by JJ Smith
3. COMMIT: Learn How to Commit to Losing Weight. Are you merely interested in losing weight or are you committed to losing weight? If you are truly committed, you will do what it takes and make the necessary sacrifices to lose weight. People fail not because of lack of interest or desire but because of lack of commitment. Learn the different types of motivation and how to apply them to your journey.
4. CONTROL EMOTIONS: Don’t Eat Your Heart Out. Learn the signals (such as boredom, depression, loneliness, frustration, anger) that trigger emotional eating. These are the wake-up calls that let us know we are dealing with toxic emotions that need to be processed and managed.
5. ESTABLISH SUCCESS HABITS: Design Your Life for Weight-Loss Success. You cannot rely on willpower and self-control to lose weight—you have to control your environment and circumstances. Your ability to maintain self-control will depend on your environment. If your house is hectic and chaotic, or if you are stressed or in a bad mood or easily distracted, you will struggle to maintain self-control. All of these circumstances can happen each and every day, so in order to have more self-control, you will have to change your environment by establishing success habits.
6. SUPPORT FROM OTHERS: Have a Support System in Place. Studies show that those who have a support community have more long-term success with weight loss. Learn how to create support systems and accountability partners.
7. SUPERCHARGE YOUR SPIRITUAL LIFE: Tap into Your Spiritual Power to Achieve Weight-Loss Success. Until your mind and spirit are engaged in your weight-loss efforts, excess weight will continue to be a problem for you. The ultimate problem is not your physical weight but what is happening in your mind and spirit causing you to gain weight.
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SLAY Resistance
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TOMORROW IS THE day you have decided that you are going to wake up early and begin to exercise regularly. You set your alarm for 5:00 a.m. so you can go to the gym before work. You fall asleep. The alarm clock loudly goes off letting you know it is time to get out of bed. You are now confronted with your first decision of the day. Will you get up or will you hit the snooze button? You decide to press the snooze button and go back to sleep. Is this a big deal? You best believe it is. You just lost the first battle of the day. You had decided to set the alarm early so you could get up and work out, but instead you hit the snooze and went back to sleep. What just happened? Resistance just won. Resistance has beaten you before you even got out of bed. You now have an uphill battle for the rest of the day.
Most of us have two lives, the unlived life and the actual one we live day to day. Between the two lives stands resistance. The unlived life is where all of our hopes, dreams, goals, and heart’s desires are, which is often different from the life, career, and home where we actually live day to day. I have been battling resistance my whole life and I imagine you have too. What is resistance? In my opinion, resistance is one of the most toxic forces in the world. Resistance is that lethargic or apathetic feeling of not wanting to do something you know is good for you. Resistance causes us to procrastinate, or delay starting something that is good for us. Do you constantly set goals and not accomplish them? Well, resistance is the reason you have not achieved the success you desired.
To give in to resistance weakens the spirit and stunts our growth and makes us not be who we were born to be. You may not have taken the time to name this lethargic, apathetic feeling, but chances are you have come face to face with resistance every day. Resistance is there, preventing you from living your best life.
Resistance cannot be seen, heard, or touched, but it can most definitely be felt. Resistance is the enemy within. Resistance has many masks: fear, procrastination, fatigue, doubt, indecision, laziness, self-sabotage, and pride. As a general rule of thumb, the greater the calling on your life, the stronger the resistance. Our genius, our gifts, our talents, and our purpose for being on this earth are on the other side of resistance. You have to fight through resistance in the smallest tasks of the day to fulfill your life’s goals.
I struggle with resistance every day. When I sit down to write, I immediately procrastinate by picking up my phone to see what is going on on Facebook or to check email. This is what resistance looks like for me. I have written several New York Times bestselling books, but every time I sit down to write, I will have to slay resistance just to get started. Resistance is subtle yet so powerful. It will stop you in your tracks if you do not recognize it and defeat it each time. How many people have tried to write a book but never finished it? How many people have tried to lose weight but never achieved their weight-loss goal? Why? Resistance has defeated them and most of the time they didn’t even realize it. Do you not believe me? I want you to stop and think about it right now. How many times did you say you were going to workout or start a new diet, and you simply did not do it, day after day, week after week? Resistance is real. Resistance is burying you and your dreams each and every day.
TAKE ACTION
Resistance will make you feel discouraged and want to quit. Resistance will make you feel hopeless about changing things in your life. Do not give in to discouragement. Do not let fear paralyze you. Resistance can start out as unhappiness but quickly turn to self-hate or even worse, depression or dysfunctional behavior. You have to focus on things that give you the spiritual fortitude to fight through and continue pursuing your best life. For me, I turn to God in prayer and simply take some small action toward my goal each day to slay resistance. Some days it’s drinking more water, sometimes it’s doing a hundred squats or simply walking to clear my mind and plan for the next day.
Think of resistance as a wall that you have to break down in order to start something new.
Taking action helps. Think of one thing, one positive action you can take this week to slay resistance. Maybe it begins with telling someone, “I am unhappy. I feel discouraged.” Just by acknowledging it, you begin to cast out fear and hopelessness. Decide today that you will take one action, no matter how small, that will help break through resistance. I do not mean start pretending to be happy or being dishonest with yourself. I mean acknowledge your unhappiness, as that dissatisfaction that is leading you to something different, brand new, or greater. It is your wake-up call to listen to what your Spirit is trying to say.
Pay more attention to the quiet discontent in your life. Do not try to cover it up with money, sex, people, drugs, or alcohol. Those things are distractions that will just keep you too busy to achieve the one thing you desire in your life.
CREATE NEW HABITS
Our habits, the things we do day in and day out, have a major impact on our lives. They shape our entire future and destiny. Resistance thrives when you have bad habits. What bad habits have you picked up to avoid doing the hard work of your life?
Let us think about some of your habits and daily routines. Do you spend time in prayer or self-reflection in the morning? Do you walk the dog? Do you eat the same thing for breakfast? Do you read a book before bed? These daily habits and routines create the rhythms of your life. Yet when was the last time you deliberately established a routine to create a life-altering habit. We will have to change our habits and routine or else we are going to fight resistance over fifty times a day. If every time you get frustrated, mad, lonely, bored, or tired and do not have a habit or routine to sustain you, you will just give in to resistance.
Most highly successful people have better habits than most of us do. Their habits consistently make it easier to defeat resistance. Good habits will help us defeat resistance in our lives as well.
CLEAN UP THE MESSES IN YOUR LIFE
Resistance thrives in messiness. We all have messes in our lives. Home mess. Relationship mess. Work mess. Kid mess. Some messes are small, some are life-altering. Sickness and death, disease and heartbreak, fear and pain, abuse and addiction, disappointment and failure, injustice and shattered dreams—all of these things make life very messy. Doctors estimate that 70 percent to 80 percent of
their business is nonhealth-related. People are not actually sick; they are just living a messy life.
When I was younger, in my twenties, I had no idea that life was so messy. This probably worked in my favor because if I had known as a young person how challenging, heartbreaking, and messy life could be, I might have thrown in the towel.
Even though life is messy, it does not mean we just live a life of messiness. We do not have to let the mess define us. We are equipped and capable of doing something about it. We have to confront our own mess, and how we have contributed to it, as well as take responsibility for the mess we have caused in other people’s lives. We are here to put in the work of eliminating messiness, fighting the good fight, and living our very best life.
Everyone is fighting the good fight against some type of internal struggle. What battle are you struggling with right now? What battle is your spouse or loved one struggling with? When you acknowledge that others are also fighting a hard battle, you can rise to the occasion to help them through it. If someone is nasty, rude, or mean to you, just know he or she may be going through something difficult. Do not treat them the way they are treating you, because criticism and cruelty harms others. Rise to the occasion and allow the greatest part of your being to show them compassion and love. When we all do this, collectively we all win against a messy life.
Show compassion and love to everyone by simply greeting someone with a smile, praying for them, and showing them more love than they deserve.
ENHANCE YOUR SPIRITUAL LIFE
So many of us focus on getting physically healthy. But what about spiritual health?
When was the last time you paused to think deeply about your life and your happiness? The quality of the life you are living? Most people do not think about their lives this way because they are simply trying to muster up enough energy to get through their busy, hectic day. They are struggling through each week, trying to make it to the weekend when they can just chill or do something fun. They simply have become indifferent and have lost hope for getting to the next level in life. When was the last time you purposefully thought about the life you are living? Are you spiritually healthy? Are you walking in purpose and winning day-to-day battles? Are you slaying resistance and staying focused and motivated? Are you living your best life—physically, emotionally, and spiritually?
Answer this question: How is your prayer life? Just as your blood pressure is a great indicator of your physical health, your prayer life is a great barometer of your spiritual health. Taking stock of your prayer life will allow you to get more in sync with your spiritual needs. It will help you get to the root of your cravings—not just your physical cravings, but your soul cravings.
Place the Word of God or inspirational books where they are visible to you every day and spend more time reading and strengthening your spiritual life.
FIVE MINUTES A DAY TO SLAY RESISTANCE
There is a phrase that church folks say: Prayer changes everything. It is the truth. In fact, nothing ever really changes until we give daily prayer a place in our lives. Take five minutes each day to pray with God. If you do not believe in praying to God, then still take five minutes a day to reflect on your current struggles and challenges and think about the best direction for your current situation. I am asking you to take five minutes out of your day to make prayer or self-reflection a daily habit. Put Post-it notes throughout your home or car until you remember this daily habit. By doing this, you are slaying resistance each day.
Resistance will try to keep you from this quiet time every day. Resistance will encourage you to do it later. But you can seize control by taking time each morning to begin your day in prayer or self-reflection.
The five-minute daily habit of prayer or self-reflection leads to spiritual health. The more we do this, the clearer our direction becomes in our life. Five minutes a day is a simple and achievable task. Try it daily and watch your life change for the better.
CONCLUSION
We all have a bit of spiritual laziness that causes us to have a weak mind that cannot defeat resistance. It is important to have a strong mind and spirit that thrives and shines bright in a world full of hopelessness. I am confident that five minutes a day of prayer or self-reflection will help you create some powerful spiritual experiences that yield amazing results in your life.
As you continue on your spiritual journey, be watchful for the resistance that has defeated you in the past. Be observant. Guard against cynics and critics. Resistance will use them to discourage you or distract you from living your best life. Stay focused on your life’s calling and purpose. Resistance is the only thing standing between you and the happiness you desire. Watch for the resistance, recognize it, and fight against it, and it will lose its power over you with time. Each time you break through resistance, you are moving toward the life you imagined for yourself since you were born.
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Use Visualization Techniques for Weight Loss
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YOU ARE READING this because you probably have tried to lose weight in the past and it did not work. You may think you failed at dieting or wasted time with gym memberships. You may be feeling disappointed in yourself.
Before we go any further, let us be sure you understand something: You did not fail on those diets, those diets failed you. Dieting does not work because it does not address the underlying reasons we gain weight in the first place. Sure, you can force yourself to lose weight temporarily by eating less or avoiding unhealthy foods, but like so many other dieters, you will always gain the weight back. You generally can keep up with healthy eating and exercising for a while, but eventually you veer off track and give in to the foods you crave. You have to get to the root of the problem that causes the cravings for unhealthy foods. Rather than continuing this losing battle with dieting, it is time to focus on changing the way you think to solve your weight problems once and for all.
An effective approach to losing weight permanently is to use visualization to get your mind and body to work together. Folks have had amazing results with visualization without having to starve themselves or deprive their body in any way. Visualization is a mind-body approach that makes permanent weight loss easier and sustainable. I will teach you how to allow your mind to work with your body to transform yourself from the inside out.
Hundreds of thousands of people have used visualization methods to achieve dramatic weight loss. These people dieted on and off for years, but are now slimmer and healthier and no longer at war with their bodies. I am not saying they are perfect, as they do have cheat meals and sometimes lose their motivation, but they have found a way to achieve their weight goals and then maintain them.
Visualization only takes a few minutes a day, and doing it daily will yield tremendous benefits. The more you practice, the better you will get over time.
HOW VISUALIZATION WORKS TO HELP YOU LOSE WEIGHT
Leptin is the master hormone in charge of body weight. Leptin controls how hungry you are on a daily basis. When leptin does not function properly, it creates an imbalance that results in a slow metabolism, premature aging, and disease. Many obese and overweight people have a hormonal condition called leptin resistance. This means that the brain is no longer listening to the hormone leptin, which is the same as having no leptin at all; and they just get fatter and fatter. The fat cells fail to respond to leptin’s message. Leptin resistance disrupts the body’s natural ability to regulate appetite and metabolism. If you become leptin-resistant, you will eat and eat as if you are starving. Some people get extremely obese because their bodies never receive the message to stop eating and start burning.
Once you understand leptin resistance, it makes sense why restrictive dieting (extreme reduction in calories) does not work. Restrictive dieting mimics a famine. As you starve yourself and fight your cravings, your body thinks you are in an actual famine; your survival mechanisms kick in and you become leptin-resistant. This causes you to be hungry and tired all th
e time.
When you practice visualizations, you can rewire your brain and reduce the inflammatory hormones that cause leptin resistance. You will stop craving unhealthy junk foods and desire real foods. You will have a balanced body chemistry that will cause you to desire nutrient-rich foods that fuel the body for healthy weight loss.
Visualization is like having a conversation with your brain, sending signals to your body that you are not in a famine state and that you’ve got plenty to eat and don’t need the extra weight on your body. This allows your body to release the weight naturally. When you unlock the secrets of communicating with your brain, the health and fitness possibilities are endless.
There are five steps to mastering visualization to help accelerate weight loss. Let us examine them.
FIVE STEPS TO USING VISUALIZATION FOR WEIGHT LOSS
Step 1: Prep the Mind
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Proper posture is critical for visualization. Sit up straight in a comfortable chair and clasp your hands loosely together in your lap. Be sure to straighten your spine and keep it straight throughout your visualization.
Focus your breathing through your nose with your mouth closed.
Now you want to bring awareness into your body and be present in the moment. You can achieve this by praying, journaling, stretching, painting, taking a hot bath, doing yoga, or listening to relaxing music. Then you want to find pictures or images that immediately make you relax. Use these to help you get your mind into a relaxed state. For some, it could be an image of loved ones or family members. You might simply look at a white light. It is a good idea to try a few images to determine which ones relax you as soon as you see them.
