Welcome to Winter

Those of us who live in West Michigan are bracing for a winter storm that's moving in this afternoon.  We've had a relatively mild winter so far with very little snow - and I'm not complaining :-).  It was a bit disappointing this year to not have a white Christmas, but once the holidays are over I'm never excited to see the white stuff on the ground.  It's funny how excited we can get about snow just before Christmas and so less-than-excited about snow in January, knowing it could be on the ground for the next three months.  Same snow, but a different attitude.

That may be where you are with your feelings about Take Shape for Life/Medifast right now.  The initial "wow, this is great and I'm losing weight" excitement may be fading, or it may even be gone.  All you may be thinking right now is "I'm going to have to eat this for the next X number of months," or "I can't have any of my favorite foods ever again."  The newness and novelty is gone and you've settled into a new routine.  The initial big weight loss has now been replaced by smaller losses each week.  If I just described you, welcome to Take Shape for Life/Medifast winter.

The challenge is how to keep moving forward and stay on plan when it's not fun anymore.  How do you keep motivated on days when you aren't sure you can look at another Medifast meal, let alone eat it?

The answer boils down to one thing:  staying focused on what you want.  You are in the process of creating something amazing in your life.  Take a moment to picture yourself at goal - really, take a moment to do this.  What do you look like?  How do you feel?  Imagine having fun shopping; imagine possibly being off one or two prescription medications; imagine your joints not hurting and being able to run if you want.  Get that mental picture firmly in your mind, then don't let go of it.

If you have a clear image of what you are creating, one lost pound at a time, then making the choices you need to stay on plan becomes much easier.  Once I had a clear image in my mind of what my life would be like once I reached my goal (and the reality is SO much better than even what I envisioned), I literally viewed off-plan foods as obstacles that stood between where I was and where I wanted to be.  It's not that I wasn't tempted - because I was often tempted - but I knew I wanted something far better than the brownie that was calling my name.

It is really a shift in orientation to move from focusing on our day-to-day actions to embracing the reality that we are creating something - a healthy, vibrant life.

My encouragement today is to take a few minutes to create a picture of what goal will look like for you.  Once you have that clearly in mind, choose wisely :-)