The Holidays are over.
Stuffing ourselves beyond becoming comatose in a chair is put away until next year. It is January and here we are with our list. This year we are going to save money, spend time with family, quit smoking, exercise regularly, read more books, eat healthier, and the number one thing we are all going to do is lose weight. Easier said than done.
I have mentioned time and again that weight is not a fat problem, it is an inflammation problem. If we can lower the inflammation and get a little healthier, our body will give up fat and extra weight, naturally. This begins with hydration and minerals or electrolytes which are in the Mineral Water Hydration Packs sold on this website.
But this may seem too easy so… “What are we going to do?”
Join an insanity workout program, do aerobics ten days a week? Hire a trainer? Most of us would like the trainer to do the exercises for us. Most of us wind up hurting ourselves slightly or significantly which is another excuse to stop trying.
I can only tell you I have been wherever you might be. I have two brothers who eat everything they want and never gain an ounce of weight. I am, though I doubtfully questioned my mother about it, am unfortunately from the same gene pool, and have the metabolism of a dead person. What does this mean? It means I am like you and ninety percent of everyone else who complains about our slow metabolism. Are we jealous of people like my brothers? Heck, yeah. Its nice to not worry about putting on fat just by looking at cheese hanging in a deli window.
That may be an exaggeration, but a lot of us just don’t know how to start, or are so overwhelmed, we give up before starting. We use the partial myth of slow metabolism as an excuse. We actually create our slow metabolism with bad food choices. This doesn’t mean my brothers aren’t different. It just means they aren’t really as different as we would like to believe.
The list of resolutions I began with is part of the reason we quit. It is a crazy list we come up with out of guilt. We beat ourselves up before the year is three days old and that is just insane. Let me ask a question here. If it was so easy to accomplish all these things than why is our list the same year after year?
Why do diet programs and companies never disappear from the landscape? There is a reason the word diet begins with the letters DIE. People take these things to the extreme and some actually die from it.
Weight loss companies survive on our repeated bad behavior and love our return visits. Yo Yo dieting just isn’t a good answer.
We have all heard phrases like: “This is a balanced approach”, “an apple a day keeps the doctor away“ , “drinking a glass water before eating will help us eat less“, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure“. All of these little pieces of folk wisdom are partially true and if enacted, will help us find some balance. There is the crucial phrase: “IF enacted“. This requires a shift in thought. Change is hard for all of us. We go with what others are suggesting without truly deciding to change for our own good. Hurting ourselves in a gym or an exotic dance class defeats the purpose. Making some common sense decisions for our own well being is a better approach.
There are some simple things to do.
- Don’t eat after seven o’clock at night.
- Get proper rest.
- Stop eating when you are satisfied not stuffed.
- Eat two pieces of pizza slowly rather than four pieces in less than a minute.
- Walk around the block with your wife or significant partner after you eat.
Enact a plan to change based on what is good for you. We all can come up with these thoughts, and more. Drink good clean water with your meal, not soda, beer, juices or alcohol. Succeeding in shedding some fat and feeling better will lead to enjoying the dance class, and doing it with ease and grace, rather than duress. Fun and enjoyment leads to replication. The Mineral Water Hydration Packs help enormously, especially with minerals to keep the electricity flowing inside us. Where we choose to begin our program will keep us at it longer.
I fell out of a tree doing relief work in a hurricane. I gained sixty pounds in ninety days of inactivity. It has taken me a year and a half to be three pounds away from where I was then. I made mistakes along the way. I stopped drinking enough of our Mineral Water Hydration Packs in my water. I was giving this advice but not following it myself. Ninety days had changed me and I rationalized it was okay to have a soda, then two, then three. Then chips and cheese and crackers. I snacked on unhealthy things and would go off track for several weeks at a time. The point is, I would take two steps forward and a step back. Does this sound familiar? The hope is not to stray too far and not to quit. I always knew when I returned from my insanity the Mineral Water Hydration Packs were there, healthy food choices were possible, and I could begin again. Common sense would return and I could move forward by walking each day, riding my bike often, dancing when I could. I move forward for myself and the vows I make to my Creator to take care of this body. It is the only one I get. We can’t get another model like my brothers but most days I wouldn’t trade it in anyway. I am comfortable in this one and grateful for its health.
I hope this year that God touches each of you in a special way and with some extra love and guidance. I pray you find a little common sense and that your list of resolutions will be missing the diet item next January.
-Tommie Weber
January 2018
