it so by choosing to deviate from my routine, from my habits of health, and CHOOSE to entertain the thoughts of yummy food.  When I THEN make the conscious CHOICE to go wherever I need to GO to BUY the yummy food.  To make the non-habitual choice to actually PURCHASE it, bring it HOME, and EAT it.  These are conscious, NON-habitual decisions I make. 

If I make a habit out of doing THAT, then yes I WILL gain all my weight back plus more.  Because we can ALWAYS be bigger, and our bodies, if we have been overweight or obese, will ALWAYS seek to store extra calories we consume as fat. 

But I'm not worried, I'm not unsure, I'm not afraid, because those sentiments would indicate that I'm worried I can't trust MYSELF.

Because I would be the one making those choices.  And I have learned through this process that I am solely responsible for my choices, and secondly that I can be trusted with.....myself.

Can you be trusted with yourself?  If you don't think you can be, then work on that.  How do you work on that? 

Stay on plan....TODAY.

Rinse and Repeat!