getting started

unmotivated

Hi all,

I guess im looking for some advice/suggestions on how to get motivated. At present im quite overweight (5'3'' and 15stone). I've lost lots of weight before but this time around I just can't seem to get myself started. I'll eat healthy for 2/3 days and then give up and pig out. I've never been particularly sporty (hate exercise really) but I do go to dance lessons once a week and walk. Just cant seem to get motivated which is bumming me out. And the worse I feel the more I eat.... Vicious cycle I know. So if anyone has any thoughts.....

Thanks

justsomebloke

ok to start off post up what you usually have as your healthy diet

unmotivated

Well I dont stick to a strick regime coz I dont think that really fits into my lifestyle. I tend to have high fibre cereal for lunch, salad/low fat sambo for lunch, pasta/rice stir-fry for dinner, yoghurts and fruit for snacks. It's not hugely different from my normal diet except i cut out takeaways and other crap.dont think id keep it up if it was too strict!

g'em

unmotivated wrote:

Well I dont stick to a strick regime coz I dont think that really fits into my lifestyle.

why does everyone always think that 'eating healthily' has to involve really strict dieting, calorie coutning and number crunching?? :rolleyes: If anything eating well just involves an initial effort to get organised and then it's easy. Once you establish a routine it then becomes more effort to eat unhealthily- it means you have to go out of your way to buy junk. By pre-pareparing meals you have them on hand and at your disposal so you never need miss a good meal.

unmotivated wrote:

I tend to have high fibre cereal for lunch, salad/low fat sambo for lunch, pasta/rice stir-fry for dinner, yoghurts and fruit for snacks.

well that's not horrifically bad, but you said in the OP that you tend to eat more when you feel down. Eating 5 or 6 small meals a day is a very effective way to control your appetite and manage your metabolism, enoucarging weight loss. Take another look at the foods you're eating. The high-fibre cereal you eat at breakfast- look at the ingredients and check how much sugar it contains. Is it packed with dried fruits, honey and other sweeteners? Most people actually eat cereal servings that are way over the 'normal' size that the cereal box will give nutiritonal info on. Best way to start the day is with oats (porridge) or a sugar-free organic museli, or protein rich eggs that will fill you up and leave you nicely satiated. For lunch is your sambo on white or brown bread? Does it have sauces or mayo on it? Make the protien and salad portion of the meal greater than the carb portion, and the same would apply for dinner. In this country we're teribly guilty of eating hyoooge portions of rice and pasta that are way bigger than what our body actully needs. Are you eating white rice/ pasta or brown? If those carbs are not used later for energy in the evening via excercise they'll more than likely go unused and get stored as fat.

I know it's said time and time again here, but do have a good look through the stickies at the top of the page, especially this one, which will give you an idea of the types of foods you should be eating. A lot of the 'healthy' low-fat/ diet foods out there are actually just processed muck and not worth the money.

unmotivated

Hey,

Thanks for the advice. I guess my real question is not what I should be eating (I've lost 3 stone before so clearly I can do that) its just how to get motivated to do it. The only reason I posted about what I do eat is coz I was asked. I dont mean to sound ungrateful- I appreciate what you have siad- I'm just looking for a different type of info I guess.

Thanks

g'em

'tis no problem at all. Like you said, if you've lost the weight before you can do it again. But think about why you put the weight back on, identify the behaviours that led you to do that. Implementing long-term healthy eating patterns and excercising regulalry will mean the weight may come off slower than if you went on a crash diet (which is 99.99% of the time a bad idea for a gazillion reasons) but the weight will stay off, you'll feel beter, have more energy and be much better off for it.

personally my motivation recently has been photos- i keep photos of how i used to look (which i don't like) on hand to remind me why i'm trying to shape up and pictures of people whose physiques I admire to remind me how I want to look. Motivation can be hard, but sometimes you just have to stop making excuses (which we're all guilty of sometimes) and get on with it.

Best of luck

Dragan

unmotivated wrote:

Hey,

Thanks for the advice. I guess my real question is not what I should be eating (I've lost 3 stone before so clearly I can do that) its just how to get motivated to do it. The only reason I posted about what I do eat is coz I was asked. I dont mean to sound ungrateful- I appreciate what you have siad- I'm just looking for a different type of info I guess.

Thanks

It's at times like this that i wade in with the mighty boot of "honesty" so i might as well do this now.

Your posting here because you are not happy with how you look. Thats the root of the problem, if you didn't have an issue with how you look you would not need to seek motivation to start a positive change.

It's really as simply as being honesty with yourself. Do you want to change? Yes? So do? I'm gonna assume that your over the age of 17 and at a point where your mentally mature enough to make decisions with your brain, and not your belly.

There is no real reason to quit any "diet" after 2 or 3 days other than being mentally weak, which while being harsh it's also true and mental weakness can simply be compounded by a lack of planning and foresight.

It's really as simple as making a decision and a promise to yourself that you will stick to a diet, and then doing so. If you fail, you need to accept that failure, not just write it off as "oh well.....whatever."

You failed. Pick yourself and use that failure to fuel another try.

unmotivated

Thanks for your advice g'em- I like the idea of using dodgy photos- will try to dig some out!

Dragan wrote:

There is no real reason to quit any "diet" after 2 or 3 days other than being mentally weak.

Dragan wrote:

You failed.

Dragon- I'm sure you mean well but for me the above comments make me feel bad about myself and more likely to comfort eat as I pointed out in my initial message. I know I failed- you pointing it out does not motivate me any more than me knowing it myself.

g'em

unmotivated wrote:

Dragon- I'm sure you mean well but for me the above comments make me feel bad about myself and more likely to comfort eat as I pointed out in my initial message. I know I failed- you pointing it out does not motivate me any more than me knowing it myself.

I assure you he does mean well, he can just be a bit balck and white with his posting sometime!!!

Ok, comfort eating is something I can relate to, big style. But I'll also say that it's something I used to do all the time, became very good at allowing myself to do it because comfort eating is just "something that girls do"- when I had PMS, of course I was allowed chocolate! If it was a girls' night in, bring on the ice cream! If I was lonely/ angry/ annoyed there was a food to suit every emotion.

But comfort eating is still a bad idea, not matter how you dress it up. It's an excuse, and it's just a matter of time until you admit that to yourself.

You have a choice when it comes to food. Let's take your response to Dragan's post as an example- it upset you. Now, how do you react? Do you use it as an excuse to eat? How will you feel after eating? Guilt, remorse, disgust? And how will you resolve it? meh, you might even eat some more.

Or, you can think- okay, I'm upset. If I eat it'll make me more upset. But if I don't eat, I can feel proud of myself, I can feel positive, and that's infinitely better than feelilng terrible!

I know that sounds a bit wishy washy, but honestly, truly, you can train your mind to approach eating totally differently. For me, one of the biggest lessons I've had to teach myself is that there will always be other meals. I used to have a terrible habit of over-eating, but I had to learn to tell myself to chillax with the food, because another meal was just around the corner and I knew I'd enjoy it more if I had earned it.

Anyways, I'm waffling now, but all I'm trying to say is that you can choose how to feel about food, it just takes some practice

King of Kings

unmotivated wrote:

Thanks for your advice g'em- I like the idea of using dodgy photos- will try to dig some out!





Dragon- I'm sure you mean well but for me the above comments make me feel bad about myself and more likely to comfort eat as I pointed out in my initial message. I know I failed- you pointing it out does not motivate me any more than me knowing it myself.

Dragan may have been mean - but it's what you need to hear.
There is no point in us saying "There there" - that type of stuff is for the personal issue section.

I know what i'm talking about as ( a few years back) i've gone from 16 1/2 stone of jelly to 14 stone of a pretty decent muscular body...

I failed many a time it's the getting back up on the wagom makes you hit you goals and feel stronger mentality.

The important thing to remember is that you cannot chage your diet at once - the shock will be too much and you'll give up.

Start simple - my first steps were - giving up burgers/kebabs when I was out drinking and ensuring I drank 2 more litres of water a day.
Those 2 aspects alone helped me lose a good deal of weight and motivated me to bring in other aspects.

Now i try to eat 5-6 meals a day , train hard and reward myself with a pizza or indian once a week.

It not easy but also it's not terribily hard either.
At most is a bit of self dicipline and the ability to say "no" I'm not ordering a chinese cos I'm too lazy to cook or stop eating chocolate cos you're bored.

You have to ask yourself "How much do I want it?"

Jumpy

I had a person tell me the most important part of me starting my body change.

First comes effort then comes motivation.
Motivation comes from the effort you put into something, dont expect you to suddenly become motivated to get fit, because even if it does happen it will only be a spur of the moment thing and unlikely to last.

Do it even if you hate it. After 2 weeks it will become routine, then if you like.. kick it up a notch.

Expect to do what I did and fumble around for a while not understanding what to do to get the best results. Even on this forum to be honest people use a bit too much "in talk" so half the time I didnt have a clue what they meant. Google is your friend here.

But dont expect motivation to appear out of nowhere.