Expectations

      
I recently read that Life's greatest stresses come from unmet expectations.
Sometimes this is what keeps people from losing weight successfully
or maintaining weight loss.

We need to develop realistic expectations.
Things we see in television reality shows, like the Biggest Loser,
can give us unrealistic expectations about the amount of fat loss
that is possible for people who are dieting.

Even the "more reasonable" expectation of 2 to 2 ½ lbs of fat loss per week
isn't actually reasonable for the majority of people.
What is reasonable?
Many people who are 20 to 50 pounds or more overweight
can reasonably expect lose an average of 1 or 2 fat lbs per week,
IF they follow their dieting plan faithfully over time.

However, this rate of weight-loss doesn't usually occur
for those people who are a just a bit overweight, or at normal weight
and just want to drop lower in their weight range.
Some people are fortunate to lose ¼ to ½ fat lb per week
even when faithfully following a low-calorie food plan.

When starting a diet, most people expect to follow it.
Then Life happens.
Life has obstacles, and we need to expect them
in order to be able to handle them.

Expect to have multiple starts.
We could do well one week,
and then something happens that kills our daily plan.
It's important not to let that make us feel hopeless, helpless, defeated.
We need to have in the back of our minds,
alternate plans, like A, B, and C.
It's the people who are paralyzed in plan A who fall apart,
and find it impossible to sustain any kind of lifestyle change.

When we tell ourselves negative things,
and beat ourselves up for our imperfections,
we are our own worst enemy.

Substitute positive self-talk for negative self-talk
Each of us needs to come up with our own language of encouragement.

Just because you've achieved weight-loss
and are at your goal weight, doesn't mean you're done.
If you're thinking:
"I'm here, now I can be normal",
I have a news flash for you.

Normal means that we have to work at lower-calorie eating every day.
It can get easier with practice,
but we must surrender to the fact that this is necessary to do.
There's no negotiation.
You just go to another phase of your new lifestyle, and continue.