Day 4: Failing at Weight Loss, Do You Start Over or Just Move On?

Day 4 Slim Down Challenge today. I didn't post Day 3 yesterday, well it was Sunday and I usually don't blog on Sunday. #familytime

I am feeling less motivated today.

My progress was maybe only 3 out of 10? Husband is working outstation for a week from today. I just feel like lazing around since today is also school off day, celebrating 'qingming'. No need to send and pick up children from school. No need to welcome husband home from work and a little mess is also okay. So it's definitely my lazy day today. I didn't workout and diet is off-track a bit.

Actually the hubs going outstation is the best time for me to focus on my diet because I don't have to cook fancy fussy meals. I never forced to cook for my husband, well maybe I'm lucky my husband is not picky when comes to food but ya know I still feel guilty when I don't prepared him proper dinner. You probably know the saying, 'the way to a man's heart is through his stomach.' So I mean when he's out of town for business, it's like cooking 'off-duty' for me. I just basically made a simple and easy meals for the children. There's no way to impress the kids with complicated meals, you know children taste is sometimes different than adult. Good food, feeling full and it's fine already. I'm afraid that if they cannot finish their food it will be always me who became their trashcan - to avoid waste! (Read, diet ruin) So that's it. Simple and zero-waste food for the kids. When I don't have to cook fancy meals that also means food temptation is in control.

30 Day Slim Down Challenge

30 DAY SLIM DOWN CHALLENGE

Day 1 - Put the blame
Day 2 - Set S.M.A.R.T. goals
Day 3 - Ditched added sugar
Day 4 - Avoid refined carbs
Day 5 - Put down the drink
Day 6 - Plan 1 splurge
Day 7 - Allow spontaneous indulgence
Day 8 - Keep grains in check
Day 9 - Eat only when hungry
Day 10 - Go for a walk
Day 11 - Never skip breakfast
Day 12 - Say NO to junkfood
Day 13 - Nix processed foods
Day 14 - Shop for whole foods
Day 15 - Meal prep
Day 16 - Reorganize your fridge
Day 17 - Keep a food journal Day
18 - Ramp up protein intake
Day 19 - Veggies / fruit on every plate
Day 20 - Know your healthy fats
Day 21 - Keep portions in check
Day 22 - Track total calories
Day 23 - Eat at the table
Day 24 - Eliminate distraction
Day 25 - Slow down
Day 26 - Downsize dinnerware
Day 27 - Bust out the scale
Day 28 - Reduce sodium
Day 29 - Sleep 7+ hours
Day 30 - Cut 100 calories 

Back to the topic. Today suppose to be good but it happen to be a less than productive day for me. Question is, when you fail your weight loss plan are you starting over from Day 1 the next day or you just move on with the plan?

Perfectionist Dieter
I used to go back to Day 1 whenever I fall off my diet. For example, I plan to do a sugar detox for 10 days but fail halfway. Say, on the 5th day. So I call it cancel and go back to Day 1. I want to follow the rules exactly. I think it's normal for anyone because we believe we'll be successful in melting off unwanted pounds if we do so. Perfectionist dieter detected! It actually feel exhausted to start over everytime you failed. 'I start over tomorrow,' or 'I start over next Monday.' This makes me feel like today or this week is my "last meal", I can eat whatever I want because it's the last time I'm going to eat those food. Tomorrow I'll be strict again. Or next Monday, I'll be strict again. Then when I slightly derailed, I am likely to want to give up for the day and "start again tomorrow" or "start over on Monday" and I end up repeating the same situation over and over.

Perfectionism ruining my weight loss effort. I am done! Sometimes our diet plan or weight loss plan is not as perfect as we want it but it's totally okay. The key is progress not perfection. Now whenever I messed up my diet, I'll try as best as I can to begin eating right at the next meal, not waiting until a certain day to begin. The next meal is a time to refresh, to begin eating wholesome foods again. I promise when I made weight loss mistakes, I'll reflect on how this happened, why this happened, and what I can do in the future to prevent it.

Your turn: Are you a perfectionist dieter? What do you do when you mess up your diet? Are you starting over at a certain day, or are you simply dust yourself off and move on? Discuss in the comments.

Read more

Day 2 Slim Down Challenge: Five SMART Goals for Weight Loss

Day 2 Slim Down Challenge today. To be honest, I am a bit worried if I can't finish this. But just what people always said, there's no try, JUST DO IT.

I am doing a NO CARB, NO SUGAR DIET for 30 days. Okay first for anyone who concerned, cutting out carbs from your diet is completely safe, according to Dr. Mike Roussell, a nutritional consultant and the author of Dr. Mike's 7 Step Weight Loss Plan and the 6 Pillars of Nutrition. Your body function very well without carbs by either making the sugars it needs or finding alternate energy sources. For example, when you drastically reduce or eliminate carbs from your diet, your body is able to make sugar to store as glycogen. If you wanted to completely cut out carbs, power your body with fats, improve your health, and exercise at a high level.

Second thing I'd like to share here, I have not failed. Yes, I had crackers and instant coffee for breakfast this morning which I suppose not to take during this Slim Down Challenge but but well, just a minor slip up – next thing is refocus and move on.

I always believe setting goals for weight loss is important because it gives you direction, boost your motivation and self-confidence. This is embarrassing I had to share my weight loss goals this month from 2 years ago. I mean like this weight loss thing I'm talking about is taking me forever, like two years and I still here? Yup, I know. Action, action, action.

30 DAY #HEWLD SLIM DOWN CHALLENGE

✓Day 1 - Put the blame
Day 2 - Set S.M.A.R.T. goals
Day 3 - Ditched added sugar
Day 4 - Avoid refined carbs
Day 5 - Put down the drink
Day 6 - Plan 1 splurge
 Day 7 - Allow spontaneous indulgence
Day 8 - Keep grains in check
Day 9 - Eat only when hungry
Day 10 - Go for a walk
Day 11 - Never skip breakfast
Day 12 - Say NO to junkfood
Day 13 - Nix processed foods
Day 14 - Shop for whole foods
Day 15 - Meal prep
Day 16 - Reorganize your fridge
Day 17 - Keep a food journal
Day 18 - Ramp up protein intake
Day 19 - Veggies / fruit on every plate
Day 20 - Know your healthy fats
Day 21 - Keep portions in check
Day 22 - Track total calories
Day 23 - Eat at the table
Day 24 - Eliminate distraction
Day 25 - Slow down
Day 26 - Downsize dinnerware
Day 27 - Bust out the scale
Day 28 - Reduce sodium
Day 29 - Sleep 7+ hours
Day 30 - Cut 100 calories 

What is actually a good weight loss goal strategy?
SMART goals, as I understand is a useful way to help reevaluate our weight loss action plan. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely.

Specific - declare what you will do, how long you will do it, and when you will do it.
Fitness: Wake up early morning and spend roughly 30 minutes exercising every morning. Exercise will wake you up. If you quickly cleared off exercise from your to-do-list, you can keep the productivity going for the rest of the day.

Diet: No carbs, no sugar. Focus on eating good quality, minimally processed real food.

Measurable - measure a goal.
Fitness: Exercising for at least 30 minutes each day.
Diet: Anything except carbs and sugar, no more than 1,200 calories in a day.

Attainable - goal that you have enough time and resources to achieve.
Fitness: Exercise every morning is attainable. If I can't make it upon wake up I still can exercise after sending the children to school. Lots of free time before the children come back from school just need to learn better time management.

Diet: No carbs, no sugar is actually something I can actually accomplish. Stop eating junk food, just focus on real food. Stop buying junk food, remove it from my house and give away any junk food to friends.

Realistic: Relevant goal, something that is reasonable.
Instead of weighing myself, I look for other ways to measure my progress. What about this, an old shirt? This top I'm wearing should look a bit looser in the middle area by the end of Slim Down Challenge. This is realistic expectation, do not want to expect too much of myself.

Trackable - Goals are best achieved if you keep a record of your progress.
I'm going to create a daily checklist of all the habits that are scientifically proven to result in fat loss, and then use that as your measurement device.

Slim Down Challenge Healthy Living Checklist

Do you have a plan? Are you setting SMART goals? Share in the comments.

Read more

Day 1 Slim Down Challenge: 30 Relatively Small Diet and Lifestyle Changes for Big Weight Loss Benefit

If I tell people I'm 6 month pregnant, anyone would surely buy it. No, I'm not pregnant. This is just fat.

I got asked by friends countless time about my "pregnancy", they refused to believe when I denied. Getting asked this too frequent, even I sometimes would get confused myself, 'could I be pregnant without me realizing about it?' That's enough to give you a slight idea how terribly out of shape I am. Haha~ Well it's not like I never tried to lose weight. If you read my older post, you'll understand my struggle with weight loss. I usually made it well the first 3 days but the motivation to lose weight just faded after few days and I'll finally abandoned it. My bad!

The Diet

Today is 1st April, a brand new day and I decided to restart my weight loss journey today. I have been putting off way too long now. 3 months passed by already and seriously I could have accomplished something but sadly I didn't.

The 30 Day Weight Loss Plan
I plan to do a no carb, no sugar diet for 30 days. And to give myself an extra push, I'm following this #SHAPESlimDown mini daily challenge and I promise to keep up with it for 30 days.

30 Day Slim Down Challenge

Day 1 - Put the blame
Day 2 - Set S.M.A.R.T. goals
Day 3 - Ditched added sugar
Day 4 - Avoid refined carbs
Day 5 - Put down the drink
Day 6 - Plan 1 splurge
Day 7 - Allow spontaneous indulgence
Day 8 - Keep grains in check
Day 9 - Eat only when hungry
Day 10 - Go for a walk
Day 11 - Never skip breakfast
Day 12 - Say NO to junkfood
Day 13 - Nix processed foods
Day 14 - Shop for whole foods
Day 15 - Meal prep
Day 16 - Reorganize your fridge
Day 17 - Keep a food journal
Day 18 - Ramp up protein intake
Day 19 - Veggies / fruit on every plate
Day 20 - Know your healthy fats
Day 21 - Keep portions in check
Day 22 - Track total calories
Day 23 - Eat at the table
Day 24 - Eliminate distraction
Day 25 - Slow down
Day 26 - Downsize dinnerware
Day 27 - Bust out the scale
Day 28 - Reduce sodium
Day 29 - Sleep 7+ hours
Day 30 - Cut 100 calories

Tell ya, this is not easy. Never. I've being in a very comfortable zone for quiet some time. Making a change of routine is going to be a challenge but I'll keep posting about my progress to keep me accountable with the weight loss plan. How's that?

I got this. 

Now I'd like to hear from you. Do you know any other small changes I can follow to lose weight? Share your ideas in the comments.

Read more

Losing Weight: Why It's So Hard To Get Started?

It has been a long time since my last post.

Yes, it's March and I AM STILL FAT. Statistic shows that 80% people already gave up their weight loss or fitness resolution by the second week of February. And as for me I haven't clicked into gear yet. You know, getting started is always the hardest part of anything. That's the reason I haven't post a while because I have nothing of worth to share. Well now it's time for some self-reflection.

Why is it so difficult to get started?

First, change is uncomfortable. For example, sleep is enjoyable and it's a temptation of many to hit the snooze button to gain extra 10 or 20 minutes of sleep every morning. But choosing to wake up early every morning to exercise require us to go out of our comfort zone. Comfort zone is a space or any type of behavior that we feel safe, in control and at ease. Trying new things, tweak off our diet, or motivate ourselves into exercise routine means pushing past our comfort zone, and it's not always easy because we have to adjust ourselves with new situation.

Second, fear of failing, fear of what people might think. Getting started means we're taking risk of attempting something we might fail, something worst can happen that we decided not to try it at all. Past failure makes us afraid to take the first step, when we know we're going to make a wrong end. Or maybe the roadblock is our friends or family that we know will make fun of us trying to lose weight.

Third, poor habit. That's it. You're lazing around just procrastinating day in day out. Remember? Just one more episode, but at the end get hooked on a TV show and binge watch all the episode in one day. When we fall into the pattern of poor time management, feeling weak and unmotivated, it's easy to get stuck because an object at rest tends to remain at rest.

How Do You Get Started, Anytime?
This is what I'm telling myself today, just do it! Easier said than done of course. But I believe it's possible. Even when our thought or feeling trying to hold us back, developing a 'just do it' attitude will help you break the bad pattern off and get started right away. There's a room for a foggy thoughts about what could happen but sometimes we just need to stop listening to them and take action.

Have you ever had a hard time of getting started with something? Tell me about your breakthrough in the comments below.

Read more

The Art of Loving Yourself: How Loving Yourself Can Lead to Weight Loss?

I'm a few days late but Happy Valentine's Day for all those celebrating!

Valentine's Day is celebrated every year on the February 14th for people to express their love to their significant other. People celebrating it by buying greeting cards, flowers, chocolates, or jewelry. But Valentine's Day is not just for couples who can have all the fun. This day is a very good excuse to be lovely to yourself all day, don't you think so? Whether you are single or in a relationship this Valentine's Day, remember to love yourself.

In honor of the month of love, I am doing recap of my old post about loving the most important being in your life: YOU! Loving yourself in this context doesn't mean you're being narcissist. Self-love is not selfish or shallow, it's totally opposite of narcissism.

What Does It Actually Mean To Love Yourself? How Loving Yourself Lead to Losing Weight?

1 - Loving yourself mean you appreciate yourself
Stand in front of the mirror and name things you like about you. It could be your nice long curly hair, or your unique monolid eyes. It could be your sweet smile or your lean arms. It doesn't necessarily your physical appearance that you could love about yourself. It could be other qualities like your positive attitude and your sense of humor.

When you appreciate yourself, you will not resort to any dangerous diet that could harm your health. When you love yourself, you will not let negative thought control and intimidate you.

2 - Loving yourself mean you take fully responsible on your body
No one is responsible for your body and your health, only you are responsible for it. We all know that we need to make new, healthy lifestyle changes to lose weight but sometime we tend to blame our busy schedule to skip workout or use boredom or feelings of emptiness as an excuse to eat crap.

Loving yourself mean you take responsibility for your own choices. Take a moment to make a list of your choices each day. What, when and how much you eat, whether you exercise or not. When you take responsible on your body, you will watch closely what you put in your mouth. You will eat only healthy foods. You will make effort to find at least 10 minutes each day for a quick workout.

3 - Loving yourself mean you embrace your uniqueness
I remember watching this famous Korean talk show called Happy Together where Hwang Shinhye was one of the guest. Hwang Shihye is a popular actress and the host of "Let Me In", a famous plastic surgery show in Korea. One of the topic discussed was about plastic surgery. The host of the show asked Hwang Shinhye whether her model daughter ever mention about getting a plastic surgery. Shinhye did suggest her daughter once that she might need to fix her eyes or nose but Jin Yi, her model daughter refused the idea. She is very confident and wants to keep her unique look.  

 Gorgeous celebrity mother-daughter:
Actress Hwang Shin Hye with her daughter Lee Jin Yi for SURE, October 20th issue.

What I'm trying to say is this - many people these days are trying to fit themselves into the image of what other people's standard of beauty or ideal personality. Maybe you want to sound sensuous and gloriously breathy like Marilyn Monroe when you speak. Or you want to have Gwen Stefani's flat abs. But the thing is you can't copy and paste the perfect body together from parts into a whole. You can't live yourself being someone you're not. This 'unhealthy habit' could damage your confidence and self-esteem. There's nothing wrong with being yourself.

When you love yourself, you will try to find the beauty inside of you and learn to be kind to yourself. When you love yourself, you will want to focus on your uniqueness and positive qualities instead of your flaws and failures. Instead of feeling sorry for yourself, loving yourself gives you the opportunity to start fresh and discover your strength, what you're capable of which will further help you accomplish your goals.

Let's discuss about this: What have you done to foster self-love? Please share your experiences in the comments below.

Read more