Motivation

More good stuff from 3 Fat Chicks, this time by Funniegrrl:

I finally stuck to a program for a number of years when I gave up on motivation. Here's what I realized:

Motivation will often get you started, but motivation is an EMOTION. Emotions always come and go, it's natural. So, if you build your world around dependence on it, you'll always be disappointed. It always leaves. If you stick around long enough it'll come back, but it's going to cycle in and out for the rest of your life.

For me, success finally came when, rather than hoping my motivation would sustain me through losing and keeping off 170+ pounds, I decided I was going to do what it takes to see me through. I had a long talk with myself about the fact that it was going to be hard when that initial enthusiasm faded, that there would be times when I was hanging on by my fingernails. I would often have to do things I didn't WANT to do, or I would have to refrain from doing things I WANTED. I could no longer live my life by whim. I would give up a lot of things I enjoyed -- not only eating whatever I wanted whenever I wanted, but I LOVE cooking and talking and reading about recipes and techniques and restaurants and cuisines. I was giving up my primary hobby. I would have to find other ways to deal with boredom besides food. I was going to make a radical change in my life, and that included being active. I learned about myself and what strategies would help me stay on track when "motivation" and "willpower" were not close at hand. I felt vulnerable when my office had it's holiday party that first year ... so I didn't go. I don't keep food in the house that I'm prone to binge on. I make sure that I have my lunch for the next day packed before I go to bed so I don't have the "I didn't have time this morning" excuse. Etc.

Good for you for coming back. There are lots of ways to keep that motivation flowing -- books and websites to read and whatnot, journaling, etc. However, I think the people who are successful in the long run do so through determination, not motivation. At least that's the case for me.

And more:

Let me challenge you to think about this in a little different way. Forget about "motivation." First of all, no one here can give you motivation -- it has to be something you give yourself. Second, motivation is an emotion that comes and goes. Even if you were to get motivated to put down the knitting and hit the treadmill, that motivation isn't going to last forever.

Getting healthy -- whether you are talking about eating, or exercise, or whatever -- is about committment. You decide that this is what you are going to do, regardless of whether or not you "feel like it" on any given day. Decide on a reasonable exercise schedule, put it on your calendar, and do it. You do it because it's time to do it, not because you'd rather do it than anything else.

I don't show up for work every day because I'd rather be at the office than at the local coffeeshop with a bagel and a crossword puzzle. I do it because I have to. Same with brushing my teeth, taking out the garbage, writing checks to the landlord. There are consequences if I don't. I don't ENJOY these things, I don't feel "motivated" to do them, but I do them nonetheless.

There may come a day -- I HOPE there comes a day -- where you enjoy exercise for its own sake. But, until that day comes, you have to make up your mind that it is simply something you are going to do because you need to do it.

And even more:

I understand what you are experiencing, but for me this isn't about "motivation." Motivation is an EMOTION, which comes and goes. There are things you can do to keep it pumped up, which I'll talk about later, but even then it's going to desert you from time to time. What has kept me going through over 3-1/2 years and the loss of over 165 pounds is DETERMINATION.

If you find yourself giving in to fleeting urges frequently, to me that's a sign that you need to do more planning. When I started my program I sat down every night and planned my menu for the next day down to the smallest detail. I laid out things for breakfast as much as I could, and I packed my lunch and all the snacks I would need at work the next day (if the next day was a work day). When I got home from work I knew exactly what I had to prepare for dinner. Some people would balk at this -- the work, and the "restriction" -- but for me it was crucial. Eating by whim was what got me to well over 300 pounds. By knowing that I would be eating a meal or snack every 3 to 4 hours, I eliminated the "hmmm I think I want something to eat" mind-wandering. I had a schedule. Second, it eliminated the possibility of making those split-second decisions to eat something bad -- if it wasn't in my lunch box it was simply off-limits. Period.

I still find that the times I eat off-plan are the times I've done the least planning and preparation. I have kind of a "menu template" that I follow, but am willing to let myself make last-minute choices within that template. However, the less prepared I am with viable choices, the more likely I am to make poor ones.

That time each evening planning the next day's food also served as a time to simply focus on what I was trying to accomplish. I think a lot of people trying to lose weight have this vague wish to do it, but they don't spend time every single day THINKING HARD about it, making concrete plans, anticipating challenges, visualizing solutions. I think we all have a strong tendency to want to "wing it" and do only what we want at a particular moment -- eat the junk, stay on the couch, whatever. The ones who are successful are those who work hard to turn that thinking around, who give up some of that supposed freedom (which is really a prison built of food and sloth) in order to accomplish goals. In addition to the time I spent on menu planning, I also made sure I went to the grocery store every week, same day and time, to stock up with healthy food for the week. There were no excuses about not having vegetables in the house or whatever. I also spent a lot of time reading about fitness and weight loss (such as Thin for Life, and Shape magazine, and health and fitness web sites). This became my hobby, it became a focal point of my life. I truly believe that for people who have a lot of weight to lose, especially if they've struggled with weight a long time, this HAS to become a project that takes center stage. It is not something you can do incidentally, at least to start. If you build a good foundation, you can gradually shift to a more "normal" life as the new habits take hold. But if you never dedicate the time and energy to planning and journaling and digging deep, it'll be hard to turn around that conditioning that associates stress with chocolate, movies with popcorn, shopping with fast food, etc.