Weight Loss Success: How to Stay Motivated

[spoiler title=’Click for video transcript’ style=’default’ collapse_link=’true’] the weight-loss journey is long so how do I stay motivated so I thought it would be a good idea to talk about keeping yourself motivated over the long haul because really you have to motivate yourself to lose the weight and then you have to keep yourself motivated to maintain your loss I’ve been on this weight-loss journey since 2014 so certainly I’ve had to figure out ways to keep myself motivated so in today’s video I’m gonna talk about you know what has worked for me what didn’t really work for me and one thing I never do so on this journey the first thing that I started to do was take progress photos which I think are an excellent idea the big wake-up call for me was when I saw this picture of me on Facebook I had been really in denial before this and so I decided to just start taking a picture of myself every week so I can just see you know physical evidence here is what I actually do look like it made it so that I couldn’t be in denial anymore another thing that I started doing eventually you know I started tracking my weight and that was very important it kept me motivated because especially once the numbers started to come down it was very motivating to see you know I was making progress and it’s also really motivating if you ever hit a plateau or if the numbers start to creep back up you can see you know no I have had success in the past and you have proof of that and I’m so glad I’ve had that written record since 2014 to really show me how far I’ve come one thing that I did especially when I was first starting out I don’t really do this anymore but I found it very motivating was I sat down in five pound increments on a Google Doc what my what my goals were so I just put you know get down to a 7 day average of of 195 pounds and every time I hit that goal I would mark through it on the Google Doc and I would write achieved on you know whatever the date was when I hit that 7 day average and that was so motivating to me it was probably the most motivating thing that I did now here are a couple things that didn’t really motivate me surprisingly rewarding myself with like physical rewards I sat down you know and I and I wrote down some things I was gonna you know like buy for myself or things I was going to do when I reached a certain goal and that for whatever reason didn’t really motivate me I think I made some mistakes there though I think one thing I didn’t really plan well for was a lot of times if I hit the goal for whatever reason money would be tight and I couldn’t really buy myself the thing that I said I was gonna buy myself when I hit the goal and so it just never really worked out right so I had to delay that and it just didn’t work so my recommendation would be if you do decide to go the physical reward route you know just go ahead and make sure you have that money set aside for the thing that you say you’re gonna buy yourself or whatever it is and that way you can as soon as you hit that goal then go out and buy that thing make it immediate don’t lie to yourself another thing that surprisingly didn’t really motivate me was the idea of like goal pants like I had this one pair of jeans that I wanted to fit back into but the thing I found with that is clothes are so tricky because you can get back into them you know you might be able to you know pull them up and like kind of fasten them and then you know it’s kind of like really hard to know like when do you really get back into them and so that was you know just not that motivating to me I never reward myself with food what I did instead of rewarding myself with food is I made my plan so that I never had to deny myself any kind of food that I wanted I could always eat it you know during my window or on cheat day above all I would just encourage you whatever works for you figure out what makes you tick what motivates you is it maybe you know giving yourself some sort of experience some sort of travel thing or is it you know buying yourself things or is it just checking something off a list I don’t know why that motivates me but it does so I’m curious to know what motivates you have you figured it out write in the comments below okay thanks for watching be sure to LIKE comment subscribe down below [/spoiler]

Video Recap

Things that helped me stay motivated:

Progress photos. I would take them from every angle, so that I could not be in denial about where I was, weight wise.
Tracking my weight. I have kept a weight tracking spreadsheet since I started weighing myself in 2015. I have found it incredibly motivating. And it serves as proof to me that I can control my weight. You can download the template below if you’d like one of your own. Download “7 Day Average Weight Tracker” 7-Day-Average-Weight-Template-From-Six-Miles-To-Supper-1-1.ods – Downloaded 51391 times – 68.57 KB
Writing down my weight loss goals in 5 p0und increments. I created a google doc back in 2016. I wrote, line by line my 7 day average goals. Example: Be at a 7 day average of 195. Be at a 7 day average of 190. And then, when I hit that goal, I lined through it on my google doc, and I wrote “Achieved on” and the date in bright green type. This was probably the most motivating thing I did.

A couple of things I tried that didn’t really motivate me:

Physical rewards. I think the main reason these things (example: after I lose 10 pounds, I will buy myself a new shirt), didn’t work for me was that money always seemed to be tight when I would hit the goal. So then I would end up delaying the reward, and it just simply didn’t motivate me. If you go this route, I’d recommend setting aside the money so that you can reward yourself immediately when you hit the goal.
Goal pants. Clothes are tricky. What does it mean to “get back into those size 8 jeans?” Does it mean physically get into them? Be able to zip them? Or does it mean to fit into them comfortably? And what does comfortably mean? Do they need to be loose? I need things more cut and dry.

One thing I never do:

I never reward myself with food. That was a big rule for me when I was setting this whole thing up. Instead, I made my plan such that I can always eat any food I want, either during my window, or on cheat day.