Take a look at your priorities and your goals.
Where did they come from?

Are they the products of soul-searching, self-analysis, and careful planning?
Or are they a reaction to pressures from other people?
Did you find them within yourself or within the pages of a magazine?

The answers to these questions are important
because they tell you if the person you're becoming
is someone you want to be.
Here's another way to look at a goal:
do you want it, or do you just think you should want it?

It's not easy to follow your own direction in life.
But it's more possible than you may think.

Question everything.
Every priority in your life needs to justify why it's there.
If you can't come up with a good reason
that actually comes from YOU, maybe it doesn't belong
. 

"To be nobody but yourself
--in a world which is doing its best, night and day,
to make you everybody else—

means to fight the hardest battle
which any human being can fight;
and never stop fighting."

...................by EE Cummings, poet

Anyone who has read very many of my prior posts should be aware that
I am a 5'0" tall medium-to-small-boned woman
who spent most of my adult life over 200 lbs, with a high of 271 lbs.

I have gained and lost over 100 lbs three separate times in my life.
Usually these this re-gains happened within about a 6 month time period,
simply by choosing to eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted.

Total freedom with food exacts a high price.

There are tall, large-boned women who can be attractive
and in good physical health at 200 lbs or more.
However, I am not one of these women.

I learned to accept and love myself, (through many years of therapy)
even when I was extremely obese.
That does not mean that I liked being enormously fat.

It has taken a great deal of very hard work to arrive at my current size,
and it takes a great deal of hard work to stay here.

I am very aware . . .from my own history. . .
that if I decide to allow myself to simply eat what I want whenever I want, 
that within 6 months to a year, I again will be 200, 270, or higher.

The only thing that would stop my body's weight ascent,
would be a return to controlled eating.
Then, I would have to control what I eat. . .
…to diet. . .just to stay 200, 250, or 300 lbs.
I know for a fact that there is no limit to how many lbs I can gain.
Therefore, I remain viligent and committed.

Like everyone else, I also want to be happy, healthy and free.
But for me, freedom with food, exacts a price I no longer want to pay.
In order to stay happy and healthy, I have to be willing to limit and control my eating.

Every Diet requires limits and controls over food intake.
In a perfect world, I could eat whatever I want, whenever I want to
and my body would adapt to a reasonable size.
But this is not a perfect world.

 
Makes 1 serving

Ingredients:

6 pieces Asparagus, boiled, drained

Sauce:
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
1 package dry McCormick Hollandaise Sauce Mix
1 cup water

Directions:

Break woody ends off 6 stalks of Asparagus,
and steam for about 4-5 minutes.

Spray non-stick coating on small saucepan
Melt butter in pan
Stir in Sauce mix
Whisk in 1 cup water.
Bring to a boil while stirring continuously
then simmer for about 1 minute until sauce thickens.
2 Tablespoons is 1 serving.

6 stalks of asparagus and 2 TB Hollandaise Sauce =1 serving
1 serving is:

Calories: 70
Carbs: 4.3 grams
Protein 2.4 grams

                      
Here is a picture of the men who were in "Starvation mode
during the famous 1940s Minnesota Starvation Research project of Dr. Ancel Keys.

People online tend to throw around the term "starvation mode" quite a bit. I've done a great deal of research on this issue,and as a result of my study,  I agree with the Experts who say that "starvation mode"...as it is commonly defined...is a Dieting Myth. Starvation mode doesn't happen until one is actually starving.

Bottom line, unless you are genetically like one of those Zucker rats that Gary Taubes talks about in "Why We Get Fat And What To Do About It"if you have more body fat than the picture above, you aren't in "starvation mode".

I very much like this quote from Brad Pilon, author of Eat Stop Eat, on the Metabolism issue:

"Unless you have a degree in human biology…and in many cases even if you do…you do not understand what ‘metabolism’ means.

Eating Less Calories isn't Dangerous for your Metabolism,

This word gets thrown around the fitness and diet media and is used to scare people into thinking there is a dangerous level of calories that will destroy their metabolism. This of course is a false premise considering your ‘metabolism’ isn’t a thing that can be destroyed or sped up or slowed down (not without drugs).

“Metabolism’ is just the sum of the processes of your body on a cellular/systemic level...that’s it…that’s all it’s ever been…nothing more. So what…who cares. Why do fitness marketers keep talking about it?!  I’ll never know.

And there is virtually nothing you can do to change this. Eating at or below your actual BMR isn’t going to ‘damage’ your metabolism any more than eating above it. And speaking of which, why don’t marketers suggest that there could be ‘metabolic damage’ when people overeat!?…anyone…anyone?

Right, just what I thought, this lie doesn’t lead to lucrative weight loss products.

The following claims are false, and are your best way to know that a person is clueless about biology and physiology and nutrition if they say:

"Eating too few calories is going to ’slow’ your metabolism" (unless they’re referring to people who are starving to death…and are in fact about to die)

"That there are foods that can ‘damage’ your metabolism"

That you can speed up or slow down your metabolism (without drugs…and that this would be a good thing in either direction)

That a slow metabolism is responsible for weight gain

That a fast metabolism is responsible for weight loss

That you have any control whatsoever over your metabolic rate

That your meal timing or exercise timing can affect your metabolic rate

…and any other garbage claim you hear from any fitness marketer with the word “metabolism” in it…

If you see any of the above claims, you can be assured that the person who said them is sorely lacking in their understanding of how the body works.

If you want to lose weight…EAT LESS than you are currently eating. End of story."

 
Successful weight-loss requires establishing new eating Habits.
For successful maintenance of that weight-loss,
one must create a new “normal” which is based on those Habits.

A Habit is a settled tendency or usual manner of behavior.
Specifically here, a behavior pattern acquired by frequent repetition
that shows itself in regularity or increased facility of performance; and
an acquired mode of behavior that has become nearly or completely involuntary.

Habit comes from repeated behavior.

Willpower is defined as energetic determination.

Willpower and Habit are related.
because Habits are ESTABLISHED…
i.e. brought into existence via some act of will…
…..one’s choice or determination…
and it initially takes willpower to establish a habit.