1) Plan ahead what you will eat for the coming day and/or coming week. If you know that you will have a tricky situation, plan for it. Pre-decide ahead of time. Decision anxiety will set you up for failure. Decide which restaurants are good for you and which restaurants are a death sentence, in terms of fattening foods that you know you can't resist. Decide before you go to that restaurant what you will order and do not look at the menu. Look online to see what a good choice will be. I tell the waiter when I order EXACTLY what I want and ask if that is okay. For example, I would never let them put salad dressing on the salad. It must be on the side so that I can dip my fork(yes, I said fork) and drizzle it on the salad. Make all tricky decisions ahead of time.
2) Make a mental box of what food items that you will eat for the rest of your life. Sometimes I think this is where we get bitter about having to diet. I came to this important conclusion...we do not have to have anything we want, anytime we want. As a Christian, I especially want to speak to that. We give up our rights to our life when we accept Jesus as our Saviour. We do this because his terms are so much better than our terms. His ways ALWAYS satisfy beyond what we can imagine.
We need to realize that as rich Americans(and we are all rich in comparison to most of the world) we have come to expect to have countless different food choices to consume. We think this is our right! Most of the world probably has 5 food choices. I have come to realize that the fewer the food choices I allow in my mouth, the simpler it is to make choices and the easier it is to eat healthy. We all need a denial list to be more focused in any area of our lives, especially in the area of food. I LOVE having fewer food choices. It has provided me freedom from food that I have not experienced before.
3) Track what you eat. This is an easy task, but not always done by dieters. Why? Too confronting!!! We don't want to confront the slice of pizza or the 7 cookies we ate. Because I am a Christian blogger, I need to add this perspective. Whenever we keep things secret, whether from shame or conviction, we will not be able to receive that grace that God offers us. For example, if we know that eating too many sweets is not healthy for us and we try to hide that act from ourselves or others in our lives, we are missing out on the grieving and healing process that is available to us. There are many ways to track our food and exercises. I love the smart phone apps that are free. Lose It or My Fitness Pal are just two of the ones that I know are easy to use and help set your calories and track them. For a small fee, there are apps that allow you to plan ahead and track even more than just exercises and food consumed.
4) This is not a well-known diet tip but it has worked for me. Have a meal replacement once a day. It is hard, if not impossible, to eat three low calorie meals a day without a lot of planning and commitment. I have found that if I replace one meal per day with a protein shake, I reach my calorie goals for the day with much less grief and struggle. There are many good quality shakes on the market at many price ranges. Slim fast(not very filling), Shakeology(my husband has used this for three years), Whey protein shakes, ...the list is endless.
Notice that I am not advocating a certain diet plan. I am promoting a total life style change. When I think of all that I missed by being overweight, it grieves me. Now when I am tempted with a slice of cheesecake, I quickly remind myself that I do not want to head back down that road. I cannot think of a single food item that it worth it. Try to hold up everything item of food that you know it not good for you but you don't think you could give up. Is that food item worth that much??? I realize that most people would say, " a bite of that would not matter." You have to decide for yourself if it would matter to you. Only you can decide that.
Last tidbit I want to share. I heard a well-known Navy SEAL speak this morning at my church. He said something profound. He shared that when we accepted Christ as our Saviour, we became a "marked man or woman." By that he meant that Satan has put his "scope" on my back and he will stop at nothing to bring me down. When I was lost, he was not zeroing in on my life because I was not a threat to him. But when I gave my life to Christ, I became a threat to his kingdom because I may help bring other people to Christ. For some reason this afternoon, I was contemplating discontinuing this blog. However, God can use something that I say to plant a little seed in someones heart that will ultimately bring them to saving knowledge of Jesus. I think I will accept the fact that if I stand behind Jesus, my self-esteem will be okay because writing this blog is very scary to my self-esteem. Hope this helped someone to experience freedom from food because we can be set free from areas that have us in bondage.
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