Goals
So the first thing, in my opinion and the opinion of many bloggers and fitness experts, that you need for a successful weight loss plan are goals. But you say "Mimi, I already set my goals. I want to lose weight this year."
Well that's fine and dandy and all but that's not going to get you anywhere. I taught a College Success Strategies class last semester and in the book I used, the author Skip Downing, (any of you in higher ed may have heard of him. I met him at a workshop. Fascinating guy) According to Skip to be truly motivating, a goal needs five qualities. You can remember them by applying the DAPPS rule. "DAPPS" is an acronym for Dated, Achievable, Personal, Positive and Specific.
What I learned while teaching that class was that many people do not set goals this way. When I asked my students what was their goals in life it was always something vague such as "I want to graduate from college, get a job and have a great career." Those were great goals but they didn't mean anything. When I asked them to elaborate they would just give me a blank stare. I had to break it down to them. First goal was to graduate from college. Well the first thing would be to graduate from community college in 2 years, transfer to university and graduate 2 years from there.
This goal was dated and specific, as well as Personal since it was what they wanted to do and not what their parents wanted, it was postitive because an education can never hurt right? And it was specific. Now let's apply that to weight loss.
I said in my last blog that I started my weight loss journey in May 2010. Now I could have set my goal to be that I lost 30 pounds by December, but I knew realistically that was not achievable. I have a full time job and a 2 year old and I still loved pizza. So that was not happening.
I set my goal that I would lose a dress size by Christmas. There I dated it. That give me six months. (Which I did achieve.) That was more than achievable. and it was Personal. That is another important thing. Your goals have to be for you. It had to be something you desire, not just something someone else wants for you. I started losing weight because I wanted to do it. I wanted to look a certain was for me. My husband has always emphasized how he loves me regardless. In fact he doesn't even want me to lose that much weight because he's afraid my hips might disappear. I had to reassure him that no matter what I weighed these hips have been my faithful companions since I was 14.
So again make sure you're doing this for you.
Next is being Positive. Motivating goals focus your energy on what you do want rather than what you don't want. So rather than saying you want to lose weight because you don't want to be fat, say that you'd like to lose weight so that you can be healthy, have more energy and feel better about yourself.
And finally Specific. Motivating goals again according to Skip, state outcomes in specific, measurable terms. It's not enough to say I'll lose weight this year or that my goal is to work harder. How will you know when you've achieved your goals? I set my goal this holiday season to at least maintain my weight. I wasn't even trying to lose weight because resistance was futile. I'm a slave to cakes and everyone knows that Christmas is the time that everyone bakes. I'm talking about the time between Thanksgiving and New Years. So I weighed myself and saw that I weighed 176. I was like alright, we are staying at 176 or going down. I went to 2 different houses for Thanksgiving but I only ate at one house and had dessert at the other. I actually baked cookies and cupcakes for my class on the last day of class. I had a holiday party at work that was full of food. For Christmas I went to THREE different houses for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Again I only ate at two houses, the third one was my mother in law's house. I was so exhausted I just laid down on the couch and slept until it was time to go home. My son's birthday party was the next day where it was an Ice Cream party!! As you can see temptation was EVERYWHERE!
On January 2 I weighed myself and was pleasantly surprised that I had not only reached my goal by not gaining any weight, somehow I had managed to lose 4 pounds. I was so proud of myself. It felt good to reach that goal.I went back to work today and many people complimented me on losing weight.
Being specific I learned keeps you from believing you've achieved a goal when in fact you haven't. It also helps you make choices that create positive results.
So what are my goals for this year? I've created a vision board with all my goals on it thanks again to Oprah. I will post the board as soon as I'm done with it. But my goals for 2011 is to lose 20 lbs by June 1st. I've decided that I needed to drink more water. So I will be adding at least 3 glasses of water to my day everyday. I will also eat at least 3 fistful sizes of fruits and/or vegetables everyday WITH every meal. That's right ladies. We need to be eating fruits and veggies with every meal! Today I failed miserably at both the water and the fruits and veggies but I'm not giving up. I just want to add though that there are no good fruits in the winter months. So it's not my fault really, I can't wait for summer to come! LOL
So remember the "DAPPS" rule when you sit down to set your goals I certainly plan on it.
Well that's fine and dandy and all but that's not going to get you anywhere. I taught a College Success Strategies class last semester and in the book I used, the author Skip Downing, (any of you in higher ed may have heard of him. I met him at a workshop. Fascinating guy) According to Skip to be truly motivating, a goal needs five qualities. You can remember them by applying the DAPPS rule. "DAPPS" is an acronym for Dated, Achievable, Personal, Positive and Specific.
What I learned while teaching that class was that many people do not set goals this way. When I asked my students what was their goals in life it was always something vague such as "I want to graduate from college, get a job and have a great career." Those were great goals but they didn't mean anything. When I asked them to elaborate they would just give me a blank stare. I had to break it down to them. First goal was to graduate from college. Well the first thing would be to graduate from community college in 2 years, transfer to university and graduate 2 years from there.
This goal was dated and specific, as well as Personal since it was what they wanted to do and not what their parents wanted, it was postitive because an education can never hurt right? And it was specific. Now let's apply that to weight loss.
I said in my last blog that I started my weight loss journey in May 2010. Now I could have set my goal to be that I lost 30 pounds by December, but I knew realistically that was not achievable. I have a full time job and a 2 year old and I still loved pizza. So that was not happening.
I set my goal that I would lose a dress size by Christmas. There I dated it. That give me six months. (Which I did achieve.) That was more than achievable. and it was Personal. That is another important thing. Your goals have to be for you. It had to be something you desire, not just something someone else wants for you. I started losing weight because I wanted to do it. I wanted to look a certain was for me. My husband has always emphasized how he loves me regardless. In fact he doesn't even want me to lose that much weight because he's afraid my hips might disappear. I had to reassure him that no matter what I weighed these hips have been my faithful companions since I was 14.
So again make sure you're doing this for you.
Next is being Positive. Motivating goals focus your energy on what you do want rather than what you don't want. So rather than saying you want to lose weight because you don't want to be fat, say that you'd like to lose weight so that you can be healthy, have more energy and feel better about yourself.
And finally Specific. Motivating goals again according to Skip, state outcomes in specific, measurable terms. It's not enough to say I'll lose weight this year or that my goal is to work harder. How will you know when you've achieved your goals? I set my goal this holiday season to at least maintain my weight. I wasn't even trying to lose weight because resistance was futile. I'm a slave to cakes and everyone knows that Christmas is the time that everyone bakes. I'm talking about the time between Thanksgiving and New Years. So I weighed myself and saw that I weighed 176. I was like alright, we are staying at 176 or going down. I went to 2 different houses for Thanksgiving but I only ate at one house and had dessert at the other. I actually baked cookies and cupcakes for my class on the last day of class. I had a holiday party at work that was full of food. For Christmas I went to THREE different houses for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Again I only ate at two houses, the third one was my mother in law's house. I was so exhausted I just laid down on the couch and slept until it was time to go home. My son's birthday party was the next day where it was an Ice Cream party!! As you can see temptation was EVERYWHERE!
On January 2 I weighed myself and was pleasantly surprised that I had not only reached my goal by not gaining any weight, somehow I had managed to lose 4 pounds. I was so proud of myself. It felt good to reach that goal.I went back to work today and many people complimented me on losing weight.
Being specific I learned keeps you from believing you've achieved a goal when in fact you haven't. It also helps you make choices that create positive results.
So what are my goals for this year? I've created a vision board with all my goals on it thanks again to Oprah. I will post the board as soon as I'm done with it. But my goals for 2011 is to lose 20 lbs by June 1st. I've decided that I needed to drink more water. So I will be adding at least 3 glasses of water to my day everyday. I will also eat at least 3 fistful sizes of fruits and/or vegetables everyday WITH every meal. That's right ladies. We need to be eating fruits and veggies with every meal! Today I failed miserably at both the water and the fruits and veggies but I'm not giving up. I just want to add though that there are no good fruits in the winter months. So it's not my fault really, I can't wait for summer to come! LOL
So remember the "DAPPS" rule when you sit down to set your goals I certainly plan on it.
I need to eat more fruit/veggies and drink more water, too.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to start with at least 1 fruit/veggie per meal. I'll match your 3 glasses of water.
Maybe we can help each other.
I've been failing miserably on the water part. I really need to step it up! Especially since I'm now working out twice a day! I'm going to make myself pass out!
ReplyDelete