Negative emotions and weight loss.

I have recently seen a lot of people experiencing negative emotions because they are not at their goal yet. Negative emotions are natural at times, issues arise when you let them control your behavior. All of us are here to improve ourselves for the better, this includes emotionally too. This can be summed up with the latin phrase “cuerpo sano mente sana” this translates to “a sound body a sound mind.” The stronger our mind becomes, the stronger our bodies can become. The stronger our bodies become, the stronger our mind is.

Some people get upset and dwell on the fact they missed a workout, or ate something they weren’t supposed to. Is this really the first time you ever missed a workout or ate something you weren’t supposed to? I can almost guarantee you it’s not. So what makes this time so much more special to get upset over? What good does beating yourself up do? It just makes you feel bad, does feeling bad produce better results? We all know it doesn’t. As some have said on these forums, “we’re human, we’re not robots.”

Most goal setting exercises are to set a deadline with a goal and work towards it. Nothing wrong with that. The issues a raise when we don’t accomplish the goal we expected by our deadline. We expect to lose 2lbs once a week, and we gain one pound. This would put some people in a complete rage. If every time you stepped on your scale and thought about your starting weight and how far you come. It won’t be a big deal if you gain that 1lbs. A lot of people say “I worked my butt off this week and lost nothing.” Does this imply when you reach your goal you’re going to stop exercising and stop eating right? The key here is to exercise and eat right for better health and fitness.

You have no control of what happens, all you can do is control yourself. You can’t control how much you lose by when. That’s not really up to you. What you can do is control when you workout and what you eat. This might be a better goal for some people, to “constantly” improve their diet and their exercise. What do I mean by constantly? Small gradual changes over time. It’s very difficult for the body just to dive in to something that it’s not used to. Marathon runners didn’t wake up one morning and say “hey today I am going to run 15miles” Some marathon runners started out being heavy, some started out thin. They all started at a point that is right for them, and built on that. You can do the same with your exercise routine and your diet. I personally believe expecting too much too soon can more than likely lead to failure. I don’t believe a deadline for goals. Yes of course you need motivation and desire and push, it shouldn’t come from an external force such as a “deadline.” Deadlines build up stress in the body which isn’t good for us. The motivation and desire should come from within to reach your goal. As I said before you can’t control “when” you reach it. All you can control is how often you train and work towards it. I don’t believe negative emotions go well with weightloss.