I know that sleep is very necessary to being awake during the day. I also have heard that it is needed to properly lose weight and build muscle. Without sleep you body is just to tired and worn out to be strong and slim. I wish I would have listened to myself earlier. For the past week I have been forcing myself to go to sleep my 12:00 midnight. Midnight is the latest I could be awake until. I also forced myself to wake up at 7:00. I was making sure to get a minimum of 7 hours of sleep a night. What a difference it made.

You can see my current sleep habits from above, so let me give you a back ground in my old sleep habits. I would usually go to bed only when I was completely exhausted. I would stay up watching TV or Surfing the interned until about 2:00 of 3:00 in the morning. Then I would crash. I would get up in the morning after about 5 or 6 snooze alarms and go straight to work at about 8:30. This was my routine. Let me tell you, it was not working out. I was tired all day, I would eat a huge breakfast to try and get energy. I would get a Large Coffee from starbucks and just be a zombie all day. The coffee would stave off my hunger, but when it wore off I would gorge on fast food for lunch. I would be in a food coma for the rest of the day. I would hardly eat dinner due to the large lunch. Then came gym time. I say time because the time came and went. I was up for hours, and then I repeated the routine. I think I figured out where the weight came from.

 I decided to reevaluate my sleep patterns when I decided to lose the weight. I had always heard fitness folks talking about waking up at 5:00 in the morning and going running. They are trim and fit, so it might be worth it. I picked 7:00 because 5:00 is just too early. 7:00 also gives me enough time to get a 30 minute walk in every morning before work. I picked midnight to go to sleep just because I want 7 hours of sleep. It is basically arbitrary. I knew it would take time to adjust so I was prepared for that. I had previously trained myself to wake up early, so this was really just remembering that. It took me one week to get used to the routine.

Today is the first day that waking going to bed and waking up was like clockwork. I was out like a light at 11:45 and up at 7:00 sharp and walked for 30 minutes. I had watermelon for breakfast with a medium coffee. I had vegetable soup for lunch and a bean burrito (home made) for dinner. I then walked for another hour or so. I was not hungry all day, I only ate what I needed and I had the energy to walk over 4 miles. It is awesome!

Thought the week I could feel myself building in energy. It started out sluggish but better that before. Each day got a little better. I’m sure that my better eating habits and exercise contributed enormously to this feeling, but I firmly believe it would not last without proper sleep. Being well rested lifted my motivation by leaps and bounds. If I feel this much better while still being overweight, I can’t wait until I lose more.

Get more sleep… it is great!

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Blogging is a great way to keep yourself motivated. I recently discovered blogging. Actually i didnt recently discover it, i did work as a web designer for over a year, but i did just recently start blogging. I can see why it is gaining so much popularity now. I find that writing about you experiences keeps them in you mind. When you consiously think about your life you retain more and learn more about yourself. Writing is a great way to make you life much more conscience.

When i desided i wanted to lose weight, about 6 months ago, i had trouble sticking to it. I would go tho the gym for a week, then forget about it for a while. I would remember the gym again and then forget. The same would go with my diet. I would buy healthy food but and i would eat it. When the food ran out, instead of buying more, i would just get some fast food. I would repeat this over and over. I couldnt keep the thoughts of working out and eating well in my head long enought to get it to stick. Then i discovered blogging.

My first attempt at blogging was to take photos of myself every day and post them on the web. I did this so i could see my progress. It didnt really work. I just forgot about doing that too. However, there was one photo i posted and along with that photo i put a little blurb about what i was doing and feeling that day. I noticed that i didnt forget about that post. Every time that i did something that was similar to what i wrote, i remembered that post. “Hmm, an interesting phenomenon I thought” I tried it again, and the same thing happened. And it kept happeneing, and thats why this blog is here.

Everything i learn about weight loss and healthy living i write down here. I find that it sticks in my mind. If i write my experiences, then I can consiously hold them longer and reflect on them. It is a tremundous tool in weight loss. I dont forget about excercising or forget to eat healthy. It gave me a huge boost in confidence. I wake up everyday and i know what i have to do to get slim and fit. I dont have to try and remember why i am motivated, its right in my blog.

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Eating healthy and excercise is always touted as the secret to weight loss. I hear it day in and day out… and i firmly believe it.  I dont thing that healthy diet and excercise are the only things you need. Your mental state, hapiness, work, friends, social life, living conditions etc. all contribute to your health and weight. I think I have figured out one of those things, eating healthy. And the secret I found to eating healthy is… my lazyness.

I am a very intospective person. I like to analyse my life to figure our why I do the things I do. I believe that if I fing out the root of my behaviors, i can then work on changing. This has worked immensely for me. It worked in finging out why i ead unhealthily. The root of my unhealthy eating habits were convience. Eating unhealthy was just too easy for me.

It was more convienient for me to eat at McDonalds then to cook a steak. It was more convienient for me to make a microwave pizza than to make a salad. If i wanted a snack, i just reached into the cupboard and grabbed a handful of doritos. It was just so easy. Upon this realization that eating unhealthy was so easy, i also realized why eating healthy was so hard. I didnt have any healthy food!

If I wanted a meal and had no food at home, i would have to go out. I had two alternatives; fast food or go to the store, buyu some meat and veggies, cook the meat and veggies and then eat. I was hungry and just driving through was much easier. So, i figured this if I went shopping and bought all healthy foods and kept my kitchen constantly stocked with healthy foods, I would eat healthy. I was right!

Since i had food at home, it was easier to just make something than to get in my car and drive to some fast food joint. Since making food at home was now easier, and all i had was healthy food, I ate healthy food! Wow! It hasn’t been difficult either. The one thing i have to watch is, the amount of food i have in stock. If I run out of food at home I instantly get the urge to eat out. I just have to make sure that my fridge id stocked healthily at all times.

I guess you could call this ‘working smarter, not harder’. Trying to use your will power to avoid bad foods is just too much work for some people… like me. I found that if I only gave myself healthy options, I would take them. Try if for yourself an let me know how it does.

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Being human means you have the unique ability to imagine things that dont yet exist. This is a very useful skill that we possess. It alows us to inovate and move foward It alows us to change our surroundings as we see fit. It also allows us to see change and effect change in ourself. THis last ability is what we will use to motivate ourselfs.

Imagery is simply imagining something. You think of something you want and you make a picture of it in your head. To use this to motivate youself is easy. You need to imagine youself as who you want to be. If you want to be slim, you imagine that. If you wan to run a marathon, you imagine yourself running a marathon. It is that simple.

Some times getting a good image in your mind is difficult. Often, you need practice at it. To learn to create an effective image, find a cool, quiet relaxing place to sit or stand. Dont lay down because you might fall asleep. Now think of what you want. At first you mind will be all over. However, try and focus on what you want to see. If you want to see yourself as a skinny person, first try and see youself as you are. Once you are able to imagine yourself, imagine youself getting skinnier and skinnier until your mental image of you is what you want. Now, just focus on that image and remember it. Dont think about how to get like you mental image or the work it will take, just concentrate on the image of who you want to be. You can let you mind wander and imagine yourself doing things or whatever. That helps solidify the image. Starting out, this should take about 20 minutes. Over time you should be able to recal the image immediatly.

What is the point of imagery? Imagery allows you to give your mind a concrete goal. If you are working to get slimmer, having a mental picture of what you want gives you something to work for. Whenever you are feeling un-motivated you can bring up that mental image of what you want to be and instantly you remember what you are working towards. Imagery is relaxing and it allows you to be motivated toward your goals.

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This is a weight loss motivation technique my sister told me about. She apparently utilized this and now never overeats. Ok, here it is. You eat a full meal, not a dieting meal, but a meal you would normally eat in front of a full length mirror. You also must be naked, or if you are shy… in your underwear. So that is the technique, you eat a full meal while sitting naked in front of a full length mirror. WHat does this accomplish?

For my sister, by the way she lost about 20 pounds and is very slim now, it made her acutely aware of her appearance. I also tried this and i became acutely aware of my appearance. Let me say, it was not a pretty sight. There is alot of things that when you eat. Your chin moves as you chew. Your shrowt moves as you swallow, you stomach moves as the food churns. Everything expands. This movement is especially noticable when you are 40 pounds too fat, like i am. I have seen skinny people eat while shirtless and there is little movement. Needless to say, i didnt like it. I think the worst part was how bloated i looked when i stuffed myself eating my usual meal.

Seeing this made me very aware of my appearance and very aware of my need to change it.  Every time after that, if i felt i was overeating, that image of me infront of the mirror would pop into my head and my appetite would cease. It was the motivation i needed to stop my overeating. I highly recomend trying this method.

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