On Friday morning I was interviewed by a nice young woman named Amanda, on behalf of her company which is creating some sort of digital diet coaching platform designed to"create and maintain behavioral changes by providing education, individual recommendations, support and other tools for a healthier life." They are talking to various "community leaders" (woo-hoo, I'm a community leader?) to get feedback. I am not a gadgety person, nor do I have much interest in commercial weight loss tools, but Amanda was nice and the product sounds like it could be helpful to some people, so I agreed to be interviewed.
It was a good review for me. It's been a while since I rehashed my philosophy for anyone. Plus, it's always rather enjoyable, when someone asks how you lost weight and expects a complicated answer, to say simply, "Diet and exercise." I think Amanda may have been a bit disappointed or at least surprised by my lack of commercial tools, but really, so very little is needed to successfully lose weight and get healthier. You need access to a good scale, and something to record your progress on. You need measuring cups and a food scale. You need a mirror. And that's pretty much it. You don't require anything fancy for work outs --- your own body provides everything you need.
What you do need, that you might not have, is information. I've said it before and I'll say it again. The very best thing you can do for your health and fitness is to educate yourself about nutrition. Just because something says on the package or the restaurant menu that it's healthy or "light" or has 50% less than the leading whatever does NOT make it good for you. Learn what really is good for you, and then figure out how to make it doable for you.
Same with exercise. If you're like me, you just have to start out doing whatever you can stand, as much of it as you can stand. But one day you may well discover that you really LIKE working out, and that you CAN really push yourself harder and enjoy it. You won't enjoy it every time. Some days it will be all you can do to pry your ass off the couch and go for a twenty minute walk. Some days it will suck, suck, suck. But it will suck a whole lot less when your pants start fitting looser, you discover that you don't really care whether you have to walk up four flights of stairs, and the bathroom mirror reveals some wicked biceps that are going look smokin' in your tank tops this summer.
Doing that interview reminded me about accountability, which is one of the reasons I write this blog. Publicly discussing my struggles, my successes and failures, helps keep me on track. I ate better on Friday and Saturday just because I thought about it. It also helped remind me that I can always get back on track.
So, I got up this morning, I did my P90X Core Synergistics (which is a fun, varied, but tough workout) and am ready to face the day. I am thinking ahead about the next few months, my new tougher schedule, and how this is going to work.
Thanks to my fabulous new agents, I am booked pretty solidly for the rest of the year. The travel craziness, never knowing what my living situation is going to look like until I get there (and therefore not knowing what food storage and prep or workout space I have), the hectic schedule ... these things are not going to change. For the past couple of months, I have allowed these things to throw me a little, but now it's time to face up to it and just figure out a way to make it work. I need some new guidelines. So that's the next project.
There's always a next step. You just have to find it.
A continuing inspiration, Ms. Sadler. :-)
Posted by: Laurel Boyd Porter | May 01, 2011 at 05:08 PM