It’s Monday – and this is a Monday after a holiday weekend. Do you feel like you overdid it with food and drink this weekend? Are you beating yourself up, vowing to cut out all bad foods, restrict calories, and exercise excessively to beat yourself up for the weekend’s indiscretions? PLEASE STOP – reset, redirect, and remain calm! Falling off your plan is temporary and everyone does it – EVERYONE!
So, let’s see if this sounds like you on this Monday morning. You ate something (or many things) you said you wouldn’t eat this holiday weekend. You feel horrible and then you feel like a failure, and then you feel like quitting. That type of thinking and self-doubt is putting you into a cycle of stress, yo-yo, self-shaming, and anger. I have heard this story and I have seen this cycle many, many times over the past 20 years that I’ve been helping people manage their weight and health. Stopping this cycle is as important as anything else you are doing to achieve your health and weight loss goals!
Today is a new day. Hopefully, you had a healthy weekend and ate nutritious foods and exercised as planned but if you didn’t, that’s fine, too. No need to feel guilt or anger, just get back on track and let it go! You can think about it like your GPS when you are driving to a new location. When you make a wrong turn, does your little GPS voice say “You idiot – you’re a failure! You are never going to get to your destination – why do you even try…? No, it does not! It simply says “At the next safe place, make a U-turn” basically, get back on track, reset, redirect, and remain calm! No beating yourself up! This journey is not about perfection, it’s about consistency and getting back on track when you temporarily mess up! Now, let’s move on!