The first steps to stop being obese - part 7
"We cannot improve what we cannot measure".
How do we know if our dedication and effort are getting results? It's simple: by measuring our weight. This involves changing the relationship we have with the scale.
We look at the scale as the messenger of bad news. It almost seems that if we don't weigh ourselves and don't know how much weight we have, we'll stop having it and having to lose it.
Divorcing with the scale is one of the main reasons for weight gain. Since we don't see a factual number, we stick to the subjective sensations of how we feel, how we look, how clothes fit... we already know what the end result is: we increase and increase. And when we decide, half afraid, to go to the scales, we are scandalised by the number that appears, as if by magic. Or, more commonly, "the scale must be broken".
As if that were the most likely explanation...
"We can't improve what we can't measure."
How do we know if our dedication and effort are getting results? It's simple: by measuring weight. This involves changing the relationship we have with the scale.
We look at the scale as the messenger of bad news.It almost seems that if we don't weigh ourselves and don't know how much weight we have, we'll stop having it and have to lose it.
Divorcing with the scale is one of the main reasons for weight gain. Since we don't see a factual number, we stick to the subjective sensations of how we feel, how we look, how clothes fit... we already know what the end result is: we increase and increase. And when we decide, half afraid, to go to the scales, we are scandalised by the number that appears, as if by magic. Or, more commonly, "the scale must be broken".
As if that were the most likely explanation...
The first step to becoming obese is to change the relationship we have with the scales!
The scales don't tell us what we already know, they tell us exactly what we don't know and need to know:
How much weight?
Am I winning the battle?
How much closer am I to the goal?
When I decided to start the journey towards being obese, I set myself conditions that I considered essential to increase the probability of having the success I wanted.
One of them was to have daily motivation .
I wanted a motivation boost every day that was concrete, real and that could not be influenced by my mood. The solution was a digital scale.
I started weighing myself every morning before I left the room and recording my weight.
Doing so was the main factor in my being able to lose the weight I lost. I'm absolutely certain that if I hadn't, I wouldn't have made it. Watching the weight come down in moments of greater doubt, vulnerability or even bad feeling was often the extra strength I needed to keep going.
The first moment was on day 3 after I reduced carbs. I felt like what I imagine a hangover from any drug to be: headaches, chills, irritability, an intrinsic urge to consume carbs. I was about to give up, I thought I wouldn't be able to keep going, that it wouldn't be worth the effort.
Until I weighedmyself.
When I saw that I had lost more than a kilo from one day to the other, I said to myself: "hang on it's working". I did and it worked. Two days later I no longer felt any discomfort, on the contrary.
That number was the certainty I needed that I could be on the right track.
It is essential to weigh yourself every day, to celebrate the small victories, to understand what we are doing right and what we are doing wrong, to adjust in order to continue on the path to stop being obese.
If you don't measure, how will you know if you are improving?