Weight Loss With Wendy

I have decided to take a break from podcasting to brainstorm new ideas and new directions to take it. I want to thank you for being my listeners.

You can still follow me on FB or IG @weightlosswithwendyc and be alert to new trainings I will be offering such as workshops each month on different topics. I will create events on FB and IG and some short videos to let you know about them.

I am still offering 1:1 life and weight loss coaching and I have a new 6-month program instead of 3 months because I found my clients coming back to me. I think the 6 months will give people more tools for maintenance and we will work on when life happens.

Meditation and mindfulness have become such buzz words that you might tend to gloss over the many benefits.

I have used meditation to help relieve sciatic nerve pain with each pregnancy, for my neck and shoulder pain, for stress relief and for a positive start to my day.

Marcy herself started meditation in a yoga class and it had such a profound effect on her well-being.  She talks about her corporate job creating stress that had a negative impactt on her physical and emotional health.

There is not a right or wrong way to meditate. The goal is to sit there and notice stray thoughts that come in, sensations in your body, and settle your nervous system by focusing on your breathing.

She shares a technique during the podcast that is simple to do at home on your own.

Marcy is the Founder of The Still State Meditation & Mindfulness Instruction.

Marcy Westcott, CMMI

830-832-2447

marcy@TheStillStateMeditation.com

In this podcast I talk with #1 Amazon best-selling author Gigi Muth on her new book:

Bloom Beyond Perfection: Leaving the Perfection Trap and Discovering the Freedom of Good Enough.

The book is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle formats.

In the book and podcast, Gigi talks about breaking out of the trap of perfectionism and provides a guide for you through her own story and research, along with tools to help you break destructive obstacles standing in your way.

She talks about how she developed the Pilgrim’s Survival Kit based on her own journey and lessons learned during her real-life Pilgrim’s journey, walking El Camino from Portugal to Santiago Spain.

The book weaves story, definitions, perfectionistic traits, guides, and questions for self-reflection.

I recognized some perfectionistic traits in myself that I was not aware of. Gigi is a great writer, and her story is from the heart.

Gigi is also offering a Book Study: A free four-week immersive experience, where she walks with you through the bondage of perfectionism and into a new era of self-love and contentment.

What happens when you have January goals to improve yourself? Life happens. 

In this episode I talk about my pain experience and how I learned to make taking care of me a priority.

How you can stick to your health goals even when things happen that you don't expect.

What I learned from a split second mistake and why phones and cars do not mix.

How to allow uncomfortable emotions with gratitude and finding joy by giving to others.

When the unexpected happens and you think things should be different, take a deep breath and allow yourself to feel the pain, discomfort or whatever it is you are feeling. If you do, you will come out the other side amazed at what else you can do.

If you need help allowing the discomfort of life and continuing to work on your health goals; get on a weight loss strategy call.

It seems like such an innocent thought; but what it turns into is “I’m going to eat whatever I want.”

This has been a common theme for many during the pandemic. When I think I should be able to eat whatever I want; it makes me feel like I’m entitled because of the stress of what’s going on in the world and our country today.

Or, after I have been on my healthy eating plan for a few months, the thought of I should be able to eat whatever I want sneaks in, causing a feeling of entitlement and craving for more.

A few questions to ask is:

-  Why am I feeling entitled?

-  Is this a useful thought?

-  Do I like the results I am creating?

-  How do I want to feel?

You may think our external circumstances are the problem, such as the pandemic, other people, food, or what someone said. But it’s how you think about the situation that causes you to feel or do anything.

One question to ask is: What do I have control of? You have control over what you eat, drink, buy, wear AND what you are thinking, feeling, doing, or not doing regarding the external circumstance.

In my latest podcast, I give you tips on how to become more aware of your thinking which empowers you to make conscious choices about what you think, feel, or eat.

In this podcast, I talk about desire and where it comes from.

Definition of desire: A strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen. Craving, wanting, wishing, longing.

Craving and desire are synonyms so if we related this to food, do we really want to be wishing or longing for a certain type of food or for something more out of our life?

Did you know that desire is created by your brain? It is something we learn and repeat. It seems involuntary because it’s something you’ve programmed into your mind.

Desire is an emotion that comes from our thoughts about a particular object, whether it’s a person, food, money, wine, etc.

This may come as a surprise to you because most of us are not even aware of our thoughts. Practiced thoughts are delegated to our primitive brain.

Food is an object and it’s not until you see it, smell it, or taste it that you have a thought about it. You have associations with certain foods, memories of what it tasted like, and all of this plus our environment help create desire.

I want to remind you that there is nothing wrong with you if you feel controlled by desire for a particular type of food. You have been conditioned and your response is unconscious. Your brain is functioning exactly as it was supposed to.

I also talk about the primitive brain, the role of environment, our thoughts, and the food industry create more desire for unhealthy foods. I also discuss how we can use our higher brain to make decisions and create awareness around food.

If you want more information on my 5-step process to lose 20+ lbs in 12 weeks or coaching in general, click on the link for your Weight Loss Strategy Call: The link is in the show notes.

Today I wanted to talk about possibility.

What is possibility? I am talking about health goals for 2022. Possibility is the chance or likelihood that you can achieve your goal.

Did you know that you only need to have 10% belief that you can accomplish your goal to start taking action?

What if it was that simple? To get started on a new goal, you just need to believe a little bit that the goal is possible to start taking action. That means you will have doubts and that’s OK. It means you are human.

That’s one thing we forget to take into consideration when making a new goal is that we will have positive and negative feelings about it and that’s normal.

But before you go into the new year with a new goal, what about the old one?

What are your wins for 2021? Can you name 3 things that went right for you with your goal, health or otherwise? It helps to start off with what went right because our brain naturally turns to the negative.

What didn’t work?

We all make mistakes and sometimes life happens. But it’s what we learn from it and how we grow that makes a difference.

What do you want to differently in working on your health goal for 2022?

The best part about reviewing what did and didn’t work is that it helps you to be more objective and not look at things so personally.

One thing to do differently is to attend my FREE workshop:

The #1 Secret to Consistent Weight Loss

If you’re tired of the diet hamster wheel and want to get off, I have a FREE workshop on how to use this tool that helps more than anything else for consistent weight loss. There are 2 dates available: Dec. 30 at 4 pm CST and January 5 at 7 pm CST

Click on the link to reserve your spot:

Today I wanted to talk about what time, money and fear of failure have in common. They are all obstacles to achieving a goal. I’ll talk about these one by one.

I think this is helpful to do now before 2022 starts because most of us set some kind of goal, usually health and 1 or 2 others.

If we are talking about a health goal, say to lose the COVID 15 and you are thinking of starting a new program; time is often a big factor. A new healthy eating plan takes too much time. Time to: Learn the new plan, prep healthy food, go grocery shopping.

I talk about ways to save time when starting a new healthy eating plan.

Now let’s talk about money as related to starting a new healthy eating plan. You can save money by eating simple and easy to make meals at home. You can also save money by not going through the drive through, snacking less, and using the food you have already instead of throwing it out.

Think of using leftovers for soup, a buddha bowl, making a quiche or frittata or having leftover/pantry night which is what we do at our house. Coaching costs money that most people don’t plan for but think about how much money you have already spent on crazy diets or exercise programs you could not follow or that you didn’t make time for?

Instead, coaching could be an investment in your future health. What is the cost of not developing diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, cancer? Or the cost savings of getting off some or all of your medications?

Now for the biggest objection to starting a new healthy eating plan even more than time and money – fear of failure or of not showing up for yourself. You foster this fear of failure when you hop from one diet to another and never look at what went wrong or what you could tweak to stay on it.

My homework assignment for you is to take a look at all your past diets (if you can remember). Write down what you liked about the plan, what worked for weight loss? AND is that something you would be willing to continue? Also make a note of what you didn’t like about the diet, and what caused you to go off of it.

Next, come to my FREE workshop where I share with you:

The #1 Secret to Consistent Weight Loss Over 50

The dates are December 28, 30, and January 5

Click here on the learn more button to reserve your spot:

“You become what you give your attention to.” By Epictetus

What action steps would you take if you had the single focus of working on getting healthier and losing the pandemic 15 in 2022?

Maybe you would:

·  Write it in your journal or on your phone every day as a reminder

·  Make a plan for making healthier meals

·  Move your body more

·  Get a physical with blood work and screening exams

·  Learn other strategies to deal with stress besides going to food

·  Take an online course to learn how to make a healthy eating plan you can live with and follow (link in the show notes)

What would stop you from working on your health?

You have stories that you have told yourself about dieting and losing weight and you just believe the old stories. You let these stories about your past diet failures dictate your future efforts at weight loss instead of questioning all of it.

I would like to propose a different way to look at the stories you have about your past efforts at weight loss.

There are 3 simple steps that I go into detail that work to keep you on track for goal. Evaluate what has worked in past diet efforts, what hasn’t worked and what you want to do differently. I go into these with examples in the podcast.

Disclaimer – At the time you read this, many things may have changed regarding the pandemic. The pandemic is an example I used and was not meant to offend anyone.I would like to offer you the gift of time and service to your health.

If you want to change your approach to weight loss, schedule a Weight Loss Strategy call with me.

Today I wanted to talk about the top 3 health tips I have learned after 38 years in nursing. I am doing this not to shame anyone or make anyone feel guilty if they haven’t made their health a priority but to motivate you to start now and keep going. If we don’t have our health, we can’t take care of our loved ones, go on trips, etc.

#1 – Pay attention to your body, don’t wait until it is screaming at you to listen! Listen to the nagging pains you are having, don’t brush them off and keep going. Your body is designed to give you signals if something is wrong.

#2 – If you are having a nagging concern like a pain, lump, skin lesion or whatever, go get it checked out. Don’t put yourself last and think what’s going on with you is not important. You can’t take care of anybody if you go down for the count.

I also talk about screening exams to keep you healthy. For a complete list, check out my blog on this episode https://weightlosswithwendy.coach 

#3. Take your health back, stop using the pandemic, stressful job, etc. as an excuse to overeat. Don’t keep doing the old restrictive diets that don’t work.

What should you do instead?

Sign up for my online course: The 4 Keys to Kickstart Weight Loss Over 50

I developed this course because I wanted to help more women get healthier, have more energy, feel more confident in their clothes and lose weight if that is their goal.

In this course, you will go from feeling defeated from past diet failures to feeling empowered and experience weight loss success.

It’s a 4 week program where you get weekly live teaching with me where we work on each key to success where you can ask questions and interact with other participants. Each week we will also have a live Q & A session where you can get help if you feel stuck.

The early bird discount is only good from 12/13/21 to 12/17/21 at $247.00. Tell your friends and do it together. Ask for this to be a Christmas present. Start the New Year with a  healthy eating plan with foods you love, a common sense approach, and a plan you can follow.

December is a time to celebrate family, friends, old and new traditions. 

You can use this same tradition of celebrating the old and welcoming the New Year by applying it to your health. Take a look at foods you eat regularly.

Use December to figure out what foods feel good, give you more energy, and a clear mind; and which foods make you feel more tired, bloated with brain fog.

There are 3 things you can do when face with food choices to practice this strategy:

1. Ask what your body really needs; are you hungry, thirsty or do you want the food because it’s in front of you or you’ve had a stressful day?
2. Eat a healthy dinner with lots of veggies, protein, healthy fats and notice how that feels in your body. Eat only foods you love.
3. Keep a food journal, not calories, points or macros – but of how food makes you feel.

Do these 3 things over the month of December and you will be all set to join my new online course: The 4 Keys to Kickstart Weight Loss Over 50. It starts January 10 and will be on sale December 28, 2021. Details can be found soon at https://weightlosswithwendy.coach 

You may think it’s impossible to improve your health during the holidays. There are so many food temptations, increased stress, holiday parties, and more to do with less time to get it done.

But what if you decided to take a different approach? A kinder, gentler approach with yourself. Most of our stress is self-imposed; mine is anyway. So, take a few deep breaths and drop the expectation to lose weight during the holidays. Make it about eating healthier.

In this episode, I give you my top 10 tips to improve your health during the holidays.

One way to set yourself up for success is to to get a copy of my Healthy Not Hungry recipe eboo. It is $20.00 well spent. 

Here is the link: https://weightlosswithwendy.coach/store/p/healthy-not-hungry 

Do you think everything in your life will be better once you reach your weight loss goal? If so, you are not alone.

The problem with this type of thinking is you bring your mindset and thinking with you from where you are now to where you want to be. It’s how you think about something that causes you to feel a certain way.

Maybe you want to skip the losing weight part and get right to skinny or fitting in your clothes without the work of eating healthy and changing how you think around food. There is no magic pill you can take or magic formula.

When you think “I just want to be skinny” or “I just want to weigh X amount”. How does that thought make you feel? For me, I feel frustrated with the way things are right now. When I feel frustrated or overwhelmed, it does not feel good and so I don’t go looking for answers, I just stay frustrated.

This is how you may feel when you have tried everything and still can’t lose the weight. The situation seems hopeless and you feel powerless. What kind of action do you take from hopeless? Probably not much or more of the same which keeps you from moving forward or figuring out a solution.

In this podcast, I give you some tips on making 1 change a week to try to move the needle. Another way to move the needle to change the way you are thinking.

The easiest way to find this out is to journal about your weight loss progress or lack thereof, and find some thoughts that may be getting in your way. Thoughts cause your feelings which cause you to do or not do something. You might notice your thoughts are very negative and that’s OK, just pick a few and ask yourself why you are thinking that way. Get curious about how you feel and why.

Our topic today is about just saying no to starting any new diets. I don’t know about you, but I remember being so frustrated and thinking something was wrong with me vs. something wrong with the lastest fad diet I was trying.

Or worse, continuing to do the same thing and going back to deprivation and hunger because it was the only thing that moves the needle on the scale even though it felt terrible.

I honestly did not know that low fat, 6 small meals a day was no longer the suggested way to lose weight. There was keto, high protein, and paleo; but I was just done with it all. It seemed like nothing worked for long.

When I joined my coaching program that suggested less sugar, breads, pastas, and eating less often with no snacking; I thought; here we go again, one more thing I won’t be able to stick to.

But the science behind it made sense and I felt good doing it only halfway. It was also based on a Mediterranean diet which is backed by science as a healthy way of eating.

Now, let’s get real about the deprivation part. I did feel a little deprived when others were eating chips or snacks or my favorite cookies; but there was another part of me that knew that I had already eaten plenty of that type of food in my lifetime and I didn’t need any more. It probably was not as good as I remembered anyway.

These are some of the thoughts I would tell myself to not be tempted to eat the snack. I did not feel very deprived because I ate my favorite food once a week. So, if I was having a craving for something, I could plan it and have it as a joy eat. I eliminated eating food in the moment in response to a knee-jerk craving.

How did I do that? By planning my food in advance and being aware of how my brain worked and how it was normal to want to eat a specific food that was my favorite; but I was able to delay gratification for my long-term goal. I was able to do that because I was not eating a lot of sugar or other processed foods which greatly increase desire and cravings.

Take a listen for more on my exact process.

Learn how I went from feeling hungry and deprived all the time to feeling in control around food.

What You Haven’t Been Told About Exercise & Weight Loss.

The reason I wanted to do a podcast on this topic is from a question I asked in a FB group about what was holding them back in their weight loss journey. The majority said exercise. The problem with this answer is that what we think and what we have heard about exercise and weight loss is not always correct or based on recent evidence.

This applies even more so to women over 50 who also have hormonal changes they are dealing with. So if we start off with misinformation about exercise and weight loss; then we set ourselves up for being disappointed and think it’s our fault when exercise does not help us lose weight.

First, I want to say that I am not against exercise. I love to exercise myself and do it every day. There is also evidence that exercise is great for:

• Your body’s overall functioning
• Your mental health
• Your emotional health
• To deal with stress

I  walk every day and do strength training and yoga 3 days a week.

But, I grew up believing that if I just exercised enough, I would lose the weight – that the calories I burned would make up for whatever I ate. Then the high intensity workouts became popular and I tried kickboxing, camp gladiator, and TRX.

I have to tell you, I did not lose any weight by adding high intensity exercise;  because it made me hungrier, so I ate more!

I talk about the latest evidence of why exercise may not help you lose weight, especially over 50.

Bottom line; don’t believe everything you have been told about exercise, newer studies have been done. Look for the evidence. Same thing with fad diets. Exercise for general health and stress reduction and to feel good in your body. Many of my clients tell me they feel more motivated to eat better when they start exercising, which is even better.

Today I want to talk about the $64,000 question: What motivates you?

What motivates us to do anything? How we think it will make us feel. Most of us do things because we want to make others happy or ourselves.

When you think about weight loss, what motivates you to even get started? It’s the possibility that we can be successful. Not only that, but for me it was the fear of staying the same or getting heavier; that was terrifying. Fear is what got me to try losing weight one more time.

What keeps us stuck? Indecision or trying to find the:

• Perfect diet
• Right time to lose weight
• Inspiration to start or keep going
• Thinking that we need to get everything perfectly lined up in our lives
• Need to change everything about our eating habits all at once, instead of focusing on a few key changes that are doable

The real secret to increase motivation is to take action; do 1 thing every day and build on that. You don’t have to have it your healthy eating plan all figured out.

Here are a few examples of small actions you could start with: Remember 1 thing (Think about this for a minute - If you did this and add 1 healthy habit in exchange for an unhealthy one and kept doing it every week until Christmas; how much healthier you would be?)

1. Get more sleep, go to bed 30 minutes earlier each night and create bedtime routine with screens off
2. Meditate for 5-10 minutes 3 days a week
3. Drink 8-12 ounces of water at the times of day when you are most likely to overeat (3 pm, 5 pm, 7-8 pm)
4. Walk 15-30 minutes 3 days a week
5. Write down what you will eat for the day B-L-D, include snacks if you eat snacks (not calories, just the food)
6. Eat more veggies at each meal
7. Eat less sugar and breads
8. Drop night-time snacking

So the most important way to increase your energy and motivation for any goal,  including  weight loss is to take action.

What will you take action on today? Let me know, I would love to hear what you started. (Remember, start with 1 small step)

Before our society found a way to artificially flavor foods, our desire came from the subtle reward healthy food provides and the satisfaction of hunger.

Today, our desire not only comes from artificially flavored foods but also from our cultural conditioning around what is “normal” eating. Another component of desire and culture is how much enjoyment we think we should get from food.

When we eat foods that are artificially flavored, it causes our reward center to release a big surge of our pleasure hormone dopamine. This stimulates a big dopamine surge followed by the feeling of urgency to act on our desires and continue to eat the cookies, Cheetos, chocolate, etc.

It’s not a problem unless we have negative consequences such as gaining weight or impact on our health. When we try to make a change to our eating habits and eat less of those foods; the desire is still there, and our willpower is often unable to overcome it.

I talk about other examples of how we get to be desire junkies in our lives with technology, such as using your cell phone and video games.

I give you ideas on how to use desire in your favor, and how to naturally reward yourself to stimulate a smaller amount of dopamine to be released and still feel satisfied.

Coming soon: Healthy Holiday & Recipe Guide. What’s in it? Thirty healthy recipes that are 5-ingredients or less with tips on eating healthy most of the time AND still enjoying your favorite holiday foods. It’s on sale for $24.97

For more information, email me: weightlosswithwendy2018@gmail.com

It’s been a year already since I started this podcast! Happy Anniversary to the Podcast!

I have learned so much over the past year. I want to thank all of you for coming along with me, listening and for your feedback.

I started by going through my weight loss journey of losing 55 lbs over 1 year and outlined my struggle of keeping it off during the pandemic. When reviewing the 52 podcasts over the past year, I noticed 3 big themes that I will talk about today.

It’s about awareness, consistency, and planning ahead of time. To be successful in weight loss you need to be aware of how you are thinking and feeling and what you are eating.

The problem is that in your busy day to day life you may be delegating all of your decision making to the primitive or habit part of your brain. This part of your brain takes over the mundane daily activities that you do every day like eating, drinking, snacking, driving to work, daily chores, etc. There is no thought involved, you are on autopilot.

Whether you have good habits or bad habits the cycle continues until you want to make a change. The primitive part of the brain wants to keep things the same and avoid change which can be painful and hard.

Making different choices such as to eat healthier or to stop snacking at night will naturally bring resistance from the habit part of your brain. This resistance makes you feel like it is hard or impossible to change.

Then when you make 1 or 2 mistakes and snack in the evening when you said you wouldn’t, you feel like you're a failure, decide it’s too hard, and throw in the towel or start again next week or next month. Meanwhile the habit continues. We give our control to our habits and feel like victims.

In a lot of the podcasts over the past year, I talk about how to use the mistakes we make by learning from them to change the habit. One important point when trying to change a habit is that you need to expect to want to eat off plan.

Remember your habit brain is trying to protect you and it thinks eating healthy is a terrible idea because eating snacks gives you that immediate dopamine hit that it is expecting every night. Plan for resistance and expect it to be there; it is normal.

In podcast 52 I talked about stress eating and how to change it. If you feel depleted at end of day, and usually go to food as a way to soothe yourself, that is emotional or stress eating. One way to change that is to take some short breaks and check in with yourself and how you are feeling.

It’s never too late to teach your brain something different. To re-educate your brain in a new habit, there needs to be consistency. I am not saying you need to be perfect, I am saying choose small changes to make and do them daily. Like drinking more water, getting more sleep at night, walking 3 days a week, or eating more veggies at 2 meals.

Throw out your weight loss manual. All of nothing diet mentality will just get you more of the same results. Try making small changes and building on it every week. Small consistent changes lead to big results. 

You can get quicker results working with a coach because we focus not just on the food but on the mindset piece which gets in the way.

Something else I have talked about in my podcast over the past year is planning ahead of time to increase your chances of success. I make a menu 1 week ahead of time and that works for me. But most of my clients like to do it the day of and that is fine too.

Planning my meals ahead of time, takes the drama out of eating because it removes decisions in the moment. You don’t have to decide what to make for dinner, it is already decided. This saves so much time, you won’t believe it until you try it.

Last week I talked about the difference between physical and emotional hunger. The next step is to be mindful of the triggers that cause you to stress eat. This could be a stressful day at work, a fight with a loved one, boredom, sadness, or loneliness to name a few.

In this podcast I go over the 4 steps to change the habit of stress eating. The steps are simple, and you can practice this anywhere. It's called Pause and Check-In or Pause & Pray.

Practicing the 4 steps several times a day will get you in the habit of allowing whatever emotion you are feeling. That way when something stressful happens, you can take a pause before grabbing your favorite comfort food.

Reacting to the negative emotion by going to food or wine or shopping online only delays feeling the negative emotion. Not only that but you feel guilty or defeated on top of what you are already feeling. Allowing or processing the emotion does not feel great, but it’s not any worse than feeling remorse from overeating. The bonus is that you halt the unhealthy habit you want to change and learn that feeling your emotions didn’t kill you.

I don’t know about you, but I have been an emotional eater for most of my life. It started in childhood. If I had a bad day at school, my Mom would make my favorite food to help me feel better. This lasted even through college; remember care packages?

It is no wonder we continue to use food to help us feel better into our adult life. I encouraged this with my children when they were growing up as well.

In this podcast, I outline the differences between physical and emotional hunger.

When you eat to numb your emotions, it feels better temporarily; but the feelings that triggered the eating are still there. Then you feel worse for overeating, beat yourself up for not having more willpower and the cycle continues.

Over the years this way of eating becomes a well-practiced habit. A habit is something you can change; it does not define who you are as a person.

You may have no idea you are thinking this way because it is going on in your subconscious. It’s like background noise or music you don’t notice anymore.

Whether you realize it or not; your emotions run the show. The key is to identify your emotional eating triggers. One way to do this is to journal or keep a food and mood diary which will increase your awareness. At first, the awareness will be after you overeat which is OK because you are learning what your triggers are. Then, over time you see patterns emerge so you can target specific actions to take to change this habit.

I was thinking about the first 2 weeks of a diet or new healthy eating plan. This is the time when we are the most motivated and excited about the plan and when we get our initial results of weight loss.

I call this the honeymoon phase. It may last longer than 2 weeks depending on what type of eating plan you are following. For me, the honeymoon phase lasted 2 months.

Then, after that, reality hits that you need to continue to follow the plan; and that’s when it gets harder in your mind. But it only gets harder because you think you should be able to go back to eating what you want.

Maybe what needs to happen is to check in and ask yourself, do I want to continue to eat this way for the rest of my life? Instead of quitting after 2 weeks, why not tweak your plan to make it work for you? Or better yet, tweak your favorite meals into healthier versions.

Don’t forget you don’t always have to eat the healthier version. You can treat yourself once a week or so by making or ordering your favorite food, and enjoying every bite.

I give you examples of what tweaking looks like from my recent workshop 5 steps to lose weight over 50. 

If you want the transcript, I upload it as a blog every Saturday on my website: https://www.weightlosswithwendy.coach   

Have you ever noticed that the idea of starting a new diet and losing weight is more appealing than doing the work?

That’s because we make things harder than they need to be. It’s also because we set unrealistic expectations for ourselves and what we are willing to do. We want to lose the weight fast when it took years to put the weight on.

In this podcast episode, I give you 8 tips that have helped me and my clients to lose weight, not only for the honeymoon period (first 2 weeks); but to continue towards their goal.

1.  Get started now – Even if you don’t have a healthy eating plan yet or you are still deciding which plan to follow. Take a moment to brainstorm and write down what has worked for you in the past to lose weight that didn’t make you feel hangry or too restricted. Pick 1 thing and start doing it today.

2.  Set a goal, then break it down so it does not feel so overwhelming

3.  Have 5 or more Why’s for wanting to lose weight – you will need all of them throughout your weight loss journey

4.  Set yourself up for success

5.  Make a plan – Come to my 5 steps to lose weight over 50 workshop, where I help you set up your healthy eating road map.

6.  Every week evaluate what worked, what didn’t work, and what to do differently.

7.  Make friends with the scale – It’s just a number.

8.  Be OK with less than perfect – You will go off your healthy eating plan and that’s OK. It’s what you learn about it that’s important.

Freedom around food (FAF) seems so unattainable for most of us even if we have lost the weight and are on maintenance. Why, because we have the tendency to focus on our struggles and not what we’ve accomplished.

I had to ask myself after 3 years of being on maintenance if I feel like I am in control around food? To tell you the truth, my gut reaction was no. But when I really think about it and how differently I think and feel about food and how far I have come, I change my answer to yes.

My gut reaction of no was from the all or nothing habit brain, coming from a place of judgment and the belief that I have to do it perfectly. Total BS. Newsflash to myself is I don’t do anything perfectly and I’m not supposed to, because I am human and not a robot.

Here is what is different for me:

·  I am no longer in the dark about how much I am eating. I don’t have to put whatever looks good into my mouth; and I have full awareness of what I’m eating. This is huge for me because I used to graze and eat all day long without realizing how much I was eating.

·  I no longer think about my weight or food when I first wake up in the morning or worry about what I will wear because I can only fit into a few things.

·  I make a plan for what I will eat for the day, so I don’t have to think about what to make for dinner; I have a plan with a simple meal that is 5-ingredients or less and I have the ingredients to make it.

·  Most of the time, I do not go to food to numb my negative emotions, boredom or plain discomfort. Not perfect here, but I’m a work in progress.

If your initial answer to the question about if you have freedom around food was no, I challenge you to consider this:

1.  Look at the areas where you have already made changes about how you think about food, if you have less cravings, or don’t feel the need to snack as often. All of these things are little wins on your way to feeling more in control around food.

2.  Maybe you decide that you are on your way to having freedom around food and all the little steps you take for your wins only brings you closer.

3.  FAF doesn’t mean you never make mistakes or eat off plan; but you learn from your mistakes.

4.  FAF means you figure out 1 thing you will do differently in the week ahead and commit to doing that.

5.  FAF is only a thought away and here are some good ones to practice:

🇺🇸  I am learning how to feel in control around food

🇺🇸  I know what fuels my body and I am willing to allow food cravings and am willing to feel uncomfortable without giving in to the craving

🇺🇸  Cravings are temporary and having a craving feels uncomfortable, but I can handle it

🇺🇸  It’s OK to make mistakes because I learn from them. Every time I learn, I am closer to freedom around food.

🇺🇸  I decide what I put in my mouthIf your want to learn more ways to have freedom around food, then join me for this online workshop:

5 Steps to Lose Weight Over Age 50

Thursday, September 16, 2021 at 7 pm CST

Are you listening to what your body is telling you that it needs or are you going through the motions and eating without even thinking about what or how much you are putting in your mouth?

Most people are on auto-pilot with what they are eating. They see something, think that looks good and automatically pop whatever it is into their mouth. No thought to checking in to see if they are even hungry.

In this podcast, I talk about a recent health scare, hospitalization and surgery and how I learned to listen to my body and how you can apply these tools to weight loss.

Join me for an interactive online workshop:

5 Steps to Lose Weight Over Age 50

Thursday, September 16 2021 at 7 pm CST

If you want to lose weight and get healthier without feeling deprived and hungry all the time, click on the link to register: https://my.demio.com/ref/G8XW3w3KauCiBHqx 

You may see a lot of coaches out there on social media for business, life issues, relationships, weight loss, etc. but wondered what exactly does a coach do? Or maybe, what do I have to do as a client of a coach?

Coaching helps people who feels stuck in the process of achieving a goal like weight loss, overdrinking, improving relationship issues, etc. A coach can show you the thinking that is keeping you from achieving your goal by being an impartial observer to what is going on in your brain.

A coach takes you from where you are and helps you to get to where you want to go by helping you brainstorm how to overcome obstacles that get in the way.

A coach assumes you have all the answers and that you are lovable and whole the way you are. I have tools I can use to help you uncover the answers already inside of you.

The type of coaching I do is causal coaching which is a process of looking at our problems from a different point of view. For example, in weight loss, I thought my problem was the diets I had tried. My real problem was my thinking around food, my weight, and my body. I was using food to numb my stress, boredom and negative emotions.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices, and I want to get this message out to hundreds or even thousands of women. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

Do you think you’ll be happier when you get to your goal weight?

I have been noticing this a lot lately with myself and my clients. You may think everything will be better when you reach your goal weight.

The problem with this line of thinking is you still take all your negative thoughts and feelings about you, your weight, food, etc. with you. Then when you don’t feel any different at your goal weight, you feel disappointed and still feel uncomfortable in your body because you haven’t worked on your mindset.

In this podcast I talk about mindset hacks, how journaling will help you understand that your thinking is creating the results you have in your life. I also give you great questions to ask yourself to keep motivated and making progress towards your goal.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices, and I want to get this message out to hundreds or even thousands of women. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

What are YOU willing to do to prevent complications in your health or prevent new health problems?

This question has been on my mind a lot recently. After my dad had COVID-19 this summer, I experienced a gallstone attack and ended up in the ER and was admitted to the hospital for 2 days. It was an eye opening experience and made me really think about my diet and what I could do to prevent another attack.

The gallbladder, the site of my severe pain, serves important functions in the process of digestion. In this episode, I talk about dietary considerations, both DOs and DON'Ts, that can help keep your gallbladder happy. I'll also share a few hard-earned insights about keeping healthy in general, since prevention is easier and more effective than attempting to cure an ailment.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices, and I want to get this message out to hundreds or even thousands of women. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

What if you decided to throw out the script that you've heard about how to lose weight — and just did it by listening to your body?

Your weight loss journey is uniquely yours. NOBODY else is going to have the same experiences. So it makes sense to own that journey and make it yours! YOU get to choose how to implement your eating plan. YOU get to choose whether or how often to snack. YOU get to choose all the parts that make up the whole journey. That feels so much more empowering than feeling like you should do this or you should do that.

The best part is that this whole process of experimentation can be combined with the experience of someone who is an expert at losing weight and keeping it off and can use coaching to help you do the same. If you're looking for someone to facilitate your process of experimentation and work with your specific needs, look no further! Reach out to me with any of the links below.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

What can YOU do with self-control?

Self-control allows you to make conscious healthy choices. With the power of consistent conscious thinking (using the prefrontal cortex, the thinking brain), you can override your primitive brain's impulses to seek immediate pleasure and make unhealthy decisions in the moment with food. i

In your weight loss journey, you may find your progress hindered by your habits around food. One minute, you may feel ready to deal with any situation, and then suddenly you realize you've been snacking between meals without thinking about it! "What happened?!" you ask yourself.

The primitive brain tends to take over when we're under STRESS and that means to go back to doing what's comfortable. For many of us, that means going back to previous eating habits that put on the pounds in the first place. In this episode, I talk about four ways to decrease the stress response in your body. This will in turn help you increase self-control by activating your thinking brain. This allows you to focus your efforts on your journey to a happier, healthier you.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

How much power is there in willpower?

In Kelly McGonigal's book "The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, And What You Can Do To Get More Of It," Kelly defines willpower as the ability to control the impulses that make us human. Humans have a "primitive brain" with three directives: seek pleasure, avoid pain, and maximize efficiency in doing the previous two things. We also have an "evolved brain." Our complex minds grant us the ability to reason and exercise self control, which sets us apart from other species.

In this episode, I'll discuss three ways to develop willpower specifically for curtailing your desire to snack, and how you can empower yourself in the pursuit of a healthier you. I talk about a simple self-assessment you can think through when you give in to the temptation to snack that will help you avoid doing it in the future. 

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

Are you choosing to feel healthy and comfortable in your own skin?

You can make getting to your goal weight painful and harder than it needs to be OR you can follow some of the ideas I found in the book "FINISH: Give Yourself the Gift of Done" by motivational writer and speaker Jon Acuff. In this episode I discuss ways you can ease the strain of meeting a difficult goal. I go into detail about healthy ways you can give yourself permission to delegate small parts of your life to someone else or decide that some chores or “To do’s” are not a priority in order to make room for the growing pains of a weight loss goal. I talk about ways to make your goal more fun with suggestions for some fun non-food rewards you can give yourself to keep you motivated to finish your goal.

The weight loss journey doesn't have to be drudgery and deprivation. You can make your pathway to feeling better less painful by leaning into changes and learning that weight loss isn't something YOU HAVE to do. It's something YOU GET to do, that YOU CHOOSE to do. This way of thinking makes all the difference. You've got this!

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families: if women get healthier, so do their families.

We all know it's hard to gear up for permanent lifestyle changes, especially during the lazy heat of the summer months. I want to HELP YOU jumpstart your forever transition to a happier, healthier you!

In this episode we'll talk about my three simple tips for weight loss. I'll also discuss 10 easy, delicious, and healthy meals you can prepare with just FIVE ingredients or fewer. In addition, if you get on a consultation call with me to discuss your weight loss goals, I will share 25 more healthy dinner ideas with just five ingredients or fewer. Use my link below to set up a call!

Don't forget: Starting July 11th, I'll be hosting an eight-week group weight loss coaching program with 10 women. The benefits of this group coaching program will be having sisterhood support and accountability. Email me to find out more; if you sign up and bring a friend, you'll get $50 off the price.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families; if women get healthier, so do their families.

What is the best decision you can make for yourself RIGHT NOW? Think on that for a second.

This is the question you get to ask yourself every day of your weight loss journey. If you realize that every moment of every day is a separate "right now," you realize that your big weight loss goal is made up of a lot of little choices that you either make for you or against you. There are always bumps in the road and for me and a lot of my clients those bumps are weekends and visits from family and friends.

There are several strategies you can take on weekends and family/friend visits. The first is to make a plan with as much detail as possible. Remember you can always look up the menus online for almost any restaurant. This plan can include a joy eat where you pick your favorite food to eat. Don't forget this is one food item, not an appetizer, salad, entree, dessert and drinks. Another way to do this is to take a bite of something that looks really good and trusting that you stick to one bite. When you take that bite, savor it and describe in your mind the flavors. 

You may not lose weight on the weekend or after family and friends visit but maintaining is still a win!

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families; if women get healthier, so do their families.

Don't forget: Starting July 11th, I'll be hosting an eight-week group weight loss coaching program with 10 women. The benefits of this group coaching program will be having sisterhood support and accountability. Email me to find out more; if you sign up and bring a friend, you'll get $50 off the price.

Can you see your future? How, where, in what way?

Vision is essential for making a goal into a reality. In this episode, I'll touch on a 10-minute visualization exercise you can do every morning that's designed to help you see your future success and the pattern of actions that will lead to success.

I must admit, when I first began using visualization techniques, I thought it was woo woo, but I have noticed growth in my personal life and success in my career that definitely stems from visualizing my successes, and I know this can help you in your weight loss journey!

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it! I love to see people making healthier choices. Women are the leaders of their families; if women get healthier, so do their families.

Joining us on today's episode is self-love sage and author Nicole C. Ayers. Today, Nicole and I discuss her personal journey, which is documented in her award-winning book Love Notes to My Body. We also discuss the role of self-talk and journaling in cultivating self-love, as well as the first three critical steps on the path to not hating your body. Nicole explained to me why, surprisingly, you needn't feel obligated to love your body so much as appreciate it! Her reasoning was so insightful. Have a listen to this episode to share in some gems from our conversation.

Body confidence is loving your body as it is, while still envisioning success with your weight goals.

In this episode, I ask some questions to help you peel back the layers of body confidence, I talk about self-care activities; and more! Our bodies are truly amazing. They are capable of great achievements, even later on in life - and that should be celebrated at every possible moment!

What happens once you reach your weight loss goal?

Once you've gotten into your target weight range, then what do you do?

In this episode, I talk about my personal steps for successfully navigating maintenance. You not only need to keep up your healthy eating plan but also keep up the mindset tools you learned while losing weight.

We still have human brains that are up to their old tricks and old diet mentality thoughts may creep back in. The key is to stay aware, weigh yourself several times a week, and make a plan for social events. The best part is if you gain weight, you have the tools you need to take it off again, if you want to.

Maintaining a weight that feels good to you, where you have more energy and feel confident in your body and in the clothes you wear is definitely worth it!

This week, I'm preparing for my upcoming online workshop to help you lose five pounds in June without starving yourself. This workshop will start June 6th and will be a weekly meeting designed to boost accountability in the process of your weight loss journey for this month. 

What's the most important part of a weight loss plan?

Is it feeling CAPABLE of losing weight? Feeling CONFIDENT that you can lose that weight? Perhaps it's both. One of the ways to feel more capable AND more confident is taking action! In this episode, I discuss five important tips that will help you stick to your weight loss plan.

How badly do you WANT to lose weight?

Fear is a powerful negative emotion that can keep us stuck gaining and losing the same weight. In this episode, I discuss the dual virtues of curiosity (wanting to KNOW) and courage (wanting to DO) and how to use these feelings to keep you going on your weight loss journey. 

I give you eight questions you can ask yourself when you eat off-plan. Knowledge is power! The more you know about yourself and your own conscious and unconscious motivations, the more clearly you'll see the path you should take.

What's keeping you from achieving your weight loss goals?

For me, one vital part of the puzzle was COMMITMENT. In this episode, I'll discuss commitment as it pertains to weight loss. I'll talk about the three big reasons why people QUIT their diets. I'll also shine a light on ten questions you can ask yourself to EVALUATE your personal commitment level when approaching ANY goal, not just weight loss.

Weight loss requires persistence and dedication to a plan; but it doesn't have to require a lot of time and energy. 

Do you ever wish you could wake up one morning and be in a thin body and never have to worry about your weight again?

Today, I want to talk about SHAME — how this emotion keeps us stuck in old patterns and struggles, and how it keeps our wishes from coming true, especially in terms of permanent health changes such as weight loss.

Perhaps the biggest issue that needs to be addressed in a major lifestyle change is not any particular pattern of behavior, but our THOUGHTS about a behavior. In this episode, I'll discuss the origins of shame, how shame halts your progress in weight loss, and why you should start reframing your own supposed failures as a learning experience by adding then phrase "and that's okay."

How important is nurturing a positive relationship with yourself in weight loss?

Would you talk to your best friend like you talk to yourself? This topic is near and dear to my heart, because I remember feeling like I didn't trust myself or even like anything about my body. I felt stuck and too overwhelmed by so many diet failures to make a change. You may be saying “Me too!”.

One of the reasons you have a hard time trusting yourself is that you also have trouble LOVING yourself. There is this constant negative chatter in the background all the time. You are probably not even aware of it.You know this is you if you have trouble accepting a compliment.

In my latest podcast episode, I talk about deliberately finding 1 thing that you love about yourself or your body, such as your hair, your smile, your fierce love for your kids and adding 1 thing to the list every day for 1 week.

Start noticing the negative self-talk and instead of changing it to something you don’t yet believe, try adding "yes, but …" and 1 thing you love about yourself.

Let’s say you ate a whole bag of popcorn mindlessly last night while watching Netflix. You might be thinking: “I can’t believe I ate the whole bag, and it wasn’t even that good.” Yes but…I love my smile. You may feel silly at first, but it works.

This one simple change can grow your trust and love for yourself. Once you start to trust and love yourself as you are, you can transfer that trust to making a healthy eating plan that is simple and not too restrictive. You can use your weight on the scale as information for tweaking your plan, INSTEAD of being a reflection of your health, competence, or value as a person.

Are you afraid to get hungry?

I know I was afraid feel any hunger on my weight loss journey, and so are a lot of my clients. Many of us have been told that we should not let ourselves get hungry — but in fact, this is the opposite of how the body works.

In this episode, I'll talk about the science behind hunger, the difference between regular hunger and cravings for sugar. I'll also explain the reasons why it's totally normal to let yourself "get hungry" while losing weight, and how you can normalize hunger in a healthy way as you lose weight.

Feeling bored seems like such an innocent emotion, neither positive nor negative. But along with bored is the feeling of discomfort or restlessness; like we need to do something to feel better or to stop feeling bored.

Last Wednesday night, after a hard day's work and a filling dinner, I sat and watched TV with my husband. After awhile, boredom began to set in. Then, a tiny thought crept into my mind: I should have a glass of wine. I rationalized it. After all, I deserved to enjoy myself! Not much longer after that and I was casually snacking in the pantry.

Luckily, it was NOT the end of the world. I'm still alive and fine, and wiser because I sat down to figure out why that happened.

So many people tell me they struggle with snacking. Snacking out of boredom can be a hard habit to break, especially without awareness of what’s going on or why it’s happening.

I find that boredom in general is an invitation to check out and allow the primitive brain, rather than the conscious mind, to be in charge. This is never a good thing. In this episode, I'll unpack why boredom is a problem and discuss some helpful strategies for gaining control of the snack habit.

I am still learning from my mistakes and I invite you to do the same; and not use snacking or boredom as an excuse to go back to eating the way you did before. Every time we eat, we make a decision to eat on plan or not. Either way it's a choice.

Remember the Seinfeld episode where Elaine and a former boss go into business selling the tops of muffins? "It's the best part!" she exclaims. That may be true of literal muffin tops, but what about the metaphorical muffin top rising above our waistband? We're usually less than enthusiastic about our this development.

In this episode, I'll talk about the reasons why so many women (like me) have trouble losing that excess weight, including the hormonal processes related to menopause that affect weight loss. I'll also talk on the psychology of weight loss and go into the difficult problem of mind over matter when it comes to crumbling the muffin top.

If you're serious about making weight loss a reality, your best bet is to start by planning permanent changes to your eating rather than a temporary "diet." Naturally, you'll do your best with an accountability partner and mentor to coach you through the process. Please reach out to me using any of the links below when you're ready to start your journey!

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it!

Schedule a call with me so I can help you lose the first 5 lbs without starving!

This week, I'll be interviewing my friend and fellow fitness enthusiast Susie Quintana, who is a personal trainer and fitness expert. Susie and I discussed how we have developed a "fitness mindset" as we age; the challenges of working during the pandemic, and how she has aligned personal training with helping people be healthy and happy. 

If you are listening on March 18, join me for a live interactive event:

Today's Live Interactive Online Event: Why your muffin top won’t crumble (How we can use the hormones we already have to lose weight)

Date: Thursday, March 18, 2021 at 7 pm CST

What does it really take to lose weight?

What helped me to finally be able to lose the weight after 30 years of dieting was thinking that it was possible for me, that I could figure it out. I got help with coaching and found a program that was not just about the food but about making a plan I could live with, use food to fuel my body, become aware of my thoughts around food, and learn how to go to a party and either plan to eat the cake or not. I also learned how to enjoy eating my favorite foods in smaller amounts and find other ways to deal with negative emotions.

We are not taught how to do that growing up and coaching can give you tools to navigate all these areas. Don’t follow someone else’s plan, make you own and get coaching on your thinking around food so you never have to go on another diet again.

If you enjoy this content, please rate my show and tell your friends about it!