Willpower and Determination
Jayfeather15
Posts: 107 Member
Does anyone have any tips on staying focused and not losing the will to diet? Does keeping a picture of a toned hot body help?
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Replies
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"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".11
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If you eat filling foods so that your satiety is always high you don't need any of those.
Still though for determination my mirror helps a lot.0 -
A particular woman that makes me jealous every time I think about her, for some reason I've not been able to get her out of my head but I know before this last pregnancy I was at my ideal weight for my body type and I felt 100 times sexier than her. Just hearing her name or the thought of her makes me want to go for a run. It's my own internal driving force7
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For me it's coming on here regularly and tracking every little thing I ingest. I feel like everyone here is holding me accountable and It feels great to share the small wins and receive the encouragement.
The calorie tracking makes me way more careful about my choices.
My Fitbit also has helped. It's constantly reminding me it's "step o clock" or "take me for a walk!" Lol.
I enjoy cooking so Ive gotten myself excited about trying out different healthy recipes and finding some really good ones that are satisfying and taste great.
I'm basically making diet and fitness my lifestyle and I'm not gonna lie it's almost becoming addicting. I usually love my red wine and haven't had that!
Also weighing myself daily (lots of ppl disagree with that) helps to keep me motivated and on track.
I used to watch YouTube videos on countless other topics. Now I can spend hours sometimes looking up different workouts, healthy food recipes, just watching videos of health and fitness gurus making good choices. It can be inspiring.9 -
THIS. I should do that.A particular woman that makes me jealous every time I think about her, for some reason I've not been able to get her out of my head but I know before this last pregnancy I was at my ideal weight for my body type and I felt 100 times sexier than her. Just hearing her name or the thought of her makes me want to go for a run. It's my own internal driving force
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Take a look at this page.
http://www.aworkoutroutine.com/how-to-succeed-at-new-years-resolutions/
He talks about motivation about halfway down and it is a good read. It may not be what you are looking for, but it is of interest.
Short answer is motivation is pretty short lived.4 -
You actually can't rely on "willpower" to stay on a diet. Willpower is something that works okay in small doses to overcome immediate problems but is not sustainable or long term. Forming better habits and being patient are far more reliable tools. Work on thinking "I'm going to do X" and then doing it. One day at a time. Rather than worrying about the control required to stop yourself from doing something.13
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what you have described above is exactly what will power is.0
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Willpower and determination always fail me. I stick to the numbers and trust the system.3
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I use my beloved sport for many years as my motivation "Table Tennis" I've played in my primary and secondary years as a overweight athlete honestly but i'm the best player of my team i mean it lol, but still behind of my success winning some of championships I still get criticism from other people because of my body the negative ones. After those days it is a last year of my high school and it is my last year to play with my team and I want to prove to those people who get descriminating me because of my body that they are wrong! I decided to change myself for the better me and I use those bad peoples as my determination to reach my goals. And now im in my College years playing as a varsity of my dearly University here in my country successful and those who doubts me that I can't be fit for life they are wrong and I enjoy ignoring them! It is just my thoughts of me but im still humbling down behind my wins and i'm never be bitter to my defeats! Just find yourself and you can be as what you want!1
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Not being restrictive with food choices helps stay "on" your diet... Strict,with calories, but not restricted.5
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what you have described above is exactly what will power is.
uh ... no, it's not. http://dramyjohnson.com/2015/01/why-willpower-doesnt-work/
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I keep recalling how I used to look and feel in my same clothes I wear now, and how angry I get when I see the number on the scale and tape measure. Then I take it one day at a time; the present is all we have anyway. I also look at pics of fit people to kind of remind myself that I can do better and I have done better and not to remain in a slump.1
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Mine is that I want to get my BP and cholesterol down and stay healthy. Most of the issues that run in the family don't care your weight, but can be somewhat helped with diet and meds.0
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Relative strength goals keep me focused. A wise man once said "I don't care if you can bench over a grand; if you can't get your fat *kitten* off the toilet without using your hands, you are not strong."2
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EbonyDahlia wrote: »what you have described above is exactly what will power is.
uh ... no, it's not. http://dramyjohnson.com/2015/01/why-willpower-doesnt-work/
Still sounds like will power.1 -
Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
Actually, there are plenty of things that tastes as good, if not better, than fit feels. I hate this quote and all derivations of it.
All I've got is that I take a break every 3-4 months and eat like I used to.7 -
Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
So not true, lol.
OP, you just have to find a sustainable diet for you. If you cut out what you like and kill yourself at the gym... it will just never work.4 -
Willpower doesn't work for long term weight control. Willpower is what you exercise when you walk past the dessert table at a party, but if you go home after the party and eat a quart of ice cream you are still going to be fat, even though you exercised willpower.
Rather than willpower, what you need are systems in place to deal with when things don't go as planned. Let's say you have a lapse in judgement and you do eat a quart of ice cream. What are you going to do about that? Maybe ask yourself why you felt the need to eat that much. Maybe consider whether you should have a quart in the freezer at all. What steps are required to make up for the over indulgence? Skip a meal? Reduce calories over a period of time? Go for a run? Continue with your calorie deficit unchanged? Know before the action what action you will need to take to make up for it. Then make your decision based on whether you are willing to take the followup action.8 -
At this point, I've developed some obesity-exacerbated health issues that will mess me up big time if I don't take the weight off. Basically, because I was carrying over 100 pounds of unnecessary weight, the veins in my legs collapsed (refluxed) from having to support it. My lymphatic system has been impacted (lymph edema). So, in plain speaking?
If I break the skin on my lower leg in any way, it is now extremely prone to infection. Sometimes a topical ointment like polysporin/neosporin does the trick, but if it doesn't, we're talking oral antibiotics. That first lymph edema flare-up meant water blisters on a badly swollen calf and seven courses of antibiotics plus about four months of daily visits from homecare nurses to change the dressings. (2 courses of antibiotic A, because the first dose seemed to be working but not enough. The second did nothing. They cultured the wound and prescribed antibiotic B, which did nothing. Neither did C. By the time they got the results back and realized that D would do the trick, it took three courses.)
A couple of months ago, my treadmill tried to kill me. It accelerated from 3.0 to 5.3 as I was stepping onto the belt and I scraped a 1"x3" patch off my shin. Two courses of antibiotic A to fix that one.
And since this is now a risk for any cut/scrape/scratch on that leg, I might well develop a tolerance to certain antibiotics, which will give me more grief.
I'm wearing compression stockings to help the circulation, but bottom line? My condition can be managed, not cured. It could flare up again. And if losing weight will help reduce the likelihood? Let's just say I'm pretty motivated right now.4 -
Find a way of eating and a level of activity that keeps you at the correct calorie level without needing willpower. It can take some trial and error, but once you find it, you're golden.5
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Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
Actually, there are plenty of things that tastes as good, if not better, than fit feels. I hate this quote and all derivations of it.
All I've got is that I take a break every 3-4 months and eat like I used to.
In the context of curing disordered eating it's a great quote.
I hate the contradiction of struggling to lose wt and promoting eating (that induces excessive) at the same time. That's disordered thinking, too.1 -
endlessfall16 wrote: »Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
Actually, there are plenty of things that tastes as good, if not better, than fit feels. I hate this quote and all derivations of it.
All I've got is that I take a break every 3-4 months and eat like I used to.
In the context of curing disordered eating it's a great quote.
I hate the contradiction of struggling to lose wt and promoting eating (that induces excessive) at the same time. That's disordered thinking, too.
Okay, I must be inferring the meaning differently than you. To me, "nothing tastes as good as thin/skinny/fit feels" means "if you want to be thin/skinny/fit, don't eat". That certainly doesn't "cure" disordered eating in my book.
How do you interpret the meaning of the saying? How does it "cure" disordered eating?1 -
Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
That's like saying, "The sky isn't as blue as the ocean is wet." It is a truth statement that is impossible to prove and even if one could, what do we do with it? What you eat doesn't keep you from being fit. Take a piece of chocolate cake for example. This seems like something that someone should use willpower to avoid if they want to be fit, but if you're in the middle of a four hour bicycle ride, a piece of chocolate cake will not only not hurt you, it might be just the kind of thing you need to let you finish the ride.
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I certainly don't surround myself with pictures of "hot toned bodies" because those are MODELS... typically those that got gifted with a certain selection of genetic makeup, often undergone surgery, and the pictures are often Photoshopped somehow, and in the end...that simply won't be *my* body. I likely will not ever look like those people and many if not all are not realistic. I don't like going for unrealistic comparisons. It feels really bad.
And I don't want to put a picture of an older version of me, because the body I had at 30 just isn't the one I have today. Even if I get to the weight I was at then, or even less, it just won't be the same. So that's not something I want to compare myself to either.
What do I prefer to surround myself with? Actually, pictures of places I'd like to go with my healthy body... nice beaches... mountains to hike up... rivers to kayak on... Parisian streets to bike to a croissant shop... and so on. That's realistic--sort of. No matter where I go, there'll I be, hopefully healthy, trim, and enjoying the ride.5 -
endlessfall16 wrote: »Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
Actually, there are plenty of things that tastes as good, if not better, than fit feels. I hate this quote and all derivations of it.
All I've got is that I take a break every 3-4 months and eat like I used to.
In the context of curing disordered eating it's a great quote.
I hate the contradiction of struggling to lose wt and promoting eating (that induces excessive) at the same time. That's disordered thinking, too.
Okay, I must be inferring the meaning differently than you. To me, "nothing tastes as good as thin/skinny/fit feels" means "if you want to be thin/skinny/fit, don't eat". That certainly doesn't "cure" disordered eating in my book.
How do you interpret the meaning of the saying? How does it "cure" disordered eating?
Yes, we have very different interpretations.
To me It's very extreme and illogical to advocate "don't eat". Not eating is not possible for any moving living thing. Don't know why you take it that far.
Besides, it's the word "taste" which is a state of mind. I take it to mean being fit should come as a higher priority. If this priority always comes first as a rule, you can't have the excessive/overweight overeating. No?0 -
In fact, lots of things "taste" better than eating to millions of people who are fit, skinny. Millions are much more into the pleasure of power, wealth, traveling, etc. than that of eating.0
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A reasonable deficit is pretty manageable and easy IMO. I don't try to restrict every little "bad" thing either...I may not have desert every night, but I have it 2-3 days per week...I usually also have a maintenance day on the weekend.
It doesn't have to be sufferfest...it can actually be really easy. My biggest issue in a cut if forgoing nightly craft beers...but I fit a few in on the weekends.3 -
endlessfall16 wrote: »endlessfall16 wrote: »Landoficeandsnow wrote: »"Nothing tastes as good as fit feels".
Actually, there are plenty of things that tastes as good, if not better, than fit feels. I hate this quote and all derivations of it.
All I've got is that I take a break every 3-4 months and eat like I used to.
In the context of curing disordered eating it's a great quote.
I hate the contradiction of struggling to lose wt and promoting eating (that induces excessive) at the same time. That's disordered thinking, too.
Okay, I must be inferring the meaning differently than you. To me, "nothing tastes as good as thin/skinny/fit feels" means "if you want to be thin/skinny/fit, don't eat". That certainly doesn't "cure" disordered eating in my book.
How do you interpret the meaning of the saying? How does it "cure" disordered eating?
Yes, we have very different interpretations.
To me It's very extreme and illogical to advocate "don't eat". Not eating is not possible for any moving living thing. Don't know why you take it that far.
Besides, it's the word "taste" which is a state of mind. I take it to mean being fit should come as a higher priority. If this priority always comes first as a rule, you can't have the excessive/overweight overeating. No?
Nothing taste as good as skinny/thin/fit feels is a mantra in the eating disorder community to discourage people from eating.1 -
Thinking about the "big picture" sometimes helps. Think about where you want to be a year from now. Do you want to change your life for the better? Enjoy good health for many many years? Be strong, healthy and independent in your later years? Remind yourself that the decisions you make now will affect you for the rest of your life. Your future self will thank you.1
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