6 Excuses I Use to Give Up on My Weight Loss Goals {And The One Way I Overcome Them}

Blogging about my weight loss journey has been super helpful in reaching my goals. To read more journal entries, I’ve tagged them diary or journal.

Recent attempts over the past year for me to “get back on a diet” has taught me a lot of lessons. Sometimes, I have to remind myself, “I’m Grateful for my compulsions!”. There’s honestly a lot I can learn about myself from my constant desire to turn back to food to solve problems, to procrastinate, to comfort, to entertain, and just because it’s a habit.

And even though I’ve conquered these things in the past, I’m starting to think it never actually goes away. It takes vigilance to notice the excuses. I’ve written about them many times. I still have the same thoughts come up again and again. The difference though, is that I now recognize the sabotaging thoughts as excuses. (I wrote a lot about that here) And now, I am so much quicker to recognize the thought, remind myself of my goals, and move on. That doesn’t mean I always resist the temptation to snack, graze, or overeat, but I do course correct a lot more quickly.

Course correcting I believe is why I’m only up 10 lbs from my desired weight, and not 20+. I actually feel pretty good at my size. My jeans might be a bit tight, but most days I have energy, and I feel great for being 50. The only days I don’t feel good is when I over eat. It doesn’t’ even have to be a lot of food. But I’m a short girl and overeating even a little can make me feel lethargic and stuffed.

I also think it’s incredibly hard to be self-employed and work from home. After 20 years of self-employment, you have to imagine I’m burned out. And I am! I need a hobby or something, because most days I just want to phone it in and binge toast and YouTube.

Even though I felt like I’ve learned the same lessons over and over about why I eat, and when I eat, it seems God wants me to KEEP learning those lessons. So, here we go!

Reasons I give up dieting before I even start!

One more day living in this body isn’t that big a deal. This excuse comes up a LOT for me. Today in fact. Since I don’t feel like I’ve been consistent for several months, it’s easy to say, “just one more day isn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things”, and yet, I’ve been saying that for 9 months now!
Social occasions that revolve around food. Just today I went out to eat with my mom and sister, and tonight I’m headed to a wedding, where dinner is provided. Although I’m capable of going out to eat and enjoying a wedding and staying on plan, sometimes, I just want to eat something that isn’t typical of my normal diet.
Disruptions to my routine. The past 6 weeks really has been crazy for me. A trip to Boston, St. George AND Peru have all happened in the last month and a half. And I’m not typically a traveler. So, that certainly complicated my resolve to stick to any type of diet.

Reasons to give up after the diet starts!

When I have attempted a return to my diet over the last few months, I found at least 3 times, I quit the diet around day 10! In fact, It was so consistent that I might add an email to send on day 10 to the people who buy my 1200 calorie diet plan. Because I could have used a little kick in the pants myself. Here’s what caused me to quit:

When I run out of food I need for “My plan!” I was doing good. I had chicken, oatmeal, egg whites, sweet potatoes… literally, all the classics of a diet. But around day 10, when I hadn’t been to the store and life got in the way, and I didn’t have chicken cooked, and I had no more egg whites, I LITERALLY gave up instead of just going to the store. It was a moment of weakness and it was hard to get back onto the plan.
Bored by the plan. This is a strange phenomenon to me, because I LOVE the food I eat while dieting. Truly. I can eat the same foods for breakfast, lunch, and snack every single day and be completely satisfied. BUT, when I think that I can’t deviate from those things I talk myself into believing it’s too boring and I want flexibility and freedom, despite every meal bringing me joy.
Stress and The feeling of frenzy- Have you ever felt overwhelmed by life and think you need something RIGHT NOW and you don’t want to spend time preparing something. It’s almost like a frenzied feeling that you need to get food as fast as possible. Yeah. I get that way. I know logically, my meals only take a few minutes to prepare, yet I grab a slice of bread straight from the bag any way.
Food just tastes good, it’s tempting, and it’s available, it’s hard to resist. I’ve written about this before. I understand that people have disordered thoughts around food, but I’ve worked with enough of them to realize, that’s not what happens to me. I don’t have any mental illness around food. Sometimes, I really just freaking love the taste of food!

So, with those excuses coming up now and then (and year after year), I found there is one technique that has helped me more than any other technique. That is: VISION!

That’s right: VISION!

When I can truly visualize my life in a leaner body.
When I can visualize my goals.
When I can visualize how I react in different situations.
When I can visualize the feeling of going to bed satisfied and not stuffed.
When I can visualize fitting into clothes that I don’t have to try on.

Then, I get back on track quickly! Where there is no vision, the People perish. (Proverbs 29)

Taking the time in the morning to reflect on my goals and then REVISITING them throughout the day (critical!!), than I stay on track. It’s working for me now, so I’m going to stick with it!

I do this through journaling, getting quiet and undistracted, while I run in the mornings, while I hike, and even while I’m falling asleep at night.

When is the best time for you to visualize your weight loss goals and make them concrete!?

(*Here’s some pictures of that recent trip to Peru!)