The Magenpie.com

Ans: Chop off a limb.

No, just kidding, but really.

People expect instant results these days, it starts getting hilarious. What with all the advertisements going around, promising all sorts of results. Who is to blame? The companies for having this sort of products and ads? Or the consumers, for demanding such things? Well, if we start, there will be no end, so let’s not even go there.

Losing weight is actually not that hard to do. Having the discipline is. Let’s clarify, I am not talking about having the discipline to eat those meal replacement stuff. I’m talking about exercise and a good diet plan. It can be lonely sometimes, especially if you have friends who love to go out and eat.

My friends love food. Nothing wrong with that, I love to eat too! But sometimes, the thought of exercising puts them off quickly, and well, that can be not too encouraging at times.

So a little background. Growing up, I was a pretty pudgy baby. But then I was a skinny toddler. Then, I became again a pudgy girl from about 9 years up. And the number bounced higher, lower, up and down over the years, up to my university days. There, due to the nature of my project work, which involved a lot of work(hard work yeh) sitting at the computer, my weight went up again. I didn’t exactly realise this until my project ended. Well after the project I went down a little, so that was good, but wasn’t fit and healthy. I guess I looked like I was at an okay weight, so I didn’t really bother either. Until one time, thebf went overseas for a period of time, and I decided to go for a run. Which is funny cos I used to hate running. But for some reason, I went, ran about 1.5km, felt bloody tired, yet good, then went again the day after. Amazingly, I went to run 3 times a week, about 1.5km to 2km each time, slowly building up to 5km. And about a month later I looked really different. During that time, my main support was runnersworld.


Changes

I hadn’t changed my diet all that much, but when I did, I cut out all soft drinks, drank my teas plain with no sugar or milk, ate more fruits and veggies, and that made a world of difference. My headaches went away, I was not as irritable as before, could think clearer, was happier, etc.

So you need a support group as well. Now that is one of the best things in my opinion, that the internet has to offer. Forums, communities, all these are great to meet like minded people. For me, since I like running, I used to go to the weight loss section in runnersworld. If you want to learn more about nutrition, you can also visit the nutrition section. So depending on what you like to do, look for a similar community that is supportive of your goal(I assume its to lose weight or improve your health).

Mind you, I did not make really major lifestyle changes. At least, not in my opinion, and not overnight. I did it slowly. I started drinking more plain water, and also started to appreciate my teas more. Green tea, white tea, red tea, black tea, peppermint tea, chamomile tea, etc.(The last 2 aren’t really teas, but that’s for another post :p) My taste buds seemingly started becoming more sensitive again, a little salt or seasoning goes a long way for me now. Sugar started tasting all funny to me, and these days, I really don’t like the taste of it anymore.

Effects

So the little changes I made, changed me a whole lot. I am calmer, more peaceful, and I’m able to think much more clearly now. I didn’t go on any sort of a crash diet. I just tried to eat as little processed food as possible. It’s quite impossible to eliminate all processed food for most people, so just eliminate what you can. I ate more fresh fruit and food, I still ate meat, but tended to prefer white meats somehow. I still ate my carbos, potatoes, rice, noodles, what have you. I still eat my fat. I can almost sense the cringes seeing that word. Yes, our bodies do need some fat, especially for the ladies. I won’t get too scientific here, it’s good for a whole topic on its own.

The important thing is to listen to your body’s needs. Cleaning up my diet helped me with that, I became more sensitive to what my body needed, and ate accordingly. I could never follow plans, so diet plans, calorie counting, etc, not my kind of thing. If you are like me, then intuitive eating is probably a good way for you to go as well. Try it out, your body will thank you for it

Stumble It!

Posted on September 15th, 2008 under Health, Intuition, Magenpie, weight loss • Tags: intuitive eating, nutrition, running, tea, weight loss. • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback