Hello and welcome to my Weight-loss programme, a 4 step approach that will help you lose weight, get fit and feel great about yourself. This programme is unique in both its style and approach. Firstly, as you can see it’s being delivered over the internet in a visual format…just like watching TV. But also, unlike buying a book or a CD and then being left to your own devices, this programme has been designed specifically to allow me to be with you every single step of the way. Through this specially designed programme I’m going to personally coach you, support you and guide you every step of the way so that you learn how to take on the habits necessary to not only lose weight but keep it off FOREVER! Over the last 15 years, I’ve helped thousands of people lose weight using this programme. My formula is tried and tested. So whether you want to lose just a few pounds or you have a substantial amount of weight you want to lose this programme is for you. Over the course of this programme I’ll be sharing with you the secrets of how to successfully make lasting changes. I’ll prove that change is not only possible but that it can also be enjoyable. Just by following the 4 steps, you will find that the results speak for themselves. I guarantee you that if who follows these steps you will succeed because each step and each technique makes sense and works. But let me first of all give you a brief outline to the 4 steps This step is all about getting you ready and preparing you to succeed. You see just like an athlete before a competition I need to get you warmed up so you’re ready to start, so that you’re in the best possible shape to start loosing weight. I’ll show you how to become excited and motivated to take the necessary action and how to sustain it. In this step I’m going to help you get very clear about what you want to achieve and give you all the information you will need to educate and empower yourself so that you can start getting results straight away. In this step I’ll be sharing with you a whole load of different and powerful tools that you’ll be using through out Step 3. Some of these tools will be nutritional, some will be to help you with your behaviour and emotions and some will be physical. This step lasts 21 days and is where you’ll be using the tools I shared with you in Step 2. But relax you won’t be using all of them at once. By focusing on just a few things at once you’ll have the time and space to practise using these tools, get comfortable with them and so develop the new habits that will help you lose weight and keep it off. When you start Step 3 I’ll be with you every day supporting and encouraging you towards achieving your goal. You can think of me like your personal coach. I’ll be with you 24/7 routing for you and helping you through the emotional ups and down until you achieve what you want to achieve. If step 3 is the practice ground then Step 4 is all about integrating what you’ve practised into real life! Many people will have stuck to a diet for 3 weeks before, perhaps even longer. But few people will have learned how to permanently change their behaviour FOREVER. This programme will do that for you. I will provide you with a method for continuing what you’ve started so for the rest of your life you will think, eat, exercise, and feel like a slim, fit, healthy person. Okay so, now that you have an idea of what each step involves, I need to give you some background information before we start step one. If you want to lose weight there are many options available to you - many different approaches that all claim to get the same results. You can cut out food groups or live off liquid supplements; you can count points, units and calories; or only eat food in certain combinations – the choices are endless. But most people’s experience of dieting is that it makes them miserable and doesn’t provide a permanent solution, but they keep on doing it. I like to think of it as scoring a goal but losing the game. You may get some short-term, short-lived benefits, but in the long run, most people feel worse off. One of the most popular Health Plans and one that many people seem to be doing, especially when they’re not dieting is the Ultimate Anti-Health Plan. It may seem like a bit of a joke and I may have exaggerated some of it BUT for many people much of this will ring true. See if it seems familiar to you... The Ultimate Anti-Health Plan If you want to put on weight, reduce your energy levels and increase your risk of illness then the Ultimate Anti-Health Plan is for you. It’s a simple 4-step approach to achieving a body that’s shapeless and lifeless. The first step in the Ultimate Anti-Health Plan is to slow down your metabolic rate. You’ll burn fewer calories, so you’ll automatically store body fat and put on weight! The easiest way to do this is to stop any kind of exercise or activity. Spend your time in front of the television. Don’t walk anywhere. Always park as close as possible to your destination. And avoid breaking a sweat at all costs! The next step in the Ultimate Anti-Health Plan is to get addicted to sugar. Stock your pantry with sugary drinks, sugary cereals and refined carbohydrates like white bread and pasta. And take advantage of special offers – that way, you’ll get the most junk for your money. Eat these foods whenever you can – especially if you’re not hungry! The more sugar-rich foods you eat, the sooner you’ll reach your goal of being overweight and unhealthy. The key to putting on weight is to eat more calories than you need. Don’t fill up on fruit and vegetable. Because if you’re not careful you’ll have no room left for fat and empty calories you need! Choose refined, processed foods full of hydrogenated or saturated fats. You can stuff yourself with hundreds of excess calories without feeling full! And you’ll also avoid fibre – which could fill you up unnecessarily! Now fried foods are good. Choosing deep-fried or battered foods can double your calorie intake over grilled, steamed, or stir-fried. Check the labels: look for high calories and high fat content. And don’t forget to buy snacks every time you visit a store. Keep some in your car, at your desk, next to the sofa and even beside your bed. And most importantly, eat fast-food whenever you can. These foods are full of saturated fat, sugar and refined flour, and these are the best friend of any Ultimate Anti-Health dieter – and a sure-fire way of consuming a whole day’s calories in one sitting. The best choices are burgers, deep-fried chicken or battered fish. And don’t forget the fries……the perfect combination of fast-releasing carbohydrate and saturated fat. You’ll spike your blood sugar levels AND overload your fat cells at the same time. And always remember to go for the largest portion available! Normally your body will tell you when you’re hungry or full, and when you need to rest, and when you need a drink. You must learn to ignore all of these urges because if you act on them, you may find yourself losing weight! Eat when you’re not hungry and eat past the point of feeling full and avoid water at all costs. By not drinking too much water you'll make sure you don’t digest food well and you’ll also maximize your stomach space for other foods. We often mistake thirst for hunger as well so if you make the mistake of drinking water you may well curb your appetite. A serious set back! If you are thirsty, drink sugary drinks or tea, coffee or full-fat milk and this will also help you to maximise your calorie intake. So by following these simple 4 steps, you’ll learn to give up responsibility for your own health. By falling prey to temptation and continuing old habits, you can stay firmly on the familiar path of weight gain! Blame supermarkets, restaurants, the advertising industry and even your mother for your eating habits……and you’ll find that once you get the hang of it, the programme will be so easy to follow that you’ll soon be doing it automatically... if you’re not doing it already! By following these 4 steps, you are guaranteed to make yourself feel sluggish, heavy and who knows maybe even depressed! So why do we do what we do? Well the answer is really quite simple, we do what makes us feel good about our self and we do what we’re comfortable doing. This generally will mean that we’ve done it for a while. In other words we’ve practiced doing it. Now to make any lasting changes in our life we need to do 3 things: * notice what we’re doing * find some other things that makes us feel good about our self without the downside of weight gain and * practise doing them until they becomes second nature to us. In other words until they become comfortable. My Weight-Loss programme is designed to teach you how to really observe what you do so that you can change your behaviour and remain naturally in control. Ok so are you ready to start step one? Let’s GO for it.
So right now I want you to do something for me. I want to ask you a question. How did you become overweight in the first place? Do you know what some of the behaviour and actions where that have got you to this point? Do you do any of the following? I eat when I’m stressed or tired… I always think about food… I always too much… I drink alcohol with every evening meal… I’m very inactive and I take the car everywhere… I spend loads of time just sitting down… The truth is you weren’t born over weight. You didn’t wake up one morning and find yourself carrying extra fat. Your weight is something that you’ve worked on and developed. You could even say that you’ve become good and skilled and putting weight on. Did you know that the definition of being skillful at something is being able to do something without thinking about, doing something automatically? Isn’t that what you do with food? So when are you triggered to eat? Do you eat when you’re: Bored? Stressed? Tired? Frustrated? Upset? Lonely? Even happy? What are the types of foods that you reach for when you experience any of these emotions? Are they often the sweet and fattening ones? For most people, eating is an automatic process. They are unaware of the many patterns they have when it comes to food and the emotions that lead them to eat and it’s your emotions that cause you to overeat. However, you have to realise that you are more than the sum of your behaviours: you can change your choices and you can do that now: you’ve learned to behave in a particular way and the great thing is you can also unlearn it. There are millions of overweight people who want to lose their excess pounds so naturally many of them turn to dieting. But after losing a few pounds and occasionally reaching their target weight because they haven’t changed their way of thinking they tend to put the weight back on again. This is because many of us eat for loads of reasons apart from hunger and even if you begin to eat well and exercise without changing your way of thinking your brain will tend to go back to what you know. You see a lot of people still not made the link between the choices they make – what they eat, when they eat, what they don’t eat, how much they eat - and their weight. They’ve been convinced, perhaps by doctors or by what they’ve read that the body they have is all down to genes or luck - so they believe there’s nothing they can do to change. Some people lose weight on certain regimes and others don’t. There are people who have been successful on low-carbohydrate programmes and others who find that cutting out fat works best for them. But no matter what the programme, there will always be people who’ve found they don’t work for them. And that’s because, when it comes to diets, one size doesn’t fit all. Yes, we all have different body types, shapes and sizes; but we are all in control of what we do within that framework and we can make the best of what we’re given People used to believe that everything about us was determined at birth and that we had no way of changing throughout our lives. But no matter how hard-wired our brains are we can always alter it - if we really want to. The great news is that I’m not asking you to follow a complicated formula. I’m suggesting that you adopt the techniques of naturally slim people and people who have lost weight and kept it off. If you really want to change, it’s time to throw away any old excuses you might have because the difference that will make the difference is you. Life today is becoming increasingly difficult – full of stresses and strains and more and more people are turning to food for comfort. And if this is your only source of comfort, then it can easily get out of control. Unfortunately, if we’ve been using food as comfort for a long time our brains keep suggesting the same solution because that’s what we’ve practised doing. Our brains doesn’t know whether it’s right or wrong, it just knows that’s the choice we’ve made in the past and automatically assumes we want to make the same choice again. If food has made you feel better or distracted you from a problem your brain will present the same solution over and over again. It’s not concerned with the long-term consequences it’s concerned with making you feel better now. Remember many of us have been rewarded or comforted with food since we were too young to know why and our brains have learnt to associate food with emotion. And if eating food comforts you or stops you from experiencing uncomfortable emotions then chances are your brain will keep suggesting food to help you. But when computer programmes become faulty or out-of-date we change them. And this is what we’re going to do with your brain. But unlike computers attempts to change a learnt behaviour can feel strange at first. Sometimes you can notice your mind and body resist when you first drink tea without sugar or say no to a biscuit, or pass on a dessert when eating out. This is your brain trying to help you. It knows what has made you feel good in the past. Do you know what happens when you eat for any reason apart from hunger? Well quite simply you’ll put weight on because your body just stores any excess food as fat. So if you want to change then you need to learn how to deal with your emotions so that you can make different choices whenever you’re triggered to eat for reasons apart from hunger. Your brain is always offering you solutions based on what you’ve done in the past and what it thinks is best. So it’s really important that you stop seeing what you do or have done as bad or wrong but instead as just something you’ve practised something you’ve learnt to do and because you’ve learned certain behaviours you can unlearn them. But it’s really important that you appreciate what a sophisticated and powerful piece of equipment your brain is. Give your brain a job to do and it will do it extremely well especially if you’ve been doing it for a long time. So, if you give it worry, self-doubt, if you keep telling yourself you don’t like exercise and the message that losing weight is difficult and it’s something you’ll never achieve then, guess what? This is what your brain will deliver. It might seem like a strange concept to you now but the reason you worry or get stressed and the reason you are overweight is that’s what you’ve practiced doing. To change thing you need to practice doing things differently. What do you want? Take a moment to think about it. You could even pause this for a moment and write down your answer. If you ask most people this question they tend to go on and on and on about what they don’t want, how hard losing weight is, how they’ve tried so many times in the past and it hasn’t worked. But it is very rare that you meet someone who will say something like, ‘I want to be slimmer,’ or ‘I want to be able to go shopping and buy the clothes I like.’ Knowing and focusing on what you do want is vital. Most of the things we do, we do with an idea of what we want to achieve – and this is usually a visual idea. Whether or not you consider yourself to be someone who thinks in pictures, it’s a fact. We’re all visual. What colour is your front door? Describe to me what your bedroom looks like? In order to know the colour of your door or be able to describe your bedroom you have to be able to see it. But the trouble is when it comes to weight loss, most people tend make pictures of what they don’t want not what they want and then they seem surprised when they end up bigger and less fit than they were before they started. Just for a moment imagine you had a photograph right now in front of yourself, taken sometime in the future, and its you looking slimmer and fitter. This is not how you might have looked in the past but how you want to look in the future. Imagine putting it in a place where you could see it every day. Wouldn’t you feel inspired looking at it? Or imagine you had a film of how you were going to look in the future; a file that shows you doing all the things you know that will make you healthier. How about if you could watch that film, every day: wouldn’t you feel motivated to change? It’s so important that you see what you want before you can begin to work on it – and this step will help you to fully open up the part of your brain so that you have a clear, more enticing, and more exciting image of you as a slimmer, fitter, healthier and happier person. So now what I want to do is take you through an exercise to help increase your motivation. This exercise is in 2 parts and you might find that part 1 is emotionally a little challenging because I’m going to invite you to look at the consequences of you continuing your current life style and that might not have been something you’ve thought about before. I want you to imagine that for the next 6 months you do absolutely nothing about changing. You continue with your current eating habits and continue with a fairly in active life style. Imagine arriving in front of a mirror six months from now, what would you look like? What would you see? How would you feel? Would you imagine that you’ve lost weight or put weight on? Now imagine seeing one year into the future. Again it’s you having continued with your current eating habits, continued to be in active. What would you look like? How would you feel? Have you lost weight or put weight on? And what’s your health like? How do you feel about that? And then imagine going 5 years into the future. It’s you having eaten more than you need to. And it’s you having continued to have led fairly in active life style. What would you look like as you look in that mirror? How would you feel? Have you lost weight or put weight on? And what’s your health like and how do you feel about that? Okay so how do you feel now? Chances are that doing this exercise has made you think you don’t want this future. Well just be thankful that none of this has actually happened – but it could! So are you motivated to move away from this possible future? Chances are yes but let’s see if we can increase your motivation even more. Have you ever stopped to think about what your future would be like if you were slimmer, fitter, and healthier? Imagine for the next 6 months you started to lose weight by adopting some of the powerful tools like eating slowly, being more active and eating only when you were hungry. What would you imagine looking like in six months time if you looked in front of that mirror? What would you see? How would you feel? Now imagine seeing yourself one year into the future as you’ve continued to apply these powerful tools and imagine arriving in front of that mirror. What would you look like? How would you feel? Your muscle tone, your complexion. Are you fatter or slimmer? What about your health do you have less energy or more energy? And how about going 5 years into the future what would you look like as you arrive in front of that mirror? What would you see? You can see that your new habits are now second nature and you automatically only eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’ve had enough. You drink lots of water and you know how to deal with negative feelings. How are you looking and feeling? Do you like what you see? If you find yourself lacking motivation at anytime then you can repeat this exercise at anytime you like because it’s contained within the resource section. Many psychologists believe that it takes 21 days of doing something different for it to become a habit. When we do something over and over again a new connection, a new pathway, is formed in our brains and the more we repeat the behaviour the more we become hardwired to it. Once the behaviour is ingrained our brain starts to see this as the clearest and easiest route to take. This is the key to my weight loss programme and it’s what makes it unique. So in step three I will support you every day for 21 days as you practice doing something different. By doing this you will ingrain new powerful behaviours that help you to lose weight and get fit Just because we’re adults, it doesn’t mean that we can’t be taught new tricks. We just have to be patient and wait for our brain to settle into its new programmes. So what have we learnt here? Well we know that dieting doesn’t work and that in order to lose weight and keep it off we need to change our way of thinking. You should also now be aware of the importance of being able to see and feel how you want yourself to be in the future, which is slimmer, fitter and healthier. Now it’s time to look at Step 2 where we will be looking at the different tools that you will be using in Step 3.
Once you know what you want to achieve you’re ready to learn some simple techniques that will help you to lose weight and take control of your eating, without having to follow any unnatural or complicated process. Step 2 is the time when you will learn all about the different tools and techniques that you’ll be picking from and then using in Step 3. When you begin Step 3 you’ll get to choose what you try and when you try it, so you pick’n’mix what you do each day. In this way, you stay in control of the process and you also get to do what’s right for you. The good news is that there are number of different tools that you can use to help you achieve your goal: they’re the weight loss equivalent of the power tool because they are the things that are essential to support you on your journey. Now the magic number for my Weight Loss programme is 21. Why? Well because as I’ve already mentioned the next step, Step 3, is 21 days long. And many psychologists believe that it takes 21 consecutive days of doing something for it to become a habit. When we do something over and over again a neural pathway is formed in our brain until it becomes hardwired. Once the behaviour is ingrained, our brain starts to see this as the clearest and easiest route to take. It’s like running the same computer programme again and again until we find ourselves doing our new habit automatically. So what are these tools? Well they’re divided in three categories: The first area of tools are all to do with your thoughts and behaviour. These three tools will help you gain back control of your eating as you learn to recognise the true signals of hunger and separate your emotions from hunger. * The first tool is eating your meals and snacks slowly. * The second is eating when you’re hungry. * And the third is listening to the relaxation and transformation mp3 track. The section of Tools is all to do with food and water. * Cutting out sugar and stimulants. * Eating natural foods. * Drinking up to 2 litres of water a day. This section is all about exercise and activity. The first one is: * Walking for at least 30 minutes every day…the second * Being as active as you possible can…and the third * Fitting in 2 or 3 regular exercise sessions a week. But please remeber if you haven't exercised for a long while you might want to consider consulting your doctor before you start. But first of all I want to give you some background information about exercise and activity. Well you might not know this but each of us now eats about 800 calories a day fewer than we did during the 1950s but many of us are still gaining weight and this primarily due to a lack of physical activity. Our addiction to diets is equalled only by our addiction to being inactive. We’ve been led to believe that it’s mainly due to what we eat that makes the biggest difference to our body but it has as much to do with what exercise we do, or don’t do. You see your body is only designed to do one thing and one thing only. Any guesses as to what that might be? Well it’s move! That’s what we’re meant to do, not stay still. And when we move our bodies work so much better. Here comes the science. The most important reason why exercise is so vital to losing weight is the effect that it has on your metabolic rate. Now according to Professor William McArdle, who’s an exercise physiologist at the City University, New York, he says that most people can generate a metabolic rate that is 8 -10 times higher than their resting value during sustained activity lke cycling, walking, running or even swimming. Well what does this mean? Well if you were to keep active you speed up your metabolic rate so you will digest the food you eat quicker. The more activity you do the more you train your metabolic rate to be fired up so that you’re even burning fat when you’re sitting down or even when you’re asleep! Your metabolism is like a fire, if you don’t stoke it, it goes out. The way to keep it stoked is to do regular activity. So if you’re overweight chances are your body is used to storing fat and you’ve become a fat storing machine well the more activity you do the more we will turn you into a fat burning machine. Now go and check out the 9 Tools.
Now what I’m going to say to you I’ve already said but I’m going to say it again because it’s really important. So are you listening to me? Good. Many psychologists believe that it takes 21 consecutive times or days of doing something for it to become a habit. When we do something over and over again we form new connections in our brains until they become hardwired. Once the behaviour is ingrained our brain starts to see this as the clearest and easiest route to take. After 21 times of running the same programme you’ll find yourself doing the new behaviour automatically so that it becomes second nature to you. It’s like running the same computer programme again, again and again until we find ourselves doing our new habits automatically. So I guess that’ll come as no surprise to you that the magic number for my Weight Loss programme is 21. And that’s because the next step, Step 3 is 21 days long. So over the next 21 days which tools are you going to use to reprogram your mind and reshape your body? The nutritional tools are… * Cut out sugar and stimulants * Eat natural foods * Drink 2 litres of water a day The exercise and activity tools are: * Walk for a minimum of 30 minutes everyday * Do 2 to 3 activity sessions a week * And be as active as you can And the behavioural tools are: * Listen to the mp3 track every day * Eating slowly * And eat only when you’re hungry You might want to choose one from each group but if you’re prevented or restricted from working on any of the areas for health or lifestyle reasons that’s fine you can actually reach your goal by doing only a fraction of what’s here. But I would urge you to have a real go at the ones that you feel make the biggest difference to you. If you’re resisting one particular area I suggest you make that your focus! Some people often resist the areas that they feel would help them to change the most. But why pick 3 things? Well, the best way to explain this is to get you to do something. Do This Now I want you to remember the following numbers: 9, 5, 3, 1, 4, 8, 7, 2, 6, 0, 3, 4, 2 Okay how did you do? Most people find it easy to remember the first few numbers and a few people can remember more. But if got confused after 3 relax this actually makes you quite normal! Most diets give you so many do’s and don’ts that it’s easy for you become confused and often demotivated. Your brain wants to be kept busy but it doesn’t want to be overloaded and 3 is a manageable number of things for it to cope with. I want to make sure that you’re clear and focused on what you’re doing so I want you to do at least 3 things every day and you can do them to the best of your ability. By trying a small number of things at one time you’ll be able to break down the task of permanently reshaping your body and reprogramming your mind into manageable chunks. And you’ll also be able to tell which of the tools make the biggest difference to you. Once you feel comfortable that you’ve mastered one technique or tool and it’s become an automatic habit for you, then you can start on a new one. Now of course if you want to do more than 3 things a day feel free, but be aware of just how much attention you can actually end up giving any one thing. Now it’s possible over the course of the next 21 days you might have used more than three tools as it took you less than that time to start applying the tool automatically. An example of this might be that after a few days of eating slowly you found yourself doing that without thinking about it. And so this would be a good time to start using another tool. But before we go any further let me ask you a question. What do you think your biggest obstacle to change will be? Well from my experience the biggest obstacle that people have is change itself. So are you a creature of comfort? Do you resist change? Let’s do a simple exercise here to test how well your brain holds on to familiar behaviours. I want you to fold your arms and notice how that feels. Now chances are it feels comfortable. Now unfold your arms and put them back together with the other arm on top and notice how that feels. Chances are it feels uncomfortable or wrong. Now go back to the first way. How does that feel? It feels like home doesn’t it! It’s funny we all go where we’re comfortable that’s what our brains do. Now I want you to fold your arms 21 times each time alternating which arm goes on top. Now when you’ve done that notice which arm is on top. Now switch arms and see how that feels. Chances are both ways feel OK and even if the ‘normal’ way still feels better I bet the ‘comfort gap’ between the two is a lot smaller. So, what have we learnt from this? Well we do things on autopilot. You went where you were comfortable. You went where you’ve been before. But this little exercise shows us how quickly and easily we can rewire our habits and make new things feel comfortable and ‘normal.’ Basically in order to succeed you need to get comfortable with change because the more comfortable you become with it the quicker you’ll change. But before you actually get going we need to talk about how you’ll measure your success and what goals you’re going to set yourself. One of the reasons people can struggle to lose weight is simply because they feel overwhelmed by the task. We live in a world now where people want instant results. Instant gratification! People want to lose weight right now and many of them believe that they can achieve rapid weight loss. And this is because the dieting world makes lots of often outrageous claims, like “lose 10 pounds in a week” or “drop three dresses sizes in three days.” But did you know that the world of science, which has been studying the human body for many years, claims that realistically you can only hope to lose between 1 and 2 pounds of fat in a week? Now sometimes fatter people often tend to lose weight more quickly but it’s mainly water or sometimes even muscle and not fat. Did you know for example that 1 pound of fat is actually equal to 3500 calories? So losing 2 pounds in a week is actually losing 7000 calories. So from a scientific perspective you’re more likely to lose somewhere between 2 and 6 pounds in three weeks. But these three weeks are far more important than losing a few pounds. It’s all about you learning new powerful behaviours that will keep the weight coming off for the weeks months and years to follow. So let me ask you? What’s the best way to eat an elephant? Well probably not all in one go but rather to break it down into small pieces. If losing two stone or five stone or even ten stone seems insurmountable you need to break it down and set it out as a more manageable, realistic and achievable goal. Take mountain climbers for example. They’re aware of their goal to climb the mountain but in order to achieve it they break the climb up into several manageable stages. So let’s say you want to lose four stone. Well that’s actually 56lbs. Now you could do this in over a year or you could do it in about six months. But what’s really important is to be realistic and not just measure your success by how much weight you’ve lost. But should I weigh myself I hear you ask? Well if you want to weigh yourself that’s fine but I recommend that you measure your success not only by what the scales say. Instead I want you to measure your success by how well you use the tools. Including how active you are, how slowly you eat because the more you focus on these behaviours the quicker you’ll set yourself up to achieve your goal. But in addition to you losing weight I’d like to ask you how would you like to feel? Chances are you want to feel more confident, to feel in control, to feel relaxed, to feel positive. Well I’d like you to have some feeling goals as well because you can start to achieve these within a matter of days and this in turn will enhance your chances of success. Doing this makes the whole process a means to an end rather than allowing your weight-loss goal to become an end itself. It will also give you other ways in which to measure your progress. Remember our weight can fluctuate for so many reasons. So it’s useful to have other ways in which to gauge how well you’re doing. So please don’t get bogged down if for one week you don’t lose weight. It is hard to achieve anything if you feel negative. Think beyond achieving your ideal weight. So take the time to think about your goals. Write down what you want to achieve. How much you want to weigh. How you want to feel about yourself. How you want to feel around food or when you look in the mirror. By going through this process even after just one week you should start to feel better more motivated and positive about what you’re doing as you can start getting results immediately. One of the best goals you can set yourself is to be gentle with yourself rather than beating yourself up. But the ultimate challenge I give you is to actually enjoy this process. Now this might involve a few ups and downs but this is a part of the learning process and its okay to make mistakes. In fact sometimes it’s important to make mistakes as this is how we can learn some fundamental lessons. But let me ask you this. How do people learn to drive? Well by stalling and making mistakes. How do babies learn to walk? Well by falling down. But they keep getting up because they know what their ultimate goal is, which is to walk. So if you really want to lose those excess pounds are you prepared to lift yourself up when things don’t go according to plan to learn something and return to moving towards your goal? So do you have to follow Step 3 for 21 consecutive days? Well ideally yes. But you may find for whatever reason you can’t do this. Perhaps you have a blow out at a wedding or you visit your relatives or you have no choice over what food you can eat. So if you find that the odd day goes a bit off track then just don’t count that day you don’t need to go back to counting up from Day 1 just add your next healthy day to wherever you left off. So it may take you a month to follow 21 days of your new habits but as long as you do the 21 days as close together as you can you’ll give your brain the best chance to form new habits and, with practice they’ll soon become second nature to you. So now’s the time for you to become really clear as to the tools you’re going to use. I mentioned earlier that you should write them down but you might also want to write down why you’re going to use these tools. Are you using them because they seem to be easy or because you know it’s what you need to do? I strongly suggest that you don’t rush into this programme and so you might want to give yourself a few days to prepare. This is especially important if you’re going to cut out sugar and stimulants or you’re going to cut out processed and packaged foods as it will be to your advantage to cut them down for a few days before cutting them out completely. Now you don’t have to believe me that eating more slowly or doing more exercise is actually going to help you to lose weight. You just have to do it. Give it a go and give it your full attention. Remember you didn’t get to where you are overnight and chances are it will take a little time to change so be patient and remain positive. So start right now by writing down in your online journal what you want to achieve and the tools you’re going to use. And as you go through the 21 days using the online journal to record what you’re eating and drinking, what tools you’re using and what results you’re getting. You could also notice what worked and what didn’t work. You could also write down your observations as to what happens. For instance mood changes, energy levels, sleep patterns, digestion. When you’re ready simply click on the “Activate Part 2” button and the coaching videos will start being sent to you. Remember that during the 21 days you can always go back to watch any of the videos to remind yourself and re-motivate yourself about what you’re doing and why. Now if you haven’t already done this, remember to get my transformation and relaxation download from the resource area as it will not only help to relax you but will also help to reinforce all of the positive behaviours you’re creating. If at the end of the 21 days you want to repeat this step because you feel you want to continue with this structured path for a little longer that’s perfectly okay. Just be gentle with yourself and listen to what your body needs. And be patient, you may be undoing many years of programming so take the time to re-programme yourself appropriately. It’s not a race to complete the 4 steps it’s a journey to find the you, you want to be. Remember practise doesn’t necessarily make perfect: but practise makes permanent. So good luck. I’ll be with you at every step of the way on your 21 days to provide you with support and help keep you on track.
Hello and welcome to Step 4. Now as I said right at the beginning, my weight loss programme is fundementally different to any other diet programme in so many ways. But one of the key differences is that this programme really prepares you to maintain your changes for the rest of your life. Now I don’t assume that just because you’ve done something once or twice or just because you know something is good for you or the right thing to do that you’ll carry on doing it forever. Most of us know what we have to do to be permanently slimmer and fitter and healthier but it doesn’t mean we’ll do it! We have to learn how to maintain our changes. And when I say maintain, I don’t necessarily mean maintain your weight because you may need far longer than 21 days to achieve that body that you want. I’m talking about maintaining your habits, the habits that will help you reach your goal, no matter how long it’ll take. Once you can maintain, to the point where your new habits are natural, then you can both enjoy and feel more comfortable with the task of reaching your ideal body weight whether that takes you another month or another year. Now the 21 days coaching that made up Step 3 will have given you a lot of time and opportunity to start re-programming yourself and making the necessary changes. But I want you to know that you can continue with Step 3 for as long as you wish. You can run those 21 day coaching videos as many times as you like. In fact the more you run through them the more you’ll get out of them and so when you do come to Step 4, you’ll feel as if your brain is newly hard-wired with healthy habits. But Step 4 is actually not the end of the programme. In a similar way to cooling down after exercise or to wearing ‘L’ plates after you’ve passed your driving test, this phase is as if not more important than what’s came before. You may have got to this point– perhaps even many times – when you’ve felt as if you’ve done all you have to do – and then found yourself slipping back into your old ways. Well, I’m not prepared to leave anything to chance – after all, we’re talking about your health, your fitness and your wellbeing for the rest of your life. So let’s make sure we do the best job we can and do it to the best of our ability. Now up to this point I’ve been with you every day, guiding you through the process teaching you new things to help you develop a better relationship between yourself and activity and food. Now everything you’ve seen in this programme, the 4 steps, the coaching videos, and the resource tools are still going to be available to you but now’s the time to really focus your energy on making sure you feel comfortable with the idea of being responsible for making future changes yourself. This involves you in making sure that you are the strongest support system. After all you’re the only person who’s with you all of the time. There are 4 things that going forward you’ll need to be able to do for yourself: 1. See yourself as the person you want to be 2. Be responsible for yourself – remember you are responsible for the choices that you make 3. Challenge yourself – set yourself daily outcomes that move you closer to your goal 4. Be gentle and support yourself – remember you will “wobble” from time to time So basically what you need to be prepared to do is coach and support yourself on an ongoing basis. You must see yourself as being capable of achieving the body that you want and that you’re worthy of maintaining it. If you see yourself as a fat, pear-shaped person, you'll never be a slimmer and toned person until you see yourself as a slim, fit and healthier person. Just when you start to see results and become happy with how you look all of a sudden, you might get irresistible urges to sleep in and stop exercising. You might get uncontrollable cravings for fattening and sugary foods. You might lose motivation. These self-sabotaging behaviuors are all results of how you see yourself. If you see yourself as a fat person, you’ll behave like a fat person. If you see yourself as a lean, fit and healthy person, you’ll behave like a lean, fit and healthy person. Someone who sees themselves as a "fat person" would never eat healthly, for to long and would often sabotage their efforts after they’ve lost a few pounds To make a lasting changes you must continue what you’ve been doing through Step 3 and see yourself as the person you want to be. Take action that is consistent with the even slimmer, fitter and healthier person you want to be. Act the part. Do something every day that moves you closer to your goal. A very wise person once said, "Act as though I am and I will be." Now to help you on the journey instead of just leaving you all on your own after I’ve been with you everyday, ’cause that would seem very unfair of me, I’m now going to send you a message every week for the next 3 weeks. But the key to this step is really down to what you do for yourself. You can break this step into chunks of time if it makes you feel more comfortable or safe. And just as 21 has been the magic number so far, I recommend that you break step 4 in another 21-day chunk and keep on reviewing your progress as you go. So if there’s a tool that you haven’t used yet, you might want to, over the next 21 days have a go at using it or if you feel you still need to spend more than 21 days working with a specific tool do that it’s really up to you. Whatever period of time you choose, make sure you keep a good balance between being gentle with youself and providing yourself with little challenges to prevent yourself falling back into your comfort zone! Remember if you’ve been cutting out foods like sugary foods or processed foods then make sure that if you’re wanting to reintroduce them you do this slowly. This will help prevent any possible reaction your body might have to a sudden reintroduction and allow your body to tell you just how much of it it really needs. This is especially important because chances are your body has got used to not having these foods. The key for you now is moderation in everything, including moderation. The outcome of these 21days for so many people is they feel better…they’ve started a process of weight loss and they’ve found some balance. THIS is what needs to be maintained. So now you have to step up to the plate (pardon the pun) and be responsible for continuing your process of change. So if one day you eat too much or you stop being active for a few days that doesn’t have to throw you out of balance. But if days became weeks and every day you start to eat more than you need then all of a sudden you’ll find yourself out of balance. The difference of course now… is that you’ll always have all of the tools available that will bring you back on track. It’s possible that you might want to eat some junk food from time to time. It’s normal to have days when you feel like hiding under the duvet and watching TV all day. These are the events that sometimes people see as their ‘downfall’ the things that put them back on the slippery slope to weight gain and yo-yo dieting. Well, it’s definitely time to break that way of thinking. And Step 4 is all about the changes you’re making so they fit within a normal busy and sociable life. There’s an old Chinese saying that says a path with no obstacles goes no where. So there are always going to be difficulties, struggles, set backs because life is not the way it’s supposed to be, it’s the way that it is and all that matters is how we deal with what comes up. So take one day at a time and if you want to return to Step 3 and any of the coaching tips and resource materials when you feel like you want more structure. It isn’t a sign of weakness to say you prefer more structure. It’s actually a sign of strength in that you recognised the benefits to be gained from the learning stages of Step 3 and that you want to continue to perfect your skills. Remember that you’ve also got all of the resource tools that you can use at anytime to support you and keep you on track. You’ve also got the tool tracker to record the tools you’re continuing to use and how well you’re using them and there’s the on-line journal to record your ongoing thoughts and progress. We live in a society where we’re expected to cope with all of life’s pressures and most of us have been taught that asking for help is actually a sign of weakness. Well guess what? You are a human being and so there will be times when you may find things a little challenging. This makes you like everyone else. So you can either decide to go it alone and risk struggling or you can get some support and get some encouragement. It maybe that you enlist the help of people who you live with, or with your colleagues, or a close friend, or some one who understands you. Or maybe all of them! Tell them what you want to achieve and how you’re going to go about doing it. Heh, you never know they might even join in with you. But by sharing your aims you’ll also be making a stronger commitment to your goal. Remember we all need people to support us in what we do and support can make a big difference. But whatever you do from here on in I wish you a life full of health, fitness and vitality.
Hello and welcome to Tool 1 This tool is all about eating your meals and snacks slowly. So let me start by asking you a few questions: * Do you gulp down your food? * Do you eat on the run? Well, one of the most common eating habits for people who are overweight is eating too quickly and not chewing their food properly. The result of this is people eating more than they need. So slowing down your eating will really benefit those quick eaters amongst us. So how will eating slowly help you? Well quite simply eating slowly will enable you to know when you’ve had enough. If you eat quickly you often go past the point of when your stomach is full. You see there are sensory nerves in your stomach that take about 20 minutes to tell your brain that you’ve actually had enough. If you rush to clear your plate and have second helpings chances are that when you eventually stop eating you’ll realise that you’ve overeaten. So why are so many of us quick eaters? Well, one thing is for sure, the pace of life we lead has speeded up. It’s unlikely that you will have seen people eating quickly and eating too much many years ago mainly because there was less food available packaged and junk foods didn’t really exist and people simply weren’t rushing everywhere. The fact is that the pace of life today for most people is very quick and there never seems to be enough hours in the day. We all tend to be in a hurry and everything we do, including eating, is in a rush. You know how aeroplanes have automatic pilots. Well for most of us, we are automatic quick eaters. Eating on the go, sticking meals in the microwave, eating in front of the TV. We gulp our food, which puts unnecessary strain on our digestive systems and in doing so we may miss out on good nutrients because our bodies find it hard to process big lumps of food. Remember that any excess food you eat gets stored as fat. So by slowing down the rate at which you eat you will re-learn what it feels like to have eaten enough rather than to have eaten too much and feel stuffed. Did you know that we’re not designed to eat big meals? The reason for this is because our stomachs are really not that big. In fact the average person’s stomach is about as big as their fist. Now you might find that hard to believe if you consider what you eat but think about it if you’ve spent many years eating more than you need to then your stomach has probably expanded so you can accommodate the excess food you eat. But the good news is that if you begin to eat slower you will eat less and your stomach will shrink back to a smaller size. In return your brain will get the message quicker that your stomach has enough food inside. So how are you going to slow down your eating? Well there are 3 things that you can do that will help you. The first is always put your knife, fork or spoon down in between bites or if you’re eating food without cutlery never put food in your mouth until you’ve swallowed everything in there. The second one is I want you to thoroughly chew your food. Chewing at least 21 times. Now this should take about 20 to 30 seconds. This might seem strange at first because generally speaking we chew our food only until we feel we can swallow it without choking. But you see digestion actually starts in the mouth because when you break down your food into small bits using your teeth you make it easy for your digestive system to absorb the energy and nutrients into your bloodstream. If you don’t chew your food properly your stomach has to work harder to attack the unchewed food and this can cause your digestive system to over-produce acid which in turn may lead to indigestion and general discomfort. The third thing you can do is cut down your portion sizes. Most people overeat on a regular basis. We don’t do it intentionally it’s just that most of us have lost touch with what is a sensible portion. You see today food is so regularly available that portion sizes have increased and many of us are inclined to eat more than we need, especially as when we’ve grown up we were told that “there were starving children in the world so we must eat what’s on our plate,” rather than letting food go to waste. So start by reducing your portion sizes, because if you do this you’re much more likely to become aware of the signals that you’ve eaten enough. I suggest that you start by eating less than usual by a ½ or a ¼. Now this may seem uncomfortable at first but remember you can always go back for more. However, I’d suggest that you wait for at least 10 minutes before you go back for more. That’ll give your stomach a chance to tell your brain whether it’s still hungry or not. Remember once you’ve overeaten it takes a lot more hard work to shift your over-indulgence. Large meals are hard for the body to digest so grazing rather than gorging is much kinder to our system. Now of course this requires us to unprogramme from much of our upbringing when we were probably told not to graze in case it put us off our meals. Now as well as eating slowly, it’s important to consider what our bodies actually need so I want to teach you a very powerful technique called “think before you eat.” But before I do that I want to tell you about a study that was undertaken on kindergarten children in the United States. For two weeks these children were left to choose what they ate from a wide selection of foods. Now you’d assume that they’d automatically pick the sugary processed foods but what actually happened was different. At the end of the fortnight these children had chosen to eat foods that comprised an almost perfectly balanced diet. Of course, they did pick at some sweets and chocolates, but they also chose to eat fruits, vegetables, carbohydrates, fish and meat. So how did they do this? Well when we were very young and even babies before our minds become tainted with ideas of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ food when we were presented with a meal that consisted of a few different things maybe some vegetables, some chicken, a glass of milk, we’d get a sense what our body needed and that’s what we’d eat. Now our parents thinking they knew best would often get us to eat food when we weren’t hungry or get us to eat foods that our bodies didn’t actually need at that time. The difference today is that we’re not so in touch with the signals that our body give us. Our bodies still continues to give us information as to what it needs but most of us ignore this and we end up eating what we think we should be eating or what we want rather than what we actually need. Think before you eat is simply a way of re-training your brain to pick what your body needs. You’ll find this liberating and enlightening and you might never have to follow another food plan again! But this exercise like any other needs to be practised so that eventually you make better food choices, choices that are based on the signals your body is giving you. Your body knows the food it needs to keep it alive and healthy. So ideally use the think before you eat exercise whenever you are triggered to eat. This exercise revolves around your ability to imagine how different foods taste and how they make you feel. So if I was to say to you right now what does a lemon taste like? Chances are you know exactly how one tastes. So the first thing I want you to do right now is to think of a possible portion of food. What comes to mind? A bowl of soup? A double hamburger with melted cheese? A banana? A slice of chocolate cake? Now run through the process of eating it in your mind. Imagine smelling this food, imagine tasting it, imagine feeling it in your mouth and then imagine swallowing it. How would this food make you feel in half an hour and then an hour? What do you imagine this food looks like inside your body? Does it give you energy or does it take energy away from you making you perhaps feel tired or bloated? Now if you think this food choice is one that your body needs and will give you energy then put it on a mental list. However, if you don’t think this food will see you happily through the next few hours, then discard it. Now I want you to repeat the process so think of another possible portion of food. Imagine smelling it, tasting it, feeling the food in your mouth and then imagine swallowing it. How will this food make you feel in half an hour and then an hour afterwards? What do you imagine this food looks like when it’s inside your body? Does it give you energy or does it make you feel tired? So let’s just do this once more. Think of another possible portion of food. And again imagine smelling it, tasting it, feeling the food in your mouth and then imagine swallowing it. How will this food make you feel in half an hour and then an hour afterwards? What do you imagine this food looks like inside your body? Does it give you energy or does it take energy away from you? So of the three which is the one that you feel your body needs the most? The key to this exercise is to run through a few choices until you pick one that you know will give you energy and make you feel good rather than feeling tired full and fat. If you find it difficult to distinguish between ‘good and satisfying’ and ‘naughty but nice’, try a few deliberately wacky opposites like toffee crunch ice-cream with treacle tart compared with a tuna salad sandwich on granary bread or a bowl of vegetable soup. Practice think before you eat as often as you can. In fact you’ll find this exercise in the resource section so you can refresh yourself on the process at anytime. This approach is likely to lead you over time to make some surprising choices but in time it will guide you back to a varied and well-balanced diet where the food that you eat gives you more energy and promotes weight loss. Slowing down the rate at which you eat will benefit you in other ways too because when you eat slowly, it slows you down which in turn will relax you. But I also want to mention something else to you. Don’t you think that eating is important enough in itself for you to give it your full attention? I challenge you, wherever possible, to separate eating from all other activities. Eating can be one of the greatest sensual pleasures of life so why rush it? See just how much pleasure you can get from the food you’re eating by eating slowly. Set aside time to eat when your mind isn’t somewhere else. And enjoy your food and the experience. By making your eating more of a focused, orgasmic experience you’ll get much more pleasure from it. You will resensitise yourself to the signals that your body naturally gives out signals that you might have been ignoring for sometime. Now if the idea of separating eating from other activities and eating slowly bothers you it’s probably a sign that you eat too quickly and that you’re hooked on the association of eating with other activities. I know it’s a cliché but often the harder it is to do something the more you need to learn how to do it. Remember what you’re doing is a bit like an experiment so take the time to learn how much food you really need and what your body actually needs to eat. And if you do end up eating too much don’t beat yourself up about it, just pay attention to how you feel and remember you can always behave differently next time.
Hi and welcome to Tool 2 This tool is all about eating only when you’re hungry. So let me start by asking you a few questions: * Do you eat when you’re bored or tired? * Do you eat to comfort yourself? * Do you eat everything that’s on your plate? You see people eat for reasons other than hunger. People eat because they might be bored, or tired, or depressed, happy, stressed or lonely. Now I know I’ve asked you this question before but I going to ask you again, what happens to food when you eat when you’re not physically hungry? That’s right, your body turns it into fat. Fat cells are your body’s storehouse of energy. So you need to make sure that you don’t give yourself too much to put away. But how will eating when you’re hungry help you? Well by eating when you need food and not for any other reason you will re-establish a rapport with your body. And this is one of the key ways of reaching and maintaining your natural body weight. Once we stop eating when we aren’t hungry, control is back in our hands. And the simplest way to reprogramme yourself to eat only when you’re hungry is to use the hunger scale. At last, some scales I hear you cry. No not those sorts of scales, The Hunger Scale. Okay so what is it I hear you say! Well it’s something you can use for the rest of your life it’s accurate reliable and you can take it any where even on holiday. You see eating when we’re not physically hungry is one of the most common causes for being overweight and the Hunger Scale is an incredibly effective way of helping you change your behaviour and once you start using it you’ll find you get better and better at ignoring your normal eating triggers and recognising the most important one – hunger. Your relationship with food will improve dramatically as you begin to notice whether or not you’re actually hungry. So, how does it work? Well whenever you think it might be hungry ask yourself a simple question ‘How hungry am I on a scale of one to ten?’ * Not Hungry * Hungry * Starving If you register 6 or above - you’re hungry. If you register 5 or below - you not hungry but your brain has suggested food to you. 6, 7 and 8 that’s true physical hunger. And if you get to 9 or 10 chances are you’re starving and you probably haven’t eaten for some time. If you let yourself get to this point you’ll be in danger of overeating once you start. So remember to eat slowly or chances are you’ll eat more than you need to. Most people have forgotten how to eat when they’re hungry and some diets can even encourage you to ignore hunger and abstain from the pleasure of eating. Some even go as far as to tell you when to eat, how much to eat, and exactly what you need to eat. No wonder we’ve lost touch with our body’s natural responses to our physical and emotional needs. In fact the subliminal message on the cover of most diet books is this: * Human beings are unable to manage their bodies and eating patterns. But this simply isn’t true. In fact, the reverse is true. It’s not listening to what our body’s telling us that has made many of us overweight in the first place. My goal is to teach you how to listen to yourself and your body and to re-learn what’s right for you. So what techniques can you use to judge where you are on the Hunger Scale and how easy it is to recognise the difference between hunger and tension or hunger and boredom? So some signs of hunger are: * Smelling or tasting a food you want when it’s not there. * Knowing exactly what you need to eat. * Empty feelings in your stomach. * Sharp, but not unpleasant sensations in the stomach, accompanied by rumbling. * Loss of energy * Irritability. * Light-headedness. * Slightly nauseous headache accompanied by a desire to eat. * A sudden fall in motivation for the task in hand. * An inability to think about anything but food. So check to see if you have any of the signs of hunger and if you’re not really sure whether or not you’re hungry you might actually be thirsty. So get into the habit of drinking a glass of water and see if the signal goes away. So if you’re not hungry what are you? Well since everyone’s different what I want is for you to really get to know yourself so you can answer that question for yourself. So before you assume that that rumbling in your stomach or that nauseous feeling means hunger stop and run a few simple internal tests to help discover what hunger really means for you. For example are you: * Bored with what you’re doing and looking for something to distract you? * Are you feeling tired? Eating can often wake you up and give you an energy boost but it might be better just to take a nap or go for a walk. * Are you thirsty? Easily confused with hunger especially if the craving’s for something juicy. * Are you clock watching and then triggered because it’s lunchtime or teatime even if you’re not hungry. * Are you lonely? Eating for many people is the next best thing to having company. * Perhaps even depressed? For a lot of people there’s nothing like a piece of fudge cake to cheer them up. * Are you in need of comfort? Some days, and some parts of the day, can seem pretty bleak and some foods can help lift your mood. So how do you cope with these cravings? Well if you’re hit by a craving that’s feels hard to resist but deep down you know it’s nothing to do with hunger this is what you do: * Never give in to it immediately. Cravings always come in waves and just like waves they always subside. * Make it easier for yourself by doing something else until the craving has passed. Anything that involves perhaps moving away from the fridge is a good idea. So taking a short walk or making a phone call often works well. But once you start listening to your hunger you’ll find you get better at ignoring your normal eating triggers and you’ll re-learn how to recognise that the only time you need to eat is when you’re hungry. Your relationship with food will improve as you begin to know whether or not you are hungry. This is something you can use for the rest of your life. But it’s also essential to recognise your common eating patterns. Many of the things we do we do them automatically which is how they ought to be. For example breathing is one of the many bodily functions that we hand over to the subconscious part of our brain. And so to is digestion. But there are some other actions that we also do automatically that perhaps we should become more aware of and monitor more closely. So let me ask you a question. Do you skip breakfast? Do you have a donut and coffee at mid-morning? Do you eat on the go? Do you eat in the car? Do you eat to stay awake? Do you eat too much of one particular food? Do you eat something sugary late afternoon? Do you eat to soak up the alcohol? Do you ordering takeaways when you’re too tired to cook? Do you skip meals? Do you substitute meals with sweat, sugary foods? Do you eat while watching TV? Do you decide it’s easier to grab some biscuits than peel an orange? Do you eat your biggest meal late in the day? Do you eat when you’re bored, or tired, sad, happy, excited or lonely? Do you eat for any reason other than hunger? The fact is if you continue with these patterns then your weight is likely to increase. The secret is to eat only when you’re hungry and to recognise when you’re not, and do something else. Whatever it is that makes you turn to food it’s just a habit that you’ve practised and learnt. So the real question is, are you ready to change? If yes then practice using the hunger scale. By using the hunger scale you might find that your hunger does not always fit into breakfast, lunch and dinner. So what I suggest you do is wherever possible carry a healthy snack with you so that you can feed your body when you’re actually physically hungry throughout the day It’s not always easy to buy nutritious food if you’re out and about so this habit will help you avoid the temptation of unhealthy convenience snacks. Good choices for portable snacks are fresh or dried fruit, a small Tupperware of unsalted seeds and nuts, a small whole meal roll, rice cakes or oat cakes. They’re all easy to pop into a bag or briefcase or to keep at your desk. Using the hunger scale is experimental. There could be times when you eat when you’re not hungry or times when you eat because you know you’re not going to be able to eat for a few hours. But please don’t beat yourself up, be positive and just do the best that you can. So my challenge to you in using this tool is to become aware of your eating patterns and what triggers you to eat. And as always it might help to record these or write them down so that you can refer to them. But it’s really important that you recognise and congratulate yourself everytime you use the hunger scale and everytime you do something different when you’re triggered to eat when you’re not hungry. This will make you feel good about yourself and therefore more inspired to continue this new positive behaviour.
Hi and welcome to Tool 3 This tool is all about the about the Relaxation and Transformation mp3 This is one of the best tools that you can use and I encourage you, if you use this tool, to use it everyday. You’ll find it in the resource section of the website and it can be downloaded on to either your PC or your portable mp3 player. This track has been specially put together to assist, support and reinforce all of the new thoughts and behaviours you are taking on. In addition it will also help to relax and de-stress you. Just by listening to this track for 21 days and beyond you will be tapping into the power of your mind and programming yourself for success. It will help you change your eating patterns, get motivated to exercise and feel great about yourself. When you listen to this track find yourself a place where you can sit yourself down as comfortably as possible where maybe you can even close your eyes and safely ignore the outside world for around about 25 minutes. But whatever you do, please do not listen to this while you’re driving or doing something that requires your full attention.
Hi and welcome to Tool 4 Now this tool is all about Sugar and Stimulants. So let me start by asking you a few questions: * Do you eat a lot of sweet and sugary foods? * Do you drink a lot of soft drinks? Now if your diet contains lots of sugar. In other words you eat lots of cakes, chocolates, sweets, soft drinks, biscuits and alcohol, and if you feel that you have to eat something sweet a lot of the time, and if your cupboards are full of sweet things or alcohol, then this tool is certainly one you’ll want to use. Okay so before we go any further I want to ask you a couple of questions. * Why do we eat sugar? * Why are our cupboards so full of sweet things? Well the answer is simple. It’s because they taste good and they make us feel great. And who doesn’t want to eat tasty food and feel great? But unfortunately there is a catch. You see sugar, in the form of sucrose has no nutritional value and you don’t need any foods that have no nutritional value. You might want them but in the long run foods containing lots of sugar make you fat because your body’s capacity to store sugar is limited. So guess what any excess sugar is turned into? FAT. In fact your body only needs a mere 2 teaspoons of sugar in it at anyone time. And the only part of your body that requires sugar is your brain. Today we have a nation that is addicted to sugar. In 1915, the national average of sugar consumption (per year) was around 15 to 20 pounds per person. Today the average person consumes his or her own weight in sugar. Refined sugar contains no fibre, no minerals, no proteins, no fats, no enzymes, only empty calories. And consequently eating too much sugar causes your body to deplete its own stores of various vitamins, minerals and enzymes. Refined sugar, by some, is called a drug, because in the refining process everything of food value has been removed except the carbohydrates-pure calories, without vitamins, minerals, proteins, fats, enzymes or any of the other elements that make up food. Many nutritional experts say that white sugar is extremely harmful, possibly as harmful as a drug, especially in the quantities consumed by so many of us. Some studies have shown that "sugar" is just as habit-forming as any drug; and its use, or misuse, and abuse is our nation's number one health disaster. And it’s no wonder when you consider all the products we consume daily which are loaded with sugar! Now the average healthy digestive system can digest and eliminate from two to four teaspoons of sugar daily, usually without any noticeable problems. So how many teaspoons of sugar do you think there are in most fizzy drink? Well there’s roundabout 11 teaspoons, and that's aside from the caffeine. When you eat foods that contain a lot of sugar you get a quick surge of energy, but only for a brief time due to the rise of your blood sugar levels. Then your body quickly releases a rush of a hormone called insulin, which then rapidly lowers your blood sugar levels and can cause a significant drop in energy Excess sugar consumption can lead to a whole host of health problems: diabetes, frequent headaches, migraines, tooth decay, poor immunity, lack of concentration, mood swings and, of course, obesity. Do you remember the classic song from Mary Poppins – “A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down”? Well sugar may have comforted you when you were a child and your body may well have been able to cope with it but the uncontrolled use of it today, with a general diet containing 50 to 60 teaspoons of sugar a day, is almost certainly harming you. Sugar is addictive and so if you choose to use this tool what I’ll be asking you to do is to cut down the amount of sugar you eat and then cut it out for 21 days. Now the whole idea of cutting it down or even right out for a period of time is to help you to break any false need you might have for these foods. That way your energy levels will increase and you’ll find it easier to lose weight and keep it off. When you consume sugar you fill your body up with toxins. And over time, you get used to these toxins so you don’t notice how they affect you until you stop having them. And like any process of change, your body needs to adapt and over the first few days it will crave what it’s used to. But if you stick to not having these foods you’ll reset your body so you don’t need them any more. And after a few days many people find that the sugar cravings subside and their body begins to function much better. So let me ask you a question….do you want to make the decision about what is right for you or do you want to let any foods make that decision for you? When you pull out a tooth or rip off a plaster you experience a short burst of discomfort before you feel relief, cutting out sugar is the same. The uncomfortable bit may last a few days but with the increased energy and clarity of thought you’ll gain it’ll be worth it. So what you’ll be looking to do is avoid foods containing added sugar. These include; cakes, biscuits, soft drinks, sweets, chocolate and alcohol. There are a couple of ways that you can use this tool effectively. The best way is to cut down and then cut it out for the 21 days. Or if that’s too much for you, you can just cut it down to a minimal level. But please whatever you choose to do please don’t be hard on yourself, just do the best you can. Now to cut your sugar intake you can start by: * Gradually cutting down the amount of sugar you add to your food or drinks. Please check your food labels because you’ll be surprised at just how much sugar sneaks into food. * If it’s at all possible remove the temptation for sweet things out of your kitchen or house. And obviously this might be more of a challenge if you live with others but please just do your best. Preparation is key so decide in advance what you can do instead of heading for the sweetie jar or if you are genuinely hungry I suggest you have a healthy snack instead: * Fresh fruit * A small handful of dried fruit: * Raw vegetables * Oat cakes with humous * A small handful of nuts Now these snacks contain natural sugars that will help quell any cravings. And if you’re not hungry then you can do something that keeps you away from temptation, perhaps ring up a friend, send an email, file your nails, go for a walk, brush your teeth, clean the bathroom, do some ironing, have a cup of herbal tea or listen to your favourite song. But you might also find it helpful visit your local health food shop and ask about sugar free snacks. When you have the urge for something sweet, ask yourself this question. ‘Is this hunger or a craving?’ Because if it’s a craving, do something else. Cravings come in waves, they build up and then they die down. So ride the wave. Stay away from brown sugar as it’s just another product taken from sucrose And it’s best to stay away from all artificial sweeteners as they do nothing to help get rid of the cravings for sugar. Remember the reason you are doing this is not to cut these foods out for ever but rather to kick the habit of eating these foods that have no nutritional value, that make you fat and can cause you harm. So by cutting them down and then out for 21 days you’ll gain back control and help your body return to a more natural state were you don’t have cravings for foods that are loaded with sugar. This is in turn will help you lose weight and give you more energy. Many people find that when they cut out sugar they actually don’t know what to eat. In fact most people who cut out sugar seriously reduce the amount they eat, which isn’t good for them. So to help you I’ve put in the resource section a whole range of recipes and snacks for you to draw support and inspiration from. The recipes are broken up into the following sections: * Breakfasts * Soups * Light Meals * Very Quick and easy meals. * Dips, dressing and salads * Toppings and flavourings for chicken and fish * Sauces and Toppings for Pasta and Rice and Potatoes * Leftovers * Box Lunches and Sandwich Fillings * Dynamic snacks * Desserts And I even put in some dinner party menus Okay so by now you’re probably more than aware of the need to cut out refined sugar, however, there’s another equally harmful substance that many people crave because it provides a similar comfort hit. It has many attractions too: it’s very socially acceptable but it can be as habit forming and is often full of sugar. Alcohol may be legal, but I bet it if were discovered today, it would be a class B or C drug! Whilst it may make us feel relaxed it can also make us do things we regret and it can also damage our health. Now alcohol is also one of the highest calorie quick fixes for stress and there are some arguments nowadays that moderate amounts of alcohol, particularly red wine, are good for our health. Now this may be true, but if you’re serious about losing weight you need to come to terms with all of the facts. Most alcohol doesn’t add any nutrients to your diet and can even cause vitamin deficiencies. Like sugar, it’s absorbed into the bloodstream very quickly, which leads to obesity and can lead to diabetes. Another problem with alcohol is that it stops you noticing how much you’re eating. Most people have experienced the alcohol munchies and, for some reason, we seem to think that anything we eat when we’re tipsy, doesn’t count. But here’s the truth: if you’ve just upset your blood sugar levels by overdosing on alcohol, anything you eat is much more likely to get stored as fat. What’s more, when you’ve had a drink, you’re unlikely to stuff yourselves on a fruit salad or a bowl of porridge: the foods that most people tend to eat when they’re in a alcoholic haze are high in fat, sugar and salt, the things your body finds easiest to turn into fat. So just like with sugar you have a choice: Now ideally I’d like you to wean your self off it and then cut it out for 21 days. But if you’re not able to do that just reduce your intake and do the best that you can. So whether you’re going to wean yourself of it or just reduce your in take here are some guidelines to help you: * Drink water with alcohol and don’t drink on an empty stomach. * Drink slowly and don’t use it to wash down your food. * Never use it to quench your thirst: it’s actually a diuretic which means it will only dehydrate you more. * Be aware of how alcohol is making you feel and how much you’ve drunk. * Drink at your own pace (unless of course your faster than everyone else’s). * If you drink at home, think small pub measures. Most wine glasses nowadays are like buckets so pour a little good quality wine and sip it slowly. * Spend more on buying high quality alcohol and drink less of it. Now in addition to cutting out or at least seriously reducing your intake of sugar and alcohol I would also recommend that you either cut out or reduce the amount of caffeine you consume for at least 21 days. If you are going to cut it down please don’t drink anymore than 3 cups of tea or coffee in a day. You see tea and coffee affects our blood sugar in a very similar way to sugar itself. It causes sugar highs and lows and can confuses our bodies. And it also can be quite addictive. When you cut caffeine out of your diet you may get some unpleasant reactions. For example if you’ve been having eight cups of coffee a day your body’s going to be so used to caffeine that you may get some side effects when you start to cut it out. So you might benefit from weaning yourself of it first. Signs of withdrawal are very similar to sugar including: headaches, irritability, lack of energy and grumpiness. An alternative to caffeine is water but if you still want to drink something hot how about herb or fruit teas? But if you’ve tried these before and found them bland this could be simply to do with your taste buds having been influenced by sugars and strong stimulants. As you reduce your sugar and stimulant intake you’ll find that your taste buds become more and more attuned to a whole range of tastes all of which will actually make your eating and drinking experiences even more enjoyable. So right now you might be wanting to grab my neck and remind me that at the beginning of this programme I said that it wasn’t about giving things up and here I am asking you to give up sugar, alcohol and now caffeine. But here’s the thing. I’m not asking you to give them up for ever, what I’m asking you to do is to give them up or at least seriously reduce your intake only for 21 days. What most people find is that after 21 days they feel differently towards these products and don’t want to consume them as much as they used to. However, the choice will be yours but after 21 days you will be in a much better place to make the choices that you want to make. In summary for a lot of people cutting out sugar and alcohol and caffeine might seem like a big deal but remember you don’t need any of these foods in your diet. You might “want them” but you don’t “need them”. So whether you choose to cut them down and then cut them out for 21 days or just choose to moderate you intake you will reap the benefits as you reduce your calorific intake and your cravings towards them.
Hi and welcome to Tool 5 This tool is all about Eating Natural Food. So let me start off by asking you a few questions: * Do you eat a lot natural food? * Do you know the benefits of eating natural foods? * Do you eat a lot of processed foods or ready made meals or takeaways? Many people just simply don’t realize that if their diet contains lots of packaged and processed foods like pizzas, takeaways and fast food then chances are they’re body is missing out on the vital nutrients it needs to be healthy. So for the next 21 days that make up Step 3 of this programme I want you to do your level best to cut out of your diet all processed, packaged foods and takeaways. But just like sugar, alcohol and stimulant which we covered in tool 4 I want you to remember that it’s not about cutting these foods out forever. It’s about giving your body a break, giving it the food that it needs and giving you the best chance to not only lose weight but actually to help you create a better association with food so that you can truly become fitter and healthier forever. With both the knowledge and experience I’ve gained from literally helping thousands of people lose weight I can tell you that after 21 days most people really do find themselves less drawn to these foods. But again, it’s not about never eating these foods again, it’s about retraining yourself to eat less of them and eating more of the foods that will make you slim, fit and healthy. You may have heard reports over the past few years that the number of starving people in the world is now roughly equivalent to the number of clinically obese people. But the irony is that many people in the developed world (where the obese people can be found), are actually eating less than they used to. So what’s going on? Well, the quality of food we’re eating has actually got worse, with more focus on highly processed foods. We’re also more stressed, less active and more obsessed with how we look and actually pay far less to the quality of food we’re eating. Now the sum total of this behaviour is that many of us are gradually eating ourselves to death and believe it or not many people who are overweight are actually suffering from the same condition as people who are starving. Yes, you guessed it malnutrition. This is because the processed packaged food we’re eating is often so heavily refined that it’s lacking in the vitamins and minerals that our bodies need to work well. You see each of us is made up of roughly 63% water, 22% protein, 13% fat and 2% in minerals and vitamins. And because every single molecule in our body comes from the food we eat and the water we drink, eating the highest quality food in the right quantities helps us achieve our greatest potential for health and vitality. Now every single process that takes place in your body, including digestion, fat burning, thinking, breathing, walking and talking requires vitamins and minerals. And when you eat fresh, natural foods your stock of vitamins and minerals gets topped up. So your body works well when you eat well. However, if you fill up on junk foods, processed foods, sugary foods, deep fried foods and takeaways all you’re actually taking in is loads of calories but with no proper nutrients. Now let’s take an apple as an example, especially as many of us have grown up believing that “an apple a day, keeps the doctor away”. Well apples provide the body with: * vitamin C, which is good for your skin, your bones, your blood and your immune system; * potassium, which helps to regulate your water balance, your blood pressure and heartbeat; and * fibre, which keeps your digestive system healthy. A chocolate bar, on the other hand, will give you sugar and saturated fat, neither of which holds much value to your health. You know people often don’t realise that the only reason we’re alive is because of the vitamins and minerals in our food and because our body needs them if you keep eating food that’s lacking in vitamins and minerals then your body’s stocks of these nutrients become depleted and you might find it harder to concentrate and process information. You’ll also have less energy and you’ll find it harder to breakdown the food that you eat and it’ll be harder for you to burn fat. That’s why junk foods are often called ‘anti-nutrients.’ They literally attack your body’s stores of nutrients and can damage your health. Foods are refined to make them last longer but by refining and processing them the food producers actually make them deficient in essential nutrients but also barely recognisable as the foods they’ve originally come from. You honestly deserve better than that. No matter what you might think, your body deserves the right to have fresh, nutritious, natural food and it will only survive on junk for so long after which it will start to malfunction. But you have the choice to stop this from happening. So let’s look at the foods that I suggest you limit and then cut out for 21 days: * Processed ready meals * Take away foods * Fast foods * Ready-made salad dressing * White flour – including biscuits, cakes and white bread * Sugary or processed cereals * Deep fried food – crisps, chips * Fatty processed meats * Full fat milk butter and margarine * All refined sugars – table sugar, sugary drinks, sweets, jam * Coffee and caffeineated tea * Diet drinks made with artificial sweeteners But remember when you cut these foods out of your diet you may get some unpleasant reactions, particularly if you currently eat a lot of these foods. Some of the short term symptoms you might experience include: headaches, irritability, lack of energy and grumpiness! Now this seems a bit unfair but if you do something positive for your body you will reap the benefits in time. Now I know that there’ll probably be at least one occasion when you eat something that you know isn’t good for you. But please don’t beat yourself up about it just make the best of the situation notice how you feel and think about why you wanted to eat it in the first place and perhaps what emotion was driving you. By becoming aware of your physical response and mental triggers, you’ll be able to avoid doing it again in the future. Okay so after all of that I guess you’re asking “what can I eat?” Well the first thing I need to say to you is really important. When you’re this tool you don’t go hungry and that you always have some food on hand, for example: * Fresh fruit * A small handful of dried fruit: * Raw vegetables * Oat cakes with humous * A small handful of nuts Now I know snacks are important, we all like them but they don’t replace regular meals. So in the resource section you’ll find a whole range of simple and tasty recipes. All of these recipes have been specifically designed to be a user friendly introduction to you enjoying food again. They’re also a safety net for you in difficult times because these are the kind of food you can eat when you’re alone, or when you’re not in a hurry, or when you might otherwise be tempted to go out and get something that you know won’t be any good. It’s the kind of food that’s always available and easy to prepare, so that you don’t get into that desperate ‘what shall I eat – there’s nothing but chocolate mousse and pizza.’ Now a lot of the recipes do assume that you’ll have a well stocked store cupboard. So before you start, take another look at the store cupboard suggestions in the resource section and write out your own list and stock up on the basics. Unlike other diet and weight loss programmes you’ll be pleased to know that these are not an expensive option. When you change your eating habits preparation is key so it’s best to decide in advance what you want to cook and eat and shop accordingly. Food is fuel and it’s also a source of great pleasure. Good food has colour, texture, taste and smell and eating can really be a full body experience. By following your new habits, you’ll be treating food as fuel so make sure you also enjoy what you eat. In my experience, when people start to connect with their hunger and their body’s needs, they start to enjoy their food more. When you follow this step, you’ll discover a newfound respect for food and for the joy it can bring into your life. And by doing this you will be giving your body a chance to cleanse itself. You’ll be bringing into your life more ‘living’ foods that give you good quality nutrients. Our dietary needs are unique and they depend on a whole host of factors. No one diet is perfect for everyone, so these are just general guidelines. Most people who believe that they eat a well-balanced diet fail to get close to the ideal intake of nutrients. So let’s just see how well you can do. And so I challenge you to spend the 21 days that form Step 3 of this programme into a time to clean out your body and fill it up with delicious nutritious food that help you lose weight and keep it off.
Hi and welcome to tool 6 This tool is all about drinking 2 litres of water a day. So let me start by asking you a few questions: * Do you drink 2 litres of water a day? and * Do you know what happens to your body if you don’t? Well water is essential to life. It makes up to between 55-75% of our body weight and we need it for many bodily functions: temperature control, lubrication of our joints, the movement of substances between our cells and our blood, the removal of toxins and digestion. Our body loses 1.5 litres of water a day just through the skin, and the lungs and the digestive system and it’s one of the main ways that we eliminate toxins from our body. If we let ourselves get dehydrated, we can’t expect to feel good. Some of the signs that you need to drink water are lack of concentration, or headache, dry skin, weakness, dizziness and even hunger. Did you know that we commonly mistake hunger for thirst? It’s true. So staying hydrated is an important part of weight loss. If you drink a lot of water, you will ensure that you eat only when you’re hungry and you’ll also help your body rid itself of toxins and this is critical in the first few days of this step, especially if you usually eat a lot of sugar or if you drink a lot of caffeine and alcohol. Here are some tips to help you increase your intake of water: * Drink a glass of water as soon as you wake up * Drink water whenever you have any alcohol or caffeinated drinks or better still as a substitute for them. * Carry a bottle of water with you all the time * Drink little and often: this makes it easier for your body to absorb the water and will also help to stop you running to the toilet every five minutes! Fruit and vegetables are made up of around 90% of water so they’re a valuable source of water in each day. But if you’re not sure if you’re hungry, have some water first and see if you’re still feel hungry in about fifteen minutes. But please do get yourself into the habit of drinking water and to over come the sense that 2 litres of water is just way too much to drink you might want to consider using a small alarm, like on your mobile phone or something similar, that you can set to go off every 30 minutes to reminder yourself to have a sip. Remember you’re already dehydrated once you notice your mouth is dry so drink a little and often.
This tool is all about walking for 30 minutes a day. So let me ask you a question: * Do you walk every day? * Do you do any walking at all? If you’re inactive this tool is definitely for you. Did you know that walking is probably one of the most under rated forms of exercise you can undertake? People generally still think that in order to lose weight they have to do some sort of punishing exercise routine. No pain no gain! Well honestly this couldn’t be further from the truth. Walking at a moderate pace for 30-60 minutes actually burns stored fat and can build muscle to speed up your metabolism. Walking an hour a day has been associated with actually cutting your risk of heart disease, breast cancer, colon cancer, diabetes and strokes. So the downside of walking is. …….there is no downside! There’s no reason not to do it and walking, along with other physical activities, stimulates the brain to release endorphins, and these are the body’s natural opiates, which actually make you feel good right away. And one of the biggest advantages of walking is that it’s free and almost anybody can do it. Unlike other physical activities, there’s no skill required for participation in a walking program. And walking as a form of exercise can be performed almost whenever and wherever. But when you start exercising and moving first you want to wake up your muscles and let them know that you plan for them to be more active. So walking at an easy pace for up to 5 to 10 minutes tells your muscles that it’s time for exercise and also helps to prevent injury. It’s also important that you walk at a pace were you’re starting to breath a little heavy, not that you’re out of breath but that you could still hold a conversation. But it’s important to remember that once you start exercising the body adapts quickly and your fitness levels will improve quite rapidly. So in order to improve your fitness you’ll either need to walk for longer or walk faster over time. But please remember to always slow down your walking before you finish so that you give your body a chance to cool down. If you walk at night be sure to wear bright clothes and look for someone who can walk with you. Okay so how do fit walking in to a busy lifestyle? Well: * Get up earlier * Park the car a bit further away from your destination * Walk during your lunch break * Schedule it into your diary * Find people to walk with So start using your body for the only thing your body’s designed to do, which is move and you’ll lose weight and feel great.
Hello and welcome to Tool 8 This tool is all about regular exercise and activity sessions. So let me start by asking you a few questions: * Do you do any regular exercise? * Are you a bit of a “couch potato”? Now I know I’ve already said this but I’m going to say it again because I’m really trying to get this message home to you, “your body is only designed to do one thing, one thing only and that’s move”, and the more you move it the better and healthier it will become and the quicker you will shed any excess weight. But if you lack the motivation to exercise and want to get more activity into your life so that you can lose more weight then fitting in regular exercise and activity sessions into your week will help you. Many people find that by scheduling activity sessions into the weekly routine helps them achieve their goals. What I’m suggesting is that you look to do 2, 3 or 4 activity sessions a week. Now the basic benchmark for one of these sessions is a minimum of 20 to 30 minutes. Ideally you want to do some form of continuous movement, something that gets your heart rate up. And the more activity you do the more fat you’ll burn. You see in order to burn fat you need oxygen and the more oxygen you take in the more fat you burn. So any continuous, rhythmical activity, which is what we call aerobic exercise such as swimming, jogging, cycling, walking, aerobics classes and even dancing, will do. Once you start you’ll notice very quickly that the more activity you do the longer you’ll be able to do it for. But this doesn’t mean that you have to do longer sessions. Anything up to an hour is fine. But you’ll be amazed at just how quickly your fitness levels increase. So what type of activities could you do? Well you may want to join a gym or rejoin a gym or take up a sport or go back to a sport or try an activity like yoga, or pilates, or dancing. But basically anything that gets you moving and sweating. But please remember variety is the spice of life. So try something different or do things you’ve done before but do them differently. Now as you know this programme lasts for about 21 days and ideally I’m suggesting that you do 3 or 4 activity sessions a week. And so to make these sessions a new habit I suggest you give yourself around six weeks. That way you’ll have done around 21 sessions and really started to make regular physical activity a part of your life. You might want to pick an activity that’s fun and sociable but there’s also another great form of exercise that’s often overlooked but that really helps people lose weight. It’s called resistance training. This is where you tone your muscles by using weights. Now resistance training has more often been associated with serious athletes and body builders rather than with slimming, especially by women. But it’s a beneficial way of helping your body get rid of those excess pounds. Many women also worry that by using weights they’ll turn themselves into the Incredible Hulk. But it’s actually quite difficult for anyone to put on significant amounts of muscle and it is much more difficult for women. You see the most important factor in muscle gain is the male hormone testosterone which women have very little of. But it’s not only the women that shy away from resistance training but also the older members of society. Yet numerous studies confirm that resistance training can preserve and even increase your resting metabolism. What that means is that regardless of age or sex resistance training can help you lose weight. Here are some other very good reasons to take up resistance training: * You can firm up your entire body and reshape it. * You can increase your metabolic rate by at least 15 per cent which means that even when you’re sleeping you’ll be burning 15 per cent more fat than you used to. * Your clothes will fit you much better because as you tone your muscles your body shape will improve. * You’ll also develop more energy feel younger and even improve your posture. Resistance training only needs to be done 2 or 3 times a week and can take as little as 30 minutes. Now if you aren’t familiar with resistance training then I strongly suggest you get some expert advice before you start. And if you haven’t exercised for a long time or you’ve got high blood pressure then please consult your doctor before doing any type of this training. You might want to consider investing into personal training. Now personal training is now much more accessible to everyday people. And it’s possible to get a trainer to teach you about resistance training and design you a specific programme for yourself. Now most health clubs and gyms will design you a programme of exercise but many of these facilities also have personal trainers. Now personal training in the home is now very popular and is much more affordable than people think. If you decide to work with one please make sure they are a qualified trainer. But if resistance training is not for you that’s fine but you might want to do something different like yoga or pilartes. Or do an activity that you can do in a group like dancing. But whatever you choose, if you choose this tool, just recognise that you are investing in your own health, fitness and well being. So what’s it going to be what exercise are you going to do? Are you going to walk for a minimum of 30 minutes a day? Or are you going to get in two or three activity sessions a week? Or are you going to be as active as you possibly can or are you going to do all three? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it once more in order to lose it you’ve got to move it!
Hi and welcome to Tool 9 This tool is all about being as active as you possible can in your day to day life. So let me start by asking you a few questions: * Do you use the remote control everytime you change the TV channel? * Do you always use a lift or an escalator instead of stairs? * Do you always look to park your car as close to your destination as possible? Well look this tool is for everyone but it’s especially for people who may not want to join a gym or people who have perhaps suffered from poor health and have to be careful with physical activity. But the simple truth is everyone will benefit from being more active. As a nation we’ve become very in active. We spend loads of time sitting down looking at our TV’s or our computers. We’ve become a nation of couch potatoes and I guess since you’re even watching this on a computer that you probably need help and I need to get you moving. I mean did you know that the average adult now spends 26 hours a week watching TV and that’s before we consider how much time they spend sitting down at work or even in front of a computer screen when they’re not at work. It’s amazing what you can achieve when you become more active. You can: * reduce the risk of premature death… * reduce the risk of developing heart disease… * reduce high blood pressure… or the risk of developing it… * reduce high cholesterol or the risk of developing high cholesterol… * reduce the risk of developing colon cancer and breast cancer… * reduce the risk of developing diabetes and help to build and maintain healthy muscles, bones, and joints… And if that wasn’t enough it can lift your mood and give you loads of energy. So the goal is to fit in as much activity into your daily life as possible. So wherever possible: * walk to the shops * use stairs instead of escalators or lifts. * park a bit further away when you go out of your car. * get off the bus or train one stop before where you’re going. * dance around to your favourite songs. Whenever you get the chance to be active just grab it because remember, the more you move it, the quicker you’ll lose it.
Hello welcome to day 8. Today we’re going to be looking at experiments. No I’m only joking we’re not a school but the fact of the matter is I want you to start seeing yourself as a bit of a scientist whose experiment is to find the best way to help you lose weight and keep it off. Chances are you’ve been experimenting many times with losing weight but ultimately you’ve put the weight back on. This current experiment is about not only losing weight but keeping it off. FOREVER! But what makes a truly great scientist is someone who not only does experiments but someone who isn’t just looking for the answer straight away he’s just looking to find out what works. He doesn’t get too involved. He doesn’t go about beating himself up “oh no it failed I’m useless”. He’s always looking, examining, and refining the situation to make something that works. And that’s kind of what you’re doing. You’re experiment with these tools and because no two people are the same, and remember that it’s not about one size fits all, it’s actually up to you to find out what works for you. Now I don’t know if you know the story of Thomas Eddison, the inventor of the electric light bulb, but it took him 14 months and over 1000 attempts to find a suitable filament. He literally got it wrong hundreds of times before he finally got it right. A journalist asked him how he felt to have failed so many times and he answered that he’d successfully found many ways that didn’t work and that he was getting closer to finding a permanent solution to the challenge. Edison could see clearly in his mind what he wanted and he just kept going. Now as I’ve said before a path with no obstacles doesn’t go anywhere. There are always going to be times when you make a mistake, where you think you’ve failed. Most of us fear failure because we think it means that then we are failures. But do you remember the “weebles”? That’s all we’re talking about. You see “failing” is really just the other side of success. We only become failures when we give up and stop trying. When we get things wrong, it’s an ideal opportunity to learn and try something else. You see what you’ve done is actually less important than your response to what you’ve done. So if, for example, you over ate because you were stressed, or tired, or bored, did you say, “Ok, that’s what I did this time, what will I do differently next time?” or did you beat yourself up to the point of just giving up? Now if you think back to a time when you learnt to drive or ride a bike. You almost certainly didn’t get that right first time. But the mistakes you made were signposts to help you improve. In other words those failings gave you the opportunity to learn. So keep learning and instead of cutting back and depriving yourself, how about experimenting with some different ways of cooking your food? Remember check out the recopies in the resource section. You could make the experiment healthier for your mind and body by using less fat and sugar. Then allow yourself to taste the food you cook. By doing this you’ll discover what you really like and how food really tastes when you’re hungry. You’re starting this from scratch and re-educating your taste buds. You’ll find that when you begin eating this way you won’t be able to eat as quickly as before and you’ll find yourself feeling fuller despite having eaten less than usual. But remember always be sure that the food you eat satisfies you. Don’t leave the table feeling hungry. This might feel like deprivation and if you think you’re being deprived you’re likely to start resenting your change of habits. Anyway for today I want you to start behaving like a scientist and decide which experiment or tool you’re going to use and pay careful attention to what happens as you use it. * How does it make you feel? * Did you get the outcome you expected? * Did the duck come back and if it did how did you handle it? You might want to take this opportunity to experiment with a new tool, one that you’ve not used before because the outcomes will be totally new to you. Ultimately you want to keep being positive and get that duck to shut up. So if you’ve not yet tried any of the exercise tools try one of them. Remember you might not get the result you expected or wanted straight away but that’s what being a scientist is all about. You’ve got to keep on experimenting. TIP OF THE DAY So many dieters believe that they’re always one mouthful away from failure: one piece of chocolate or a late night binge and it’s easy for them to think, ‘I’ve blown it’ and what a great excuse to dive back into your old habits. But once it’s eaten, it’s finished, it’s history so stop beating yourself up and get on with your life. All of the successful slimmers I’ve worked with have used experiences like this as opportunities to learn. Okay so that’s what I want you to focus on and do today. Tomorrow, day 9, we’re going to be looking at Relaxation. So until then be gentle with yourself, make a note of the tools you’re going to be using and have a great day experimenting.
This content will launch in a popup window. It is also available from the 'Resources' link in the menu above.
Below the main menu bar you’ll find a Messages Area. In this space the programme will display a selection of messages to let you know what the programme is doing when you selected various options. It also displays, on a regular basis, any reminders that you may have set yourself. For details on how to set yourself a reminder see the how to video called “Reminders”. Below the Messages Area is the video player where all of the video content will be shown. But I’ll talk more about the video player and all its control features in the “How to..” video entitled “The Video Player”. To the right of the video player is the Calendar, the My Journal area and the Other stuff area. But I’ll talk more about those in the relevant “How to..” videos. Below the video player there are 4 tabs – Today, 4 Steps, 9 Tools and How to. The Today tab is where, after you’ve activated Part 2 of the programme, you’ll find your daily coaching videos as well as the resources that are relevant to the daily coaching video content. If you’ve not yet activated Part 2 of the programme you’ll see only 3 tabs - 4 Steps, 9 Tools and How to. You will see to the right a transcript of what’s been said so that you can read along with the videos or even just read. Clicking on the 4 Steps tab will give you access to the videos and transcripts that make up the core principles of the programme. You may find the transcripts useful if you’re watching the video for a second, third or even fourth time. Particularly when you’re looking for something specific you recall being said. To scroll through the transcript simply click on the left hand mouse button and drag the scroll-bar either down or up. Clicking on the 9 Tools tab will give you access to the videos and transcripts to the 9 Tools that form the basis of the programme. Clicking on the How to tab will let you see all of the “How to” videos – which is what you’re watching now. There is a lot of information in these 4 Steps and 9 Tools and you are strongly recommend to become familiar with them before you activate Part 2 of the programme and start receiving the Daily coaching videos.
The video player has been designed to be a simple as possible. In the centre of the video playback screen there is a large arrow head pointing to the right. Click on this icon to start the video that is already loaded into the player. If you want to pause a video that is playing, click on the pause button or click on the video playback window. To restart either click on the play button in the centre of the video playback window or on the small play button on the video control bar. The video volume can be adjusted by clicking on the left or right side of the speaker icon. When you first select the video the progress bar will also show you how much of the video has been downloaded. After the video has downloaded the amount of time the video has been playing can be seen here and the time remaining here. Where you are in the video can be seen via the progress bar. Please note that you don’t have to wait for the video to fully download before you click the play button to view it. Now if you want to rewind to an earlier or later point simply move your mouse over the progress marker and you’ll see your mouse pointer change to a little hand. All you have to do then is hold down the left mouse button and drag the marker to where you want it.
In the top right hand side of the Video Coach page you’ll find the My Programme Calendar. This is one of the most important parts of the programme. However, before you can see the calendar you need to activate Part 2 of the programme. To activate Part 2 of the programme simply click on the Activate Part 2 button. But please do not do this until you’ve worked through the pre-activation emails that will be sent to you and you’ve seen the videos for Step 1, Step 2, Step 3 and all of the 9 Tools and you feel fully comfortable with that material. Once you’ve activate Part 2 of the programme you’ll notice that the button changes to say “My Programme calendar”. In Part 2 of the programme you’ll be sent an email every day for 21 days with a link that takes you into the programme and where you’ll find the daily coaching video relevant to where you are in the programme already loaded under the Today tab. In other words when you’re on Day 3 of the 21 day coaching videos, Day 3 will be loaded under the Today tab and if you’re on Day 9, then Day 9 video will be loaded under the Today tab. Once you’ve activated Part 2 of the programme you can view all of the videos that have been created by simply rolling your mouse over any of the 21 Days and clicking on the “eye”. You can also pause the programme should you need to. This will stop the daily emails being sent out to you until you’re ready to start receiving them again. This is designed to help you remain in control of the programme and give you a breathing space. Should you want or need one. If you pause the programme, you should always set a restart date. You can choose to restart the date that you wish to restart the programme on by simply clicking on the calendar and selecting a date from the pop-up calendar. The date they’ve selected will be shown in the Messages Area. Alternatively you can restart the programme from an earlier Day in the 21 day coaching series. So let us assume that we are on Day 5 of the 21 day coaching series. Now, whatever date you set your restart from, you can not jump the Daily Coaching video sequence. In other words if you paused the programme at Day 5 of the series you can only restart the programme from either Days 1,2,3,4,5, or even 6 but not any Day beyond Day 6. To restart from an earlier Day in the programme “roll-over” the Day you want to restart from and click either “Start date”, to select a date from the pop-up calendar (this will allow you to restart the programme at the Day you’ve chosen but from a future date) OR if you want to restart from that Day BUT actually from Today’s date, simply click on the “Start Today” label. The programme will start sending you emails again from whatever date you selected. When the email arrives to remind you that you’ve restarted the programme all you have to do is know if you’re ready to restart. If you’re ready then away you go. If you want to pause the programme for a further period of time simply, repeat this process. To close the panel simply click the close button in the top right hand side of the panel.
Making notes and recording your thoughts, feelings and insights is an important part of the programme. Now the first time you open a panel whether it be “Make Notes”, Track Tool use”, “Set Reminders”, “Feedback” or “Tell a friend” you’ll see a help panel. This panel will not automatically appear again if you are in the same session but you can always see the help for any panel by clicking on the help button which is always situated in the top right hand corner of the panel. To create a note, click on the Create New Note button. Give it a meaningful title – something that will help you recall what the note’s about. Then click in the free text box and type away. There’s space for about 300 words for each entry. When you’ve done that click on the save icon in the top right hand side of the panel. The programme will then take you back to your notes register. If you want to modify any note then just click on it and it will open. If you want to delete it just click on the delete button alongside the entry. To close the panel simply click the close button in the top right hand side of the panel. PLEASE NOTE that Notes are not emailed to you. They are also NOT displayed in the Messages Area like Reminders are.
Tracking your ability to confidently use your selected tools is critical to your success. Once you’ve activated Part 2 of the programme you’ll be able to record what tools you’re using on a daily basis and your effective use of the tool. To record details on the Tool or Tools you are using simply click on ‘Track Tool Use’ label and the ‘Track Tools’ panel will pop open. Down the left hand side of the panel you’ll see all 9 Tools. Going across the top you’ll see numbers from 1 to 21 representing the 21 Days of the daily coaching that makes up Step 3 programme. On the right you’ll see a heading called How Effective. The Effective rating is from 1 Star to 5 Stars where 1 Star means “Not Effective” and 5 Stars means “Highly Effective”. As an example if you were on Day 5 of the programme, then this panel might look something like this. To identify the tool or tools you’re using simply click on the box and a tick will appear. To rate yourself simply click on the appropriate Star. Once you can rate yourself at 5 Stars for a few days then you could move on to using another tool because you’ve reached a degree of competence in that particular one. The rating is not calculated as an average of the previous ratings. It’s simply the level of competency you’re rating yourself at RIGHT NOW. Don’t try to tackle too many tools at the same time. It’s far more effective to use only 1, 2 or 3 at a time. Get skilled in the use of using them before moving on to learning how to use more. To close the panel simply click the close button in the top right hand side of the panel.
Reminders are a very useful tool to help you get closer to reaching your goal. To create a reminder simply click on the ‘Set Reminders’ label in the menu and the ‘Set Reminders’ panel will pop open. To create a new reminder simply type into the free text box and then click on the “add reminder” button to save it. You’ll find enough space to see about 10 words per entry but if you click on the entry you can read much more if necessary. But honestly this is meant to be a reminder so the shorter the better. Also makes them positive statements something that’s going to encourage you to move forward and gives yourself credit for the progress you’re making. When you’ve done that if you want to modify a reminder just click on it and you can edit it directly. If you want to delete it just click on the delete button alongside the entry. You can have up to 7 reminders at any one time. By checking the box next to your reminders the programme will send you an email of that reminder. If you’ve checked more than 2 of them, then the programme will select a reminder at random. Reminder emails are sent out twice a day one at around 9.00am GMT and the other at around 5.00pm GMT. Reminders will also appear in the Messages Area of the Video Coach page. To close the panel simply click the close button in the top right hand side of the panel.
There are many resources to support you achieve your weight loss goal. To access these simply click on the “Resources” label in the menu and a pop up window will open. This window, as you will see, can be moved around your computer screen as well as resized so that you can watch a resource video and still not lose where you might be in the programme. If, when you click the Resources label, the window doesn’t open then make sure you’re browser has been set to allow for pop ups. The first set of resources are a series of short videos. To watch one of them simply click on the title and the video will play in the Resource Video player. This player works in exactly the same way as the main Video player. For details on how to operate the video player and all its control features see the “How to..” video entitled “The Video Player”. The second resource is a series of “Give yourself credit” posters. Giving yourself credit for the progress you’re making is an important part of the programme. In fact it forms the basis to the Day 4 coaching video. You’ll find the poster in several versions. To download simply follow the instructions on the page. The third resource is the Relaxation and Transformation mp3. This is an excellent resource and one that you best download onto your computer and then maybe put on to a portable mp3 player or onto a CD so that you can listen to it whenever possible. To download it simply follow the instructions on the page. For more information about this resource watch the Tool 3 video. The fourth resource is the Meal Plans and Recipes. This resource contains the same useful information that, albeit laid out slightly differently, you’ll find if you click on the Meal Plans and Recipes button on the main Video Page window. To close the panel simply click the close button in the top right hand side of the window.
If you want to send any feedback then simply click on the Feedback label in the menu and the ‘Feedback’ panel will pop open. Type your feedback into the text area and then click on the “send feedback” button. To close the panel simply click the close button in the top right hand side of the panel.
If you want to Tell a friend about this programme simply click on the ‘Tell a friend’ label in the menu and the ‘Tell a friend’ panel will pop open. All you have to do then is type your friend’s email address into the address box and then type the message you want to send them in the main box. You’re provided with a space for up to 300 words. When you’re finished click on the ‘Send’ button and that’s it. The email that has been sent to your friend will be titled ‘Your Name wants to tell you about petecohen.tv’ and your personal message along with a link to the website will appear in the main body of the email. Please be assured that your friend’s email address will NOT be stored or used in any way.
So some signs of hunger are: * Smelling or tasting a food you want when it’s not there. * Knowing exactly what you need to eat. * Empty feelings in your stomach. * Sharp, but not unpleasant sensations in the stomach, accompanied by rumbling. * Loss of energy * Irritability. * Light-headedness. * Slightly nauseous headache accompanied by a desire to eat. * A sudden fall in motivation for the task in hand. * Or an inability to think about anything but food. So check to see if you have any of the signs of hunger and if you’re really not sure whether you’re or not you’re hungry you might actually be thirsty. So get into the habit of drinking a glass of water and see if the signal goes away.
So how do you cope with these cravings? Well if you’re hit by a craving that’s feels hard to resist but deep down you know it’s nothing to do with hunger this is what you do: * Never give in to it immediately. Cravings always come in waves and just like waves they always subside. * Make it easier for yourself by doing something else until the craving has passed. Anything that involves perhaps moving away from the fridge is a good idea. So taking a short walk or making a phone call often works well. But once you start listening to your hunger you’ll find you get better at ignoring your normal eating triggers and you’ll re-learn how to recognise that the only time you need to eat is when you’re hungry. Your relationship with food will improve as you begin to know whether or not you are hungry. This is something you can use for the rest of your life. But its also essential to recognise your common eating patterns.
I want to give you some background information about exercise and activity. Well you might not know this but each of us now eats about 800 calories a day fewer than we did during the 1950s but many of us are still gaining weight and this is primarily due to the lack of physical activity. Our addiction to diets is equalled only by our addiction to being inactive. We’ve been led to believe that it’s mainly due to what we eat that makes the biggest difference to our body but it has as much to do with what exercise we do, or don’t do. You see your body is only designed to do one thing and one thing only. Any guesses as to what that might be? Well it’s move! That’s what we’re meant to do, not stay still. And when we move, our bodies work so much better. Here comes the science. The most important reason why exercise is so vital to losing weight is the effect that it has on your metabolic rate. Now according to Professor William McArdle, who’s an exercise physiologist at the City University, New York, he says that most people can generate a metabolic rate that is 8 -10 times higher than their resting value during sustained activity like cycling, walking, running or even swimming. Well what does this mean? Well if you were to keep active you speed up your metabolic rate so you will digest the food you eat quicker. The more activity you do, the more you train your metabolic rate to be fired up so that you’re even burning fat when you’re sitting down or even when you’re asleep! Your metabolism is like a fire, if you don’t stoke it, it goes out. The way to keep it stoked is to do regular activity. So if you’re overweight, chances are your body is used to storing fat and you’ve become a fat storing machine. Well, the more activity you do, the more we will turn you into a fat burning machine.
So before you assume that that rumbling stomach or nauseous means hunger stop and run a few simple internal tests to help discover what hunger really means for you. For example are you: * Bored with what you’re doing and looking for something to distract you? * Are you feeling tired? Eating can often wake you up and give you an energy boost but it might be better just to take a nap or go for a walk. * Are you thirsty? Easily confused with hunger especially if the craving’s for something juicy. * Are you clock watching and then triggered because it’s lunchtime or teatime even if you’re not hungry. * Or are you lonely? Eating for many people is the next best thing to having company. * Perhaps even depressed? For a lot of people there’s nothing like a piece of fudge cake to cheer them up. * Or are you in need of comfort? Some days, and some parts of the day, can seem pretty bleak and some foods can help to lift your mood.
So what’s spurring you on? What’s your motivation for change? And how much do you desire to be slimmer, fitter and healthier? Let me ask you a question, on a scale of 0 to 100 where 100 is “you’re really up for it” how much do you desire it? Chances are you’re number’s high maybe 80 maybe 90 maybe even a 100. Whilst your desire might be quite high, how motivated are you? So again on a scale of 0 to 100 how would you rate your motivation? Chances are like most people your motivation is lower than your desire. Guess what? This is why most people fail to lose weight and keep it off. Okay so now what I want to do is take you through an exercise to help increase your motivation. This exercise is in 2 parts and you might find that part 1 is a little emotionally challenging because I’m going to invite you to look at the consequences of you continuing your current life style and that might not have been something you’ve thought about before. I want you to imagine that for the next 6 months you do absolutely nothing about changing. You continue with your current eating habits and continue with a fairly in active life style. Imagine arriving in front of a mirror six months from now, what would you look like? What would you see? How would you feel? Would you imagine that you’ve lost weight or put weight on? Now imagine seeing one year into the future. Again it’s you having continued with your current eating habits, continued to be in active. What would you look like? How would you feel? Have you lost weight or put weight on? And what’s your health like? How do you feel about that? And then imagine going 5 years into the future. It’s you having eaten more than you need to. And it’s you having continued to have led fairly in active life style. What would you look like as you look in that mirror? How would you feel? Have you lost weight or put weight on? And what’s your health like and how do you feel about that? Okay so how do you feel now? Chances are that doing this exercise has made you think you don’t want this future. Well just be thankful that none of this has actually happened – but it could! So are you motivated to move away from this possible future? Chances are yes but let’s see if we can increase your motivation even more. Have you ever stopped to think about what your future would be like if you were slimmer, fitter, and healthier? So right now imagine for the next 6 months you started to lose weight by adopting some of the powerful tools like eating slowly, being more active and eating only when you were hungry. What would you imagine looking like in six months time if looked in front of that mirror? What would you see? How would you feel? Now imagine seeing yourself one year into the future as you’ve continued to apply these powerful tools and imagine arriving in front of that mirror. What would you look like? How would you feel? Your muscle tone, your complexion. Are you fatter or slimmer? What about your health do you have more energy or less? And how going about 5 years into the future what would you look like as you arrive in front of that mirror? What would you see? You can see that your new habits are now second nature and you automatically only eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’ve had enough. You drink lots of water and you know how to deal with negative feelings. How are you looking and feeling? Do you like what you see?
Okay so what is it I hear you say! Well it’s something you can use for the rest of your life it’s accurate reliable and you can take it any where even on holiday. You see eating when we’re not physically hungry is one of the most common causes of for being overweight and the Hunger Scale is an incredibly effective way of helping you change your behaviour and once you start using it you’ll find you get better and better at ignoring your normal eating triggers and recognising the most important one – hunger. Your relationship with food will improve dramatically as you begin to notice whether or not you’re actually hungry. So, how does it work? Well whenever you think it might be hungry ask yourself a simple question ‘How hungry am I on a scale of one to ten?’ * Not Hungry * Hungry * Starving If you register 6 or above - you’re hungry. If you register 5 or below - you not hungry but your brain has suggested food to you. 6, 7 and 8 that’s true physical hunger. And if you get to 9 or 10 chances are you’re starving and you probably haven’t eaten for some time. If you let yourself get to this point you’ll be in danger of overeating once you start. So remember to eat slowly or chances are you’ll eat more than you need to.
Are you one of those people that think you should lose weight, or you need to lose weight, or you have to? Well one thing so many of us don’t realise is that the words and the tone we use have a radical effect on how we feel. So let’s do an experiment here. I’ll say a statement and then I want you to repeat it and notice how you feel. * I should lose weight. * I have to lose weight * I need to lose weight Do you feel positive and optimistic, or do you feel negative, doubtful, may be even resentful? Now let’s repeat this exercise with some different words and again notice how you feel. * I’m going to be slimmer. * I want to be slimmer and fitter and healthier * I will be slimmer * I’m going to be slimmer How do these words make you feel? What you probably noticed was when you used phrases like ‘I should… ’ or ‘I have to… ’ or ‘I need to… ’ that you felt obligated and probably thought about the process as being painful or unpleasant: but when you said things like ‘I want to…’ or ‘I am’, ‘I’m going to… ’ you feel a great, a sense of progress, expectation and excitement and if you’re going to create any lasting changes that’s what we need to take with us! After all why would anyone want to change to a future that doesn’t seem better than the present? So get into the habit of speaking and acting positively about what you want and I promise you you’ll carry those good feeling with you into everything you do.
Think before you eat is simply a way of re-training your brain to pick what your body needs. You’ll find this liberating and enlightening and you might never have to follow another food plan again! But this exercise like any other needs to be practised so that eventually you make better food choices, choices that are based on the signals your body is giving you. Your body knows the food it needs to keep it alive and healthy. So ideally use the think before you eat exercise whenever you are triggered to eat. This exercise revolves around your ability to imagine how different foods taste and how they make you feel. So if I was to say to you right now what does a lemon taste like? Chances are you know exactly how one tastes. So the first thing I want you to do right now is to think of a possible portion of food. What comes to mind? A bowl of soup? A double hamburger with melted cheese? A banana? A slice of chocolate cake? Now run through the process of eating it in your mind. Imagine smelling this food, imagine tasting it, imagine feeling it in your mouth and then imagine swallowing it. How would this food make you feel in half an hour and then an hour? What do you imagine this food looks like inside your body? Does it give you energy or does it take energy away from you making you perhaps feel tired or bloated? Now if you think this food choice is one that your body needs and will give you energy then put it on a mental list. However, if you don’t think this food will see you happily through the next few hours, then discard it. Now I want you to repeat the process so think of another possible portion of food. Imagine smelling it, tasting it, feeling the food in your mouth and then imagine swallowing it. How will this food make you feel in half an hour and then an hour afterwards? What do you imagine this food looks like when it’s inside your body? Does it give you energy or does it make you feel tired? So let’s just do this once more. Think of another possible portion of food. And again imagine smelling it, tasting it, feeling the food in your mouth and then imagine swallowing it. How will this food make you feel in half an hour and then an hour afterwards? What do you imagine this food looks like inside your body? Does it give you energy or does it take energy away from you? So of the three which is the one that you feel your body needs the most? The key to this exercise is to run through a few choices until you pick one that you know will give you energy and make you feel good rather than feeling tired, full and fat. If you find it difficult to distinguish between ‘good and satisfying’ and ‘naughty but nice’, try a few deliberately wacky opposites like toffee crunch ice-cream with treacle tart compared with a tuna salad sandwich on granary bread or a bowl of vegetable soup. Practice think before you eat as often as you can. In fact you’ll find this exercise in the resource section so you can refresh yourself on the process at anytime. This approach is likely to lead you over time to make some surprising choices but in time it will guide you back to a varied and well-balanced diet where the food that you eat gives you more energy and promotes weight loss.
Now what I want you to do is take a moment to sit comfortably and think about some of the things you’d like to be doing in the future. Perhaps going into a clothes shop, putting on a pair of jeans and being overjoyed at just how well they fit you. Or maybe being able to run down the streets full of energy or looking great on the beach wearing a swimming costume or just being around food and feeling in control. The more you practice seeing what you want to have happen the more you unlock the power of your brain because what we focus on, we can create. Let’s do something here. I want you to sit comfortably and I want you to look up and imagine that you could see a picture of yourself in the future, perhaps in six weeks time. It’s a picture of you a little slimmer, fitter and healthier. Now imagine that picture moves closer towards you and as it does, it gets brighter, clearer and bolder. And as it gets closer and closer, it eventually moves inside you as you get the feeling of being slimmer, fitter and healthier. Now imagine that another picture appears, it’s the same as the one before but this time it’s even clearer. Great, well done. Remember to do this again and again and again. Because the more you do it, the more vivid and real the image will become and the easier it will be for you to create this in your life.
So many people have a real problem motivating themselves to exercise, that even when they think about exercise the first thing they think about is how much they don’t want to do it. It’s so difficult to get motivated if you keep making excuses. And the most common excuse is, “I haven’t got time”, but the fact is you have the time to do things you enjoy, perhaps like watching TV or eating your favourite food. The fact is most people simply don’t like exercise and that’s why they don’t do it. When most people think of exercise they conjure up images that put them off. Are you one of those people? Do you talk yourself out of exercise? Are you in the “I’ll start tomorrow” brigade? Do you see exercise as boring, dull and hard work? If so then it’s not surprising that you find it difficult to get yourself motivated to exercise. But let me ask you a question. How much do you want to be slimmer, fitter and healthier? How important is it to you? What would you get out of being slimmer, fitter and healthier? Let me share with you a great technique to help you get motivate to exercise. Do you know that feeling you get when you’ve finished exercising when you’ve just been for a long walk or a swim or just done an exercise class? Of course you do. When we do an exercise or an activity our brains secrete happy hormones called seratonin and endorphins that actually make us feel good. So my challenge to you is the next time you think about exercise is to ask yourself this question, “what’s in this for me?” I then want you to immediately focus on the feelings you’re going to get when you’ve finished and with those feelings in mind get moving.
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