What's Your Motivation?

How do you stay motivated to make the better choice, the healthier choice? Making the better choice instead of the more comforting choice when it comes to food, Making the choice to fit in a workout instead of a few more minutes of sleep, isn't always easy. I takes motivation and daily reminders of why you are passing up a trip to Dairy Queen or choosing to only eat one ounce of dark chocolate instead of the entire bar to keep you on track. Sometimes just a look in the mirror at what you have accomplished is all you need. Or stepping on the scale every week. For some the motivation is reminding themselves of a specific date because their journey to a better lifestyle began because of an impending special event such as a wedding, a reunion, a landmark birthday, or some other special occasion, but depending on how far off the event is, it can be difficult to continually make the better choice. And once that day has come and gone, how do you continue to motivate yourself to stay on track?

 I've been on a journey to a better lifestyle for a little over 11 months now. I've lost 37lbs and am literally half the size I was, but even I have had those moments of weakness and have run into what I viewed as road blocks, but I've kept as I say, "fighting the good fight."

 These past few weeks since school has let out has been especially hard because it is a completely different schedule from the school year for me. So trying to rearrange everything has proven to be difficult. Then the other day I stumbled upon a healthy dose of motivation. I was scrolling through some Facebook pictures from 2 years ago when I took my daughter to an amusement park and I couldn't believe how different I looked then compared to now, but when I looked at those pics I didn't think about how I LOOKED so much as I how I remembered feeling. Those memories are happy ones because of the joy and excitement of my daughter, but remembering how tired I felt and how much my feet hurt at the end of the day the day is what motivated me. I remembered how much effort it took to keep up with my baby girl that day. And almost immediately, I made the stark comparison of the way I felt on this years trip to the same amusement park. I climbed the ropes, went up several flights of stairs to slide down slides multiples times, climbed stairs to the top of a big tree house and ran across a rope bridge, walked all over the park, play in the ball pit, and still had plenty of energy at the end of the day!

I feel the difference my lifestyle change has made every day when I run around the backyard playing tag, stomping like a dinosaur, or dancing with my baby girl. I can throw her in the air and catcher her as many times as she can manage to giggle out "again, again! mommy throw me again!" and ride her around piggy back without stopping to rest. This is why I choose the all you can eat salad buffet when we go to Chuck E Cheese, or the South West Chicken Salad with grilled chicken when everyone else gets McDonalds. This is why I'll gladly grill some salmon marinated in red hot, with a side steamed broccoli, and some fruit salad for dessert. And that is why I woke up early this morning and went for a half hour run. I thought of printing off a few copies of those pics from two years ago and hanging them on the refrigerator, the mirror, and near the bathroom scale, because it's no longer about how I look, or how much I weigh. It's about how I feel and what I can do.

 This was never a motivation that occurred to me when I started out. My journey started because I simply want a better reflection. I wanted to look the way I did before I got married coupled with the fear of all the health problems that came with being overweight. Now, my motivation is the way I feel. Which also makes the food choices and the workouts easier to do, because even eating healthier foods makes me physically feel better.

So, how do you stay motivated?
 Do you hang pictures of yourself to remind you of how far you've come?
 Do you hang that special dress where you can see it every day?
 Is it the compliments you've gotten from friends, family, and co-workers?
Do you keep a journal to refer back to?
Do you track the weight you lost?
Are you inspired by stories of others?

Test Post

I didn't realize my blogger app want functioning properly, so there are several posts that I thought I published from my blogger app that haven't shown up on either this or my PreK blog. So this is a test post to see if uninstalling & reinstalling has made a difference. This could pose a problem because I am rarely sitting down in front of my computer. Hope this works.

The good news is it works the bad news is because I installed & reinstalled I lost all the unpublished posts from the last month or two. :: sigh::