Focus

 

I saw this chart posted on a Facebook Weight Watcher group and it caught my attention right away. My sister and I just recently had a conversation about this very thing.

She told me the only way to change a behavior is by changing the way you think about the event.

I first began this journey by focusing on maintenance. Yep, you read that correctly. I was focused on maintenance.

1. It was important that I maintain the loss of even a single pound. No matter how far I got, I didn't want to ever go back to where I began. Not ever!
2. I also wanted to eat without having to constantly dwell on food, both what to eat and what not to eat.

When I began, I think my focus was on the left side of this chart for every single item. Setting those two goals was probably the first shift of focus. If you look at the right side, it would be the one that reads "things that I want for myself".

In the past, dieting got harder as time went on. I got impatient and eventually gave up. Each time I gave up I gained back every last pound I had worked so hard to lose. This time things got easier with time - not harder. It still surprises me to say that.

Without realizing when it happened, I noticed I was no longer thinking obsessing about food. I had faith in myself, in the science of how weight loss works, and I could feel how my little changes were taking hold and they were working. I knew impatience had led me to failure before and would again if I didn't figure out how to avoid it. To be patient also meant to accept setbacks as part of the process. (Accepting setbacks were more words of wisdom my sister shared with me years ago. She's pretty smart, huh?)

I Google'd tips on developing more patience. This article helped. It didn't tell me to do A, B, or C but, it gave me a lot to think about. I've gone back to re-read it several times. I started thinking about the situations where I was most patient and compared it to times when I could have done better. What made them different?

Here's what I knew. I'm most patient when it comes to quilting. Some projects get put in "time out" when things aren't working out the way I'd hoped but, I don't get upset and I don't quit on them. I go back later, make a few changes, and try again. I just had to figure out if there was something there that could help me to be more patient with weight loss.

I'm no behavior expert but I think I might understand the reason. Well, maybe. Time will tell. With quilting, I have a vision of how to get from start to finish - even if it means that I have to leave the situation and return later to alter that vision. I have other ideas that might work if the first one doesn't. I know people who are better at it that I can ask questions if I run into trouble. And, I feel confident in my ability to figure it out. (Not cocky but confident. There's a difference.) My only vision for losing weight was an illusive number on the scale. Yes, I knew what I wanted to look like after I lost weight but, I had no vision of the steps in between to get from where I was to where I wanted to be. Consume fewer calories than you expend was always just too vague. I've heard many, many times to set smaller, more tangible goals. I interpreted that as "lose a pound a week", or "log food every day". Smaller goals didn't help me get anywhere, at least for very long. It changed my focus but didn't improve it.

What I needed was to work on one step of the process at a time. I needed a vision of what to do next, just like I do with quilting. Be methodical. That's where my ability to be patient lies. That's my super power.

The first one was to walk a specific number of steps each day. If I could do that, it would get me closer to being healthy. I kept an eye on my calories but, there were so many eating habits I had to change that it was overwhelming and depressing. (Wrong thinking for sure but, that was how I felt at the time.) I began to focus on simply hitting my magic number of steps each day. I accepted the fact that some days life would get too busy (setbacks) but I kept thinking that every morning I begin at zero anyway no matter what I did the day before. It was okay if I didn't make it every single day, I just had to start every day by trying.

Next, I focused on being able to enjoy eating without having to constantly be calculating. I didn't want to make food my enemy. Almost every day I bugged a lady I sat next to at work named Becky about what she ate for breakfast and what she planned to have for lunch/dinner. She was patient and kind. ♥ She looked to be the perfect size so I was interested in how she did it. She told me about eating yogurt every morning and often mentioned eating beans for a meal. I read that protein and fiber worked to keep you from feeling hungry so I understood why her natural eating habits helped keep her fit. I tried eating like Becky. I kept a yogurt I liked in the fridge and blueberries in the freezer. I made batches of a low calorie version of chili and stocked my freezer. Those two little changes - changed everything. I now had two things I actually enjoyed eating and with my chili recipe calculated once, I never had to think about it again. It changed my focus and it worked. I started to live how I pictured I would live when I hit my goal weight.

Just like some people have trouble with credit cards, paying them off then charging them right back up again... if you don't change how you think about the event, you don't change! I have more work to do. As far as that chart above, I'd have to say what I'm working on now is changing from focusing on bad habits to focusing on good ones. I focus too much on bad habits because I often worry about old habits creeping back in. I gained weight back in the past because I let that happen. So, how am I trying to change it and stop worrying? For the last month or two, I began creating and testing more of my own recipes for frozen meals that I can prepare in batches for my freezer. It allows me to still cook Sam's favorites, which are often high in calories, and not have to white knuckle it (another thing my sister cautioned me about). I can just reach in the freezer for one of MY favorites. As a bonus, having several options to choose from without having to stop and cook myself a seperate meal on those nights, frees up a LOT more time to sew! A win/win.

If you're reading this and trying to lose weight I hope you'll really take a long hard look at that chart above. Be totally honest with yourself. Where is your focus? If it's one of the items on the left, how do you change it? Is there something you can DO toward reaching that goal? If there is someone in your life that is successful doing the thing you want to be able to do, be observant. You can learn a lot just by watching the things they do and where they choose to focus.

Another Healthy Choice knockoff

 Tonight I tried to make another one of Cafe Steamers dinners I like.  I used the recipe I found for Mexican Street Corn at The Skinnyish Dish and added chicken and black beans to it.  These are the ingredients I used (I forgot to add the chicken and Hellman's light mayonnaise in the photo). 

The recipe importer at My Fitness Pal is easy to use, just copy and paste the link to the recipe.  You can then add or substitute ingredients.    I usually enter all the ingredients and then adjust the number of servings to get to the amount of calories I want.

I weight the entire thing in grams and then divide by the number of serving.  I place each container on the scale and spoon the contents until it reaches the correct weight.  

Example:  total weight 1243 grams divided by 12 servings = approximately 103 grams per container.

Their photo is better but the contents of both taste pretty similar.  (And, mine cost less than half as much as theirs.)  I made 12 servings.  Their dinners are 240 calories and mine are 182. (Next time, I'll double the amount of sauce and change them to 203 calories each.)

  
I have 5 types of frozen meals I make in batches now.  I deliberately choose different types of dollar store containers so I can easily distinguish them from each other in my freezer. 

It's pretty easy to pop them out like ice cubes if you prefer to microwave in a regular bowl like I do.   If one gets a little stubborn, putting the container in some warm water for a minute or two usually solves the problem.

Knock offs

 I really have to stay focused on maintaining my weight loss.  It's a slippery slope to go "off" for the holidays and then expect to get right back on track.

My plan is to enjoy the holiday meal.  But, that's ONE meal... not a week's worth of mindless eating.  I'm cooking a big variety of vegetable and hope to have lots of those for left-overs with the ham.  Hopefully, the potatoes and rolls will be just enough for one day.

To prepare for next week, I did another batch cooking and tried a knock off of Healthy Choice Cafe Steamers barbecue steak frozen dinners.  I did a turkey/sweet potato version a couple of weeks ago and it turned out well.  

I don't have a double bowl like the original so, I'll just add the sauce to mine after it's heated in the microwave.

My version is both cheaper and fewer calories.  The main reason for taking the time to make my own though is because they're often out of stock at my local Publix.  I'm trying hard to make very few trips into stores these days.  

Theirs:  300 calories - $3.29 cost

Mine:    179 calories - $1.85 cost

Goals

 I reached a big goal today!  I'm normal now, at least in size. 

I've spent most of my adult life hoping, wishing, and making multiple attempts to reach "normal".  I always gave up.  Not because it was too hard to eat healthy food or, because tracking what I ate became too tedious.  I quit because I got impatient.

I've had success in accomplishing goals in the past.  Some were easier to achieve than others and many took a lot of work and dedication.  None of them, however; challenged my ability to stay motivated like losing weight has.

One of the most difficult things I've ever had to overcome is looking in the mirror and not getting discouraged.  It's hard to persevere when the first thing you see every morning is the consequences of your bad choices staring back at you.

While I was working on losing the weight, people often said "this is a marathon, just be patient".    They were wrong.  Not about being patient, that's important but, their analogy was incorrect. Losing weight isn't a marathon.  It's a maze. 

We walk straight into brick walls, take wrong turns and, we have to continue trying to figure out the path that will get us to where we want to go.  Time and patience alone won't do it.  Staring down that image in the mirror and vowing to keep going forward (even when you run into brick walls) is the only thing that works.   Knowing with everything in you that there is no going back to where you began - no matter how familiar that path might feel.