Spleener's back

Counting carbs/calories is a drag. Obsessive scale stepping is a recipe for despair. If you want to count something, "days on habit" is a much better metric. Checking off days on a calendar would do just fine, but if you do it here you get accountability and support. Here's how. Start a new topic in this forum called (say) "Your Name Daily Check In." Then every N day post a "reply" to that topic as to whether you stayed on habit. A simple "<font color="green">SUCCESS</font>" or "<font color="red">FAILURE</font>" (or your preferred euphemism if that's too harsh) is sufficient, but obviously you're welcome to write more if you want. On S-days just register that you're taking an S-day. You don't have to do this forever, just until you're confident you've built the habit. Feel free to check in weekly or monthly or sporadically instead of daily. Feel free also to track other habits besides No-s (I'm keeping this forum under No-s because that's what the vast majority are using it for). See also my <a href="/habitcal/">HabitCal</a> tool for another more formal (and perhaps complementary) way to track habits.

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spleener
Posts: 36
Joined: Wed Jun 24, 2009 11:10 am

Spleener's back

Post by spleener » Mon Nov 16, 2009 6:38 pm

You probably didn't miss me--I wasn't a huge poster--but I knew I was gone.

I found the No S Diet back in June and had some really solid success with it for about six weeks. Eventually I saw Intuitive Eating as the next shiny new diety thing (or the next stop on my evolutionary path toward becoming the Perfect Eater, or something), and I pretty much killed all the progress I'd made (not to mention gaining back the five or so pounds I had lost).

After several months of just surrendering, followed by a couple weeks trying to get back on the diet-of-the-week treadmill, I finally came to my senses and went back to something that actually makes sense (and even better, something that works). I'm sticking with straight-up vanilla No-S; the only thing even close to a mod is that I'm not going to freak out if my daughter wants to share a skittle with me on a Thursday. I'd rather give myself a red day for 10 calories of candy than make her feel like she can only be nice to me on the weekends (she's seven, so sharing is important to her). I also don't want to create a "mod" to deal with those occasional situations; I'd rather just color in the calendar red, know why I did it, and not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Accepting a bite of something from my daughter doesn't mean that I need to go crazy the rest of the day. It's not actually a problem for me, and it ends up being an occasion of hyper-vigilance for no good reason at all. For the most part I think a ridiculous amount of adherance to this is good, but I don't need to drag her into it.

So, I'm back! Here's looking forward to my first 21 days, and another 21 after that. I also have a blog: http://lowcarbsoylent.blogspot.com.

Kevin
Posts: 1269
Joined: Mon May 02, 2005 9:02 pm
Location: Maryland, USA

Re: Spleener's back

Post by Kevin » Mon Nov 16, 2009 7:10 pm

That was very well put. Suck up that you're "breakin' the law" and just get on with it. Welcome back!
spleener wrote:You probably didn't miss me--I wasn't a huge poster--but I knew I was gone.

I found the No S Diet back in June and had some really solid success with it for about six weeks. Eventually I saw Intuitive Eating as the next shiny new diety thing (or the next stop on my evolutionary path toward becoming the Perfect Eater, or something), and I pretty much killed all the progress I'd made (not to mention gaining back the five or so pounds I had lost).

After several months of just surrendering, followed by a couple weeks trying to get back on the diet-of-the-week treadmill, I finally came to my senses and went back to something that actually makes sense (and even better, something that works). I'm sticking with straight-up vanilla No-S; the only thing even close to a mod is that I'm not going to freak out if my daughter wants to share a skittle with me on a Thursday. I'd rather give myself a red day for 10 calories of candy than make her feel like she can only be nice to me on the weekends (she's seven, so sharing is important to her). I also don't want to create a "mod" to deal with those occasional situations; I'd rather just color in the calendar red, know why I did it, and not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Accepting a bite of something from my daughter doesn't mean that I need to go crazy the rest of the day. It's not actually a problem for me, and it ends up being an occasion of hyper-vigilance for no good reason at all. For the most part I think a ridiculous amount of adherance to this is good, but I don't need to drag her into it.

So, I'm back! Here's looking forward to my first 21 days, and another 21 after that. I also have a blog: http://lowcarbsoylent.blogspot.com.
Kevin
1/13/2011-189# :: 4/21/2011-177# :: Goal-165#
"Respecting the 4th S: sometimes."

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