Motivation

Several people have asked me how I've stayed motivated.  I put in so much effort, and reap small rewards, how do I get up every day and do it again?  I have lots of ways, but I'm going to focus on the most important two.

First: getting out of bed in the morning.  I do my gym sessions before work, which means I roll out of bed at 4:40 am.  Yes, 4:40.  It hurts to even type it.  I tried everything to make those mornings easier.  One big helper is to plan my workout the night before, so in the morning I can be on auto-pilot.  But sometimes that doesn't do it, so I enlisted the help of my husband, demanding that he literally kick me out of bed.  Take his foot, put it on my booty, and push.  That only works on mornings that he stays awake long enough to help!  So, here's what actually works for me, for work-outs and for eating.

I OWN my choices.

For my workouts, I read somewhere about the power of thought in making choices.  The change from "I can't" to "I won't" is huge.  So on the mornings when I realllllly don't want to get up, and my head starts in with, "I can't get up this morning, I'm too tired," I make the conscious decision to think, "I won't get up this morning."  And then I feel like a big brat, pouting that I *won't* do something, and that makes me get out of bed.  Another trick is when the husband asks if he needs set my gym alarm (the clock is on his side of the bed).  He says, "you going to the gym in the morning?" and I say, "I should," because it's easier for me to turn that "should" into "will".

Here's how it works for eating.  When temptation strikes (usually in the form of sweets!), I ask myself, "will this put you closer to or further from your goals?"  Some days the answer is, "further from, but I still want it!" and sometimes, it's "further from, walk away!"  Either way, the question slows me down enough to think about what I'm eating, and be confident about that choice.  Then I'm not staring at the scale the next day, thinking "well, I crap shouldn't have had that second cookie that I don't even remember eating, there's those 2 pounds."  Since I made the choice, it's easier to bounce back and say, "well, there's that cookie.  It was good, you enjoyed it, and now you work it off!"

Now, the only thing I haven't figured out is when the opposite happens.  Yesterday, we had a brownie extravaganza at work.  So I had a brownie and some ice cream.  And this morning, I was expecting to see it on the scale, and I was going to be completely fine with that.  But that PCOS-monster showed up, and I've lost 5 pounds since yesterday.  When that happens, my head is all, "Hooray, brownies and ice cream everyday!"

Both examples (food and workouts) come back to control.  When I'm knocking out reps at the gym and not seeing results on the scale, it can be frustrating.  But knowing that I am the one in control of when I workout and what I eat, it makes it easier to keep going.

I hope that makes sense, and that it helps someone who is struggling.  Small changes in thinking can make huge differences!!