How To Take Dieting, One Day at a Time

“Eat to live. Don’t eat to live.” I don’t know who to give credit for that quote, but it has deep meaning when it comes to being healthy. I’ve checked out some blogs lately, and I see a lot of people skeptic about dieting. They think, “I don’t know if I can do this because I’m used to such and such a food everyday.” When it comes down to it, dieting, like everything else in your life, is a habit. If you’ve read any of the dieting articles on this website, then you know we don’t believe in the idea of changing what you’re eating for a few weeks to reach a particular goal and then once you’ve reached it, going back to your old habits.

One thing I’ve learned in my short little life is that nothing is permanent. Every aspect of your life, whether good or bad, can be changed by changing your habits. If you do something everyday over a long enough time period it becomes a habit. So how do you change your bad habits into good ones? It’s easier said than done, but the basic rule of thumb is to take it a day at a time. You don’t need to do a complete back flip and try to turn yourself into fitness model overnight. You’re more likely to fail if all you focus on is the goal. This is true for everything you do. You have to concentrate on the day ahead of you. A better way to put it is to break up your ultimate goal into smaller, more achievable goals. If each day all you require is to eat 5 small meals a day, hit the gym for an hour or so, and stay away from the drive-thru, then you’re far more likely to succeed then if all you’re thinking about is “How the hell am I going to do this for 3 months?”

Because if you slip up and set yourself back a step or two, you ultimately think that your goal is unachievable if you’re worrying about the long term. “Great, I had that cake at work and now my whole diet is ruined. Stupid Milton!” If you’re taking it a day at a time then admit it, you still screwed up. But there is always tomorrow. Refocus your energy on the day ahead. Motivate yourself enough to reach all of your tiny goals the next day, and learn from the mistakes you’ve made in the past.

Swole for Summer - Day 16 Update

In the grand scheme of things, I’m doing pretty well on both my diet and exercise. I was planning on going to the gym only 4 days a week, but I’ve been so concentrated on Swole for Summer that I feel like a loser if I don’t go to the gym every chance I get. So even on my off days, I will drag my ass to the gym to get some cardio in to make up for all the cardio I haven’t been doing.

Thank god for spring. I can cook, but 97% of what I can cook involves a grill. When it’s warm outside then that means I have no excuses for screwing up my diet. It just makes it a whole lot easier when I have so many other things to worry about.

It’s funny because I look at the daily progress pictures and don’t see a damn thing changing. I’m going to assume that you’re all as sick of looking at my moobs as much as I am. But hell, I dropped 12.5 lbs in a little over 2 weeks, so it has to be going somewhere.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 3rd, 2007 at 10:13 pm and is filed under Motivation, Swole for Summer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.