Photos courtesy of Stephen Odom and Mitch Frink Photography / Via mitchfrinkphotography.com
I had been wondering a lot about what keeps people motivated to continue on their weight loss journeys and I stumbled on a Buzzfeed article that shed some interesting insight.
In Here’s How This Man Quit Drugs, Alcohol, And Junk Food and Lost 125 Pounds, Stephen Odom listed six things that helped him:
1. Rewarding oneself: This made me think about how my restrictive diets every time I try to lose weight always leads to me craving and breaking to those foods. For Odom, it was junk food, for me it’s things like buttered toast.
2. Focus on a short term goal: He so aptly says that looking at the macro weight loss picture of “I want to lose 125 lbs” would seem so daunting, it would demotivate anybody. So instead of saying “I want to lose 15 lbs,” I should start saying “I want to lose 2 lbs this week,” and take it one day at a time.
3. Start small: Gradually eliminate unhealthy food from your diet rather than going cold turkey, Odom says.
4. Cook healthy meals you enjoy: I enjoy cooking but healthy food usually tastes pretty bland to me and I can’t keep it up after two weeks. So I’ll need to do some research on this one. Any website tips?
5. Do actions that build your self-esteem: Odom replaced running to food for comfort with “esteemable” actions like cleaning his room or riding his bicycle when he was feeling down.
6. Reward yourself: Again, instead of restricting yourself, enjoy those things you think are weaknesses (but in moderation).
I am going to try to approach my journey using Odom’s tips. I’ll let you know how it goes 🙂