Staying Motivated

Figure out why you want to lose weight. If you know why you want to change, then maybe it'll inspire you to keep going. If you don't have a strong reason, a why, then you won't change permanently. I changed so that I'd feel better, look better and live longer. Every day I make the choice for those things. What makes you want to lose weight? When I feel snacky, I chew gum or see if a 1/2 bag of popcorn will fit into my daily calories. I will also drink a diet soda or some water. Also, move. Get off the couch and go for a walk or go fold laundry or whatever makes you do something other than sit and think about eating stuff when you're not really hungry!

I believe in setting up the plan to maximize making it easy, rather than to lose weight fast. If I work on changing habits in (relatively) happy ways, then I can usually continue those habits almost on autopilot once life gets complicated. The times when I have motivation or willpower - both fleeting things, for me - are for identifying a new/desired habit, making the change, then practicing until it becomes routine. This may be a small step at a time, but it leads somewhere, in a way that stop-and-go doesn't!

On the specific points of stress or boredom: If the root problem isn't hunger, fueling or nutrition, then the best solution isn't food.

For boredom: Resume an old hobby, or start a new one, to be less bored/more engaged. Bonus points if the hobby requires clean hands (such as sketching, needlework, playing a musical instrument, etc.), or creates dirty hands (such as painting, gardening, carpentry, etc.). Things that get you away from foods, such as a walk outdoors, can also be good.

For stress: If you can reduce or eliminate the stress, do it. Otherwise, different things are good stress management techniques for different people. Some to consider: Exercise (not extreme, mild to moderate), journaling, meditation, hot bath or shower with nice-smelling soap, enjoyable music, watching/listening to comedy movies/podcasts, reading amusing books, prayer if religious, adult coloring books, getting out in nature, hot herb tea or other soothing non-caloric beverage, playing with pets, etc.

I tend to eat when I'm bored or stressed too. The trick is to reach for other things when something triggers you to seek comfort or company in food.

Make a "To do" list of what you can do instead. Reach for that instead of food and see if it stops the impulse.

(I've just thought of it so I don't know if it will work. I'm going to try it myself.)

Motivation is a fleeting emotion. Nobody is 100% motivated all of the time and we all do things on the daily for which we aren't motivated and they are just routine. One issue I often see is lack of flexibility in what people are doing and it becomes an all or nothing thing...so when they do something "bad" they just say screw it all, I messed up.

I am flexible in both my diet and exercise regimen. As diet goes I eat well most of the time and for the most part my meals are planned out for the week on Saturday or Sunday so that we can go do the shopping. But I also plan in indulgences...like Fridays are "no cook" nights so that's typically when we go out or get take-out or have our pizza and movie night. I brown bag my lunch 4 days of the week and have 1 day that I go out for lunch and maybe that's a burger from Blake's or some Popeye's Chicken or Teriyaki Chicken Bowl or whatever. That lets me look forward to those things instead of those things being always things. They're also planned...I didn't do anything "bad" and they don't magically erase all of my other good nutrition.

There are also certain things that I just don't keep in the house because once I get going on them there's no stopping...other things I can easily moderate. If those things that I cannot moderate are not in the house, I'm not going to indulge in them...they aren't there.

As exercise goes I'm a big believer in doing things you enjoy doing. People tend to take a very myopic view of what constitutes "exercise". Unless I'm actively training for an event of some kind, most of my daily exercise is active recreation. I walk my dog most days...I enjoy a good hike on the weekend...I enjoy going to the foothills with my MTB or cruising a cross country single track...getting on my road bike and riding the path along the Rio Grande...kayaking with the family, etc. These things don't require a ton of motivation...they are recreational activities that I enjoy that also happen to be physical in nature. Training is another matter and requires more rigidity and I have learned from my past mistakes that I can't train all year around as it does start to take the fun out of things so I've decided going forward to keep it to one event with a 12 week or so training block...and then it's back to just having fun for the rest of the 9 months of the year.