Mental visualization

What a whirlwind few weeks it has been with some highs and some lows. I got home on Sunday night and have been dragging myself around since then barely able to function. My nerves were still shot and I was having a hard time bouncing back.

Since yesterday I have been trying to figure out how to snap out of this short lived funk and get back into my momentum that I had going so well. This morning as I was snuggled up with Rylee going over some things I had learned over the weekend in Chicago, I remembered something that Kim Lyons said. She talked to us about mental visualization. Taking a step back and sitting there with your eyes closed visualizing your goals. How do you feel at your goal weight, was does that look like, what do you need to do to get there ect. Look at a picture of either yourself at that weight, or if you don't have one a picture similar to what you would like to be (not an unrealistic one).

So this morning I laid there and remembered how I felt when I was at my goal weight, how my clothes fit, what they felt like touching my skin, putting on make up because I cared more about my appearance, being able to shop in regular size clothing, what my workouts felt like. Then I looked at my picture of me at goal and visualized how it would feel to be back there again and what I would have to do to get there. 

The past few days I have been pretty negative because it seemed like one thing after another was going wrong and it was wearing me down and burning me out. For the past few months I have had very good, positive, headspace and I have been wanting to do a gratitude post. I have been feeling extremely blessed and grateful lately so I am going to start putting that together for you in the next few days.

I was going to do a post about Chicago since I learned SO much there, but I think I will integrate it into posts like I have today instead of doing one big post about it. That way I can leave the negatives out of it and behind me and move forward with the awesomeness that I got from the training.

I'll leave you with the picture of myself that I used for my visualization this morning:

Chicago

On Friday night after work Sean and I headed to Detroit so that we could stay at a park n’ fly before we caught our flight to Chicago.

The line up to get into the states was a bit long, an hour and 20 minute wait, but we had a good time joking and laughing so it went by quickly. We went to the Golden Corral in Port Huron for dinner where I had two plates of salad (with dressing on the side) and a small amount of roast beef (very, very good there). After that we headed to Detroit. On the way to Detroit we were in bumper to bumper traffic, in what seemed like construction.

Sean was getting really annoyed but it didn’t really bug me so I thought it was funny how upset he was getting. After we were bumper to bumper for almost an hour and got almost no where the traffic started getting a bit light (keep in mind this was about 10pm at night, not rush hour traffic!) Once we were out of the bumper to bumper we were annoyed because two of the three lanes on the interstate were closed for NO REASON! There was no construction going on, no holes in the road, NOTHING. So they wasted our time for nothing. But in the end we arrived safely and went to bed.

Saturday morning we woke up early and ate breakfast before catching our flight to Chicago. Our flight was good, we were in the front row of the plane and had big seats. When we touched down my dad met us and we went to the hotel to change to the OBS conference.

Let me tell you this – I did NOT want to be there. I was miserable. I didn’t want to hear what they had to say, because to be honest I didn’t want anything to do with the business at all. There was a product training with one of the Presidents team member that taught me a lot more about Herbalife products and started to plant a little seed of excitement. It is reassuring to know what high quality materials they are made from. I know I have been taking them regularly for about 3 weeks now and haven’t noticed a big difference, but they do take time to work, especially when I had some of my symptoms to the extreme. It  will still take a bit of time, but I am going to stick it out and I am going to get rocking results!

I was still very uncomfortable sitting so long and so I kept getting up and walking around at the back of the room while they were talking. Slowly, little bit by little bit I started to think more and more about keeping doing my business. Our chairman gave a really good message about stretching yourself and not giving up. The people in our lives who think we are going to fail are what drive us to keep going.

The Sunday morning training started at 9am but I was just SO exhausted and tired and miserable I decided to sleep for a while and then go to the training for the 1pm break out sessions. At this point I was still wishy washy about starting again because of everything I have been through the past year. Then listening to Tanya I started to get really motivated and excited and I knew at that point that this business will be a big part of my life for ever. I was understanding concepts that hadn’t clicked before and things started making sense and I wanted to jump in with two feet and just go for it!

There was a voice in my head though that was telling me just to wait a bit though. I ned to still give myself some time to get better and focus on me before I jump back in and go for it. I have given myself the deadline of the August training which is in Georgia. I am going to keep working on myself and put all of my effort into my product result and personal health. After the August training I am going to jump into this full and give it everything I have. I will use the August training as my pump up and really give er.

After we left the training yesterday we went to dinner and of course we got deep dish pizza. I knew that we were going to be having this and was so looking forward to it. I ordered a salad because I knew that I only wanted one piece of pizza. It took about 40 minutes to cook, which was fine, and when it got there I was salivating.

We just got a regular and this was ONE PIECE! I ate it very slowly and savoured every single bite. I stopped and ate my salad in between bites and of course I was talking a lot too. I can honestly say that when I was done my 1 piece, and ½ of my salad I was stuffed. It was SO good and worth every single calorie. I tracked honestly and tried to over estimate a bit so hopefully I was able to get it right. I had planned for this for a long time and felt very good about my choice to have 1 piece, my salad, and water.

We also knew that we were going to a donut shop too that had a very large selection of fresh donuts. When we got there we decided to order ½ dozen and I got a knife so I could take a small bite of each one. I LOVED all of them but 1 (I tried 5). The one I didn’t care for I only took a small bite then left the rest, and the others I took pieces of and really really enjoyed them. Again, this was something we planned for and I tracked them as accurately as possible.

This morning we went to breakfast at Cracker Barrel and I had a really healthy selection that has left me quite satisfied.

I know that most of this post is about the food I ate this weekend, but I am really really proud of myself for planning and tracking, and sticking to it. Given that we were sitting so much and in the car a lot, I didn’t have a chance to get my exercise but I am going to kick that up this week for sure.

Since our hotel was 30 minutes away from downtown Chicago we didn’t get a chance to see anything there. After pizza we were going to do a drive through downtown howeverpolice had everything blocked off for the NATO summit that was happening.

Now we are on our way home and I have made myself some new goals, that I will share with you over the next few posts.

Tomorrow is Sean and my two year anniversary so be ready for a bit of a sappy post J

Talk to you all soon!

A long weekend

It’s my favourite weekend of the year. Why is it my favourite weekend you ask? Because it is the weekend I was lucky enough to marry Sean. May 22, 2012 marks our two year anniversary! Since we are going to be gone this weekend we are going to celebrate next weekend.

Today right after work we are leaving for Detroit. We are going to stay there overnight and catch an early flight to Chicago. There is an Online Business Systems training that I had already signed up for and bought my tickets before I took a small step back in the business. We are going to fly in tomorrow and my parents (who are already there) are going to pick us up from the airport. Sean is going to hang out at the hotel and I will go to the training with my parents. In the evening Sean and I will get to site see, but not for very long.

Sunday, same thing. We will be in training until about 3pm and then we are leaving to start driving home. I was hoping for more time in Chicago since everyone raves about that city but I’ll take what I can get.

My back has been feeling better as I mentioned, however, I went back to soccer last night and afterwards it was really hurting. Today so far I am feeling okay, but the thought of sitting the 8 hours in the car on the way home is making me cringe. I am going to make sure I keep doing my stretches and hopefully all will be well.

On Wednesday I bought a new Weight Watcher 3 month tracking journal and was planning on using it once I came back from Chicago. However, I got a huge rush of motivation yesterday and decided to start right away. I think it will be good to keep me on track this weekend. I am going to prove that you can go away on vacation, have fun, and still make healthy choices. Tonight we are going to Ruby Tuesdays for dinner and I printed off the menu so I can pick what I want, although I am really craving a salad (with Blue Cheese dressing, on the side). If we get there and nothing looks appealing we will go to our trusty back up choice of the Golden Corral, in which I will also get a salad, with Blue Cheese dressing, on the side.

Tomorrow I plan on having a shake for breakfast, some type of deli sandwich or something like that for lunch and dinner is still unknown.

My only issue is going to be trying to figure out how I can get in some exercise since most of the day Saturday and Sunday will be spent sitting, and most of Monday will be spent in the car.

My sister is watching Levi for us, and yes I admit this is lame, but I already miss him terribly. I always miss him though, even from the time I leave for work until the time I get home, I miss him lots.

Hopefully I will be able to post over the weekend but if not I will give a full update when I get back. I am hoping to use my time in the car to sort some pictures and hopefully then I will get my Elton John post up (it’s only a month late haha!)

Let's drop the T's

I’m back! I’m sorry for the temporary LOA but I have returned!

I’ve been spending a lot of me time lately and doing lots of thinking, and reflecting. I’ve been working on making small but positive changes in my life, both at home and at work, you and happen to have caught me on a good day!

I want to share with you something that I’ve been working on lately, and that is dropping the T’s. Okay, so what does that mean? Let’s turn can’t into can, won’t into will, shouldn’t into should and so forth. So much of our lives are spent thinking about the things we “can’t, won’t shouldn’t” do. For example, I can’t accomplish this goal, I won’t make it, I shouldn’t try. So, let’s drop the T’s and move forward.

Now you’re asking…what does that look like? Well, I’m not an expert by any means, but here is what I have come up with (I will do 1 example of the few plans that I have come up with for myself and then you can fill your own goals and make your own plan!)

My plan

What do I want to accomplish? Getting back to my goal weight

Why this is important to me? So that I can live a healthy life, fit back into my clothing, so getting older isn’t as hard on my body, to be able to be an example and to show to everyone that it can be done a healthy way!

How am I going to do this? I am going to make a commitment to myself to loose 1 pound, one day at a time and not look at how much I have to loose total.

I will make my weekly meal plan, and stick to it.

I will get to the gym at least twice a week to start, and build up again from there.

I will see my trainer at least once a week, preferably twice.

I will treat myself once a day, or a minimum of every other day.

I will track everything I eat.

Now it might look like I have put a lot down for how am I going to do this, and yes I started it all at once, but for me these are small changes that I can make to sustain my weight loss/maintenance long term – which is very important to me.

I have made some other goals in terms of finances, my emotional/mental health, and house work. I used a plan for each one and made sure that I started out SMALL. I did not throw out everything in my kitchen and promise never to eat junk food again, because let’s be honest, I’d fail after a few days. I did however look at the small steps that I could take that would get me there. It might take longer than I want, but I will get there. I have also been sending a list of everything I eat to my mom, it will help to keep me accountable.

On a different topic, I have some very exciting things coming up in my near future!

Next weekend: something huge is happening (I can’t post more details right now since it is a surprise for someone, but the wait will be worth it).

May: Going to Chicago with my parents and husband for the long weekend. We are going to a business conference, but it will still be exciting. Plus it’s the same weekend as our two year anniversary!

July: I am going to BC again to see my family <3. This time my parents will be there at the same time as me so it will be extra exciting.

August: Camping!

September: Women’s retreat

Food for thought: When you put your mind to it, you can achieve anything you want