Recognizing your pitfalls

Posted on January 25, 2015

So it's completely possible to be on that right path yet still continually derail yourself through habitual pitfalls, I know I've done that many times. I think for me personally looking at it from the perspective of where did I go wrong rather than cast blame on situational factors or those around us, shows me a lot about how I operate.

For example I had a trainer last year who whenever I said it was too hard, he would push back, if I cancelled at the last minute he was ok with that and basically didn't hold me accountable. Bottom line I wasted 6 months on personal training that got me nowhere. Now I could argue that the trainer was bad, the timing, location didn't suit me etc but the bottom line is I don't like it when things are hard. I want them to be easy and on my terms. Well that's not going to work here. So what I did was I changed trainers. I told the new gal upfront that I have tendencies. I purposefully chose someone busy and more expensive, yet close to my house. She made it clear her schedule doesn't have time for cancellations and she's not hard up for another client so if I want to work with her I'd better show up. She also pushes me really really hard. This has definitely helped to break one set of my tendencies.

The power of habit states that people generally do well when they are on track, and they can stay on track for a while. However as soon as some stressful event occurs, they tend to forget everything they're learning and go back to old ways. What is your contingency plan? What are the triggers? Boredom, stress at work, avoiding an important deadline, traveling out of town? Have some alternatives ready that when that moment hits you can purposefully take it in the direction that will best serve this journey and get you to your end result.

Happy Sunday!

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Meg

01/25/2015 10:51AM

Yes I agree with Nathan. When I get stressed I become unconcerned about what I am eating. In that way I am very predictable. I get irate or stressed, I reach right for chocolate!!

Ruby541

I tend to use food as a distraction, if there's an important deadline and I want to be temporarily distracted from it I'll reach for food. If I'm eating I'm usually putting off something else! It's hard to recognize that habit loop and see the trigger as it happens and change the action ... but when you're looking at it objectively it makes it easier to see and then make it a challenge to find something else that gets you to the same result!

Nathan A.

01/25/2015 5:41AM

Great post again Tata. Very self-aware and reflective. You should be a writer if you aren't already! :)I found in the past that one of my biggest issues (or success factors) is that my success with weight loss is directly tied to how closely I track my food consumption. I had formerly used MyFitnessPal to track my calories and exercise, and was immediately successful at losing weight. I eat less when I know I've already hit my intake maximum, or sometimes I know I need to do some exercise when I'm over. The math doesn't lie about calories in vs calories burned equals either weight loss or weight gain. So I've again started tracking. Sometimes I feel ashamed at the things I eat when i look over the list at the end, but no matter what, I'm going to track it now.The other thing I found is that stress causes me to be unconcerned about what I eat, which has predictable consequences. Finally, my job is sedentary, so I need to exercise more, and eat less. Guaranteed success!