Creating Rules You Love

Dream it and you can achieve it! Well, not exactly…

It’s one thing to fantasize + dream about + pray for the day you’ll arrive at your goal weight. It’s another to actually gather the tools you need to do it, apply them and make it happen.

We like to spend a great deal of time imagining ourselves in our ideal body.

We visualize how we’ll look, the praise we’ll receive, the sarong free beach vacations, and all the new things we’ll enjoy doing as thinner versions of ourselves.

Envisioning feels amazing in the moment – we get a lovely dopamine surges that lights up our brains with anticipation. That’s why planning your next diet feels so good. But – as NYU psychologist Gabriele Oettingen discovered in her research – envisioning doesn’t correlate with actual achievement.

Remember The Secret? Exactly.

There is a key ingredient missing from this approach – and that ingredient is considering and planning for the obstacles that might get in our way. We need to think about the positive outcomes we want to achieve, while simultaneously creating strategies to overcome these obstacles.

Try it…

What are three obstacles that might be keeping you from reaching or maintaining your weight loss goal?

For example…

• Making poor choices when eating out.
• Eating too much at dinner.
• Letting myself get way too hungry and then eating everything in sight.

Now, come up with a strategy (or two or three) to overcome your top three obstacles.

If you have a set of strategies in place, you can avoid the grand internal debate. You know what I’m talking about.

Ooh there’s Lobster Mac and Cheese on the menu. That sounds amazing – and Sue is ordering it. But I shouldn’t – because I’ll feel terrible + stuffed + guilty if I do. But I might not have the chance to order it – ever again. And why does Sue get to have it? That’s not fair. She doesn’t even need to lose weight. Ugh, what should I do? Screw it, I’m ordering it.

Instead of relying on willpower to white-knuckle your way through potential pitfalls, come up with solutions. And by solutions, I mean a set of rules – your rules – rules that feel good + doable to you.

• If I’m out to dinner, I still make healthy choices.
• If I’m out to dinner, my limit is two glasses of wine.
• If someone orders dessert for the table, I take no more than three bites – but only if it’s something amazing and totally worth it.

Establishing a set of rules, eliminates the debating + justifying + negotiating.

Creating your own set of rules is not about being mean or punishing yourself. It’s about love. Tough love. Pure love.

And healthy is a place you get to with love.

XO ~Robyn

Robyn Spurr is a Certified Health & Weight Loss Coach, Personal Trainer and founder of Chickadee Weight Loss. She helps women end the suffering with food and their bodies and teaches them how to lose the weight – for good.