KCCC's No-S story
Posted: Sun Sep 28, 2008 12:08 am
I have previously written long complex posts that tell my story, so will gather them up and paste them in (with some editing for coherence) rather than re-writing.
Short form - have been on No-S about 2 years. Am able to maintain on it, when I was continuously gaining before. Love it.
General stats: I am 52, 5'7", about a size 10. I don't generally weigh anymore, but did for this thread. Currently 145.
While stabilizing my weight is a HUGE benefit, I feel that my new attitude toward food has been the best part of No S. I don't make a spectacular weight-loss story, because my weight isn't much different. However, I've lost a lot of mental "baggage" that I'm truly happy to see go. The side effects of maintaining weight through a deprivation mindset are not good. No-S allows me to enjoy food MORE while eating less... what a gift!
== (excerpted, with edits, from http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic ... highlight=
Some background... I’ve done calorie-counting diets, and I’ve done them successfully. When I was in my late teens and early 20’s, and heading toward the same levels of obesity prevalent in my family, I lost weight – and gained it back, alas – several times on calorie-restricting diets. I can still reel off calorie counts for an amazing variety of foods. I did eventually lose and keep off the excess weight when I began a regime that combined calorie-counting with exercise. At some point, I realized that I liked the way I felt when I exercised regularly, and I even learned to enjoy the exercise I did. (That’s not to say I’m naturally active – I’m not. I take exercise classes because left to myself, I get lazy.)
At any rate, I kept off the weight for decades, but I now describe how I did it as “an armed truce with food.†I exercised regularly, watched what I ate, and monitored the scale closely. Whenever my weight was “out of bounds,†I immediately went on a restriction diet until it was back where I could live with it. During all that time, I doubt anyone looking at me (5’7â€, size 10 max) would have thought “wow, she really has a weight problem†– but in some respects, I did.
Yet that all worked until I hit mid-life, had a baby in my 40's, and lost exercise time... all at once. At that point, I began to struggle. Several rounds of Weight-Watchers convinced me that I could LOSE through diets that demanded total attention, but I couldn’t maintain that way anymore. No-S has been an incredible relief.
In addition to being able to maintain with relative ease on No-S, I deeply appreciate the difference in mindset, which seems HUGE to me. In my calorie-counting days, I rarely enjoyed food. Food was “good†or “bad.†Treats were always consumed with a side order of guilt. I ate a lot of “fake food,†because it was lower in calories. I was always bargaining with myself over food (“if I have this now, I won’t have that later… if I don’t have this now, I can have that later.â€) Food never just WAS. With No-S, I don’t count calories, I just eat one plate when it’s mealtime. I do eat mostly healthy stuff – I like it – but I no longer categorize foods as “bad†just because they are high in calories. And I eat "real food" most of the time. I now think that, within these guidelines that sort of replicate “how we were designed to eat,†my body is wiser than my mind in determining what it needs.
==excerpted from http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic ... highlight= (not my thread)
It is important to accept "where you are." I was thinking about that just this morning... I have spent most of my adult life in a healthy BMI range, with the exception of the early 20's wake-up call that I was heading into obesity and the period immediately following pregnancy (and that's excused). Within that range, my weight has been within a 10 pound range 80% of the time, I'd say.
And I've never been happy with it. My "ideal weight," in my head, has always been "five pounds less than I am now" - NO MATTER WHAT I WEIGHED. Even for a few months when I was well below the usual 10 pound range.
What woke me up to that is looking at pictures recently. There were a couple taken about a year ago where I was about 5 lbs less than I am now, and I thought "Man, I look great in those! I wish I weighed that now." And then I remembered how I felt when they were taken... which was "If I could only lose 5 lbs, I'd look pretty good!"
Sheesh.
At this point, I've decided I'm going to build good eating/exercise habits, and let my body be the weight it wants to be... and let go of it.
If I'd directed all the energy I've spent on "those last 5 lbs" to something IMPORTANT, my life would surely be better. Collectively, if everyone had done the same... well, I bet we'd have world peace by now.
(Added note: I did tend to weigh in the 130's when I was younger, so maintaining this attitude is still a challenge.)
== and from http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic ... highlight= , just because I liked it, and don't want to lose it.
I sometimes listen to "Zencasts" on my iPod. (Zencast on iTunes, or go to http://amberstar.libsyn.com/) The teaching stories and metaphors often seem relevant to No-S (or any habit-change).
Some time ago, one of the teachers was talking about change, and used the metaphor of imagining a line, then imagining another 5 degrees off. Five degrees out of a circle's 360 seems like very little, and looks like nothing... at first. But as you follow the lines out, the change becomes more dramatic and noticeable over time. The divergence from the original path becomes more marked.
Even so, a small change, over time, can take you a far distance from your original path.
Some of us on this board are just starting. Their five degrees consist of the basic No-S habits, with no other changes. Perhaps even phasing in the new habits one at a time...
Others of us have been here over time, and are finding that our changed direction is becoming noticeable in ways we didn't expect. We tend to make healthier food choices, are more consistent, have different tastes in food, etc. Our initial 5 degrees marked a change in direction that has grown over time.
I really like this metaphor, because I have learned that it's important to make gradual changes. If they're too much, the initial enthusiasm burns out too quickly. So now, when I'm trying to make a lasting habit, I look for "5 degrees I can do." (And of course, when you add 5 degrees on top of an earlier 5 degrees, you can end up with AMAZING directional changes.)
/another bloggy post from KCCC
== (same thread, further down)
One piece of the "line" analogy that I don't think I made clear enough was that we should avoid comparing ourselves to people who are at different places on their own journey, or at least be ultra-careful about it - even when we're trying to help.
It's easy for new folks to look at the things long-term people are doing and think that it's required, or something they SHOULD do, and get discouraged. ("Look at all these people eating oatmeal. I don't even LIKE oatmeal! I thought you didn't have to do this kind of stuff?")
It's easy for long-term folks to give well-meaning advice that doesn't take into account "where people are." (I am sure I've done that. Embarassed ) Things that I consider "sweets" may be too stringent for a beginner... and not high on the overall priority list for them.
Thinking about the "5-degree slope" of the line is helpful in terms of evaluating how much "challenge" to offer or take on.
===
Short form - have been on No-S about 2 years. Am able to maintain on it, when I was continuously gaining before. Love it.
General stats: I am 52, 5'7", about a size 10. I don't generally weigh anymore, but did for this thread. Currently 145.
While stabilizing my weight is a HUGE benefit, I feel that my new attitude toward food has been the best part of No S. I don't make a spectacular weight-loss story, because my weight isn't much different. However, I've lost a lot of mental "baggage" that I'm truly happy to see go. The side effects of maintaining weight through a deprivation mindset are not good. No-S allows me to enjoy food MORE while eating less... what a gift!
== (excerpted, with edits, from http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic ... highlight=
Some background... I’ve done calorie-counting diets, and I’ve done them successfully. When I was in my late teens and early 20’s, and heading toward the same levels of obesity prevalent in my family, I lost weight – and gained it back, alas – several times on calorie-restricting diets. I can still reel off calorie counts for an amazing variety of foods. I did eventually lose and keep off the excess weight when I began a regime that combined calorie-counting with exercise. At some point, I realized that I liked the way I felt when I exercised regularly, and I even learned to enjoy the exercise I did. (That’s not to say I’m naturally active – I’m not. I take exercise classes because left to myself, I get lazy.)
At any rate, I kept off the weight for decades, but I now describe how I did it as “an armed truce with food.†I exercised regularly, watched what I ate, and monitored the scale closely. Whenever my weight was “out of bounds,†I immediately went on a restriction diet until it was back where I could live with it. During all that time, I doubt anyone looking at me (5’7â€, size 10 max) would have thought “wow, she really has a weight problem†– but in some respects, I did.
Yet that all worked until I hit mid-life, had a baby in my 40's, and lost exercise time... all at once. At that point, I began to struggle. Several rounds of Weight-Watchers convinced me that I could LOSE through diets that demanded total attention, but I couldn’t maintain that way anymore. No-S has been an incredible relief.
In addition to being able to maintain with relative ease on No-S, I deeply appreciate the difference in mindset, which seems HUGE to me. In my calorie-counting days, I rarely enjoyed food. Food was “good†or “bad.†Treats were always consumed with a side order of guilt. I ate a lot of “fake food,†because it was lower in calories. I was always bargaining with myself over food (“if I have this now, I won’t have that later… if I don’t have this now, I can have that later.â€) Food never just WAS. With No-S, I don’t count calories, I just eat one plate when it’s mealtime. I do eat mostly healthy stuff – I like it – but I no longer categorize foods as “bad†just because they are high in calories. And I eat "real food" most of the time. I now think that, within these guidelines that sort of replicate “how we were designed to eat,†my body is wiser than my mind in determining what it needs.
==excerpted from http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic ... highlight= (not my thread)
It is important to accept "where you are." I was thinking about that just this morning... I have spent most of my adult life in a healthy BMI range, with the exception of the early 20's wake-up call that I was heading into obesity and the period immediately following pregnancy (and that's excused). Within that range, my weight has been within a 10 pound range 80% of the time, I'd say.
And I've never been happy with it. My "ideal weight," in my head, has always been "five pounds less than I am now" - NO MATTER WHAT I WEIGHED. Even for a few months when I was well below the usual 10 pound range.
What woke me up to that is looking at pictures recently. There were a couple taken about a year ago where I was about 5 lbs less than I am now, and I thought "Man, I look great in those! I wish I weighed that now." And then I remembered how I felt when they were taken... which was "If I could only lose 5 lbs, I'd look pretty good!"
Sheesh.
At this point, I've decided I'm going to build good eating/exercise habits, and let my body be the weight it wants to be... and let go of it.
If I'd directed all the energy I've spent on "those last 5 lbs" to something IMPORTANT, my life would surely be better. Collectively, if everyone had done the same... well, I bet we'd have world peace by now.
(Added note: I did tend to weigh in the 130's when I was younger, so maintaining this attitude is still a challenge.)
== and from http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic ... highlight= , just because I liked it, and don't want to lose it.
I sometimes listen to "Zencasts" on my iPod. (Zencast on iTunes, or go to http://amberstar.libsyn.com/) The teaching stories and metaphors often seem relevant to No-S (or any habit-change).
Some time ago, one of the teachers was talking about change, and used the metaphor of imagining a line, then imagining another 5 degrees off. Five degrees out of a circle's 360 seems like very little, and looks like nothing... at first. But as you follow the lines out, the change becomes more dramatic and noticeable over time. The divergence from the original path becomes more marked.
Even so, a small change, over time, can take you a far distance from your original path.
Some of us on this board are just starting. Their five degrees consist of the basic No-S habits, with no other changes. Perhaps even phasing in the new habits one at a time...
Others of us have been here over time, and are finding that our changed direction is becoming noticeable in ways we didn't expect. We tend to make healthier food choices, are more consistent, have different tastes in food, etc. Our initial 5 degrees marked a change in direction that has grown over time.
I really like this metaphor, because I have learned that it's important to make gradual changes. If they're too much, the initial enthusiasm burns out too quickly. So now, when I'm trying to make a lasting habit, I look for "5 degrees I can do." (And of course, when you add 5 degrees on top of an earlier 5 degrees, you can end up with AMAZING directional changes.)
/another bloggy post from KCCC
== (same thread, further down)
One piece of the "line" analogy that I don't think I made clear enough was that we should avoid comparing ourselves to people who are at different places on their own journey, or at least be ultra-careful about it - even when we're trying to help.
It's easy for new folks to look at the things long-term people are doing and think that it's required, or something they SHOULD do, and get discouraged. ("Look at all these people eating oatmeal. I don't even LIKE oatmeal! I thought you didn't have to do this kind of stuff?")
It's easy for long-term folks to give well-meaning advice that doesn't take into account "where people are." (I am sure I've done that. Embarassed ) Things that I consider "sweets" may be too stringent for a beginner... and not high on the overall priority list for them.
Thinking about the "5-degree slope" of the line is helpful in terms of evaluating how much "challenge" to offer or take on.
===