When Losing Weight Should You Weigh Every Day? by Kathryn Martyn, M.NLP

How to Break the Weighing Habit

Face it, if you weigh yourself more than once a day, you are a serious scale addict, and if you let the number on the scale affect how you feel, you are probably a bit too involved with that appliance. Danger, danger! Step away from the scale!

The scale simply cannot tell the difference between muscle and fat, and while fat is bulky and lumpy, muscle is sleek and shapely. Muscle also gives you strength, agility and power. Muscle can be used as fuel, but it is not the primary fuel source. Fat on the other hand is a storage fuel for times of famine. It also shields our body's organs and provides a protective layer from the outside world. Without some body fat we cannot survive, and without some muscle you'd not have the strength to get out of bed. But while fat is necessary, many of us have a bit more saved up than is necessary. Most of us never consider our body's ratio of fat to muscle. We instead rely on the bathroom scale. We've been told we need to weigh a certain amount, or be within a certain range to the point that many who start eating well and exercising consistently abandon their plan when they don't quickly see a difference on the scale. Even when their body is visibly changing, they still are disappointed if the scale won't budge.

Consider for a moment, those first hints that something is changing: Your waistband may be getting looser, your rings may be slipping off, your face may start to look a little slimmer, and your shoes, yes your shoes will start to become too big for your feet. Many will start losing in the hands and feet first. That's just dandy, I know. We all strive for skinny fingers and toes, but I didn't design the body, I just own and operate one.

You may own and operate a car? Do you take care of it the same way you take care of yourself? Do you store gasoline in the trunk, in case you can't find a gas station? Probably not. Do you stockpile extra oil and batteries? No, probably not. Then why do you worry about dinner when you haven't finished eating lunch? Have you ever gone ahead and eaten something because you might get hungry later? Why do we worry so much about food when there is no scarcity that I've noticed? Where I live there is food at every corner, 24-hours a day, at the bank, the gas station and even the neighbor's garage sale.

Interestingly, I've found that when the scale suddenly showed a loss, greater than expected, it seemed to induce in me a desire to remedy that situation. I'd overeat that day and the next, somehow unraveling any good I'd done previously. Even with all the knowledge and sense in the world, we still become unsensible in the face of that judge, the bathroom scale!

I think the problem isn't that we are unhappy by the numbers so much as we expect certain numbers. If you are dieting, then you are wanting to see a lower number, but what happens when you do? Do you reward yourself for a job well done? Do you decide you've done so well, you might as well have a treat? The scale habit can adopting other ways to measure your progress, and starting a daily journal which gives you a way to chart what you are doing. You're not stopping one thing so much as you are starting another. Ending one habit always involves beginning another.

Get a small notebook or journal to write in. If you want a fancy, leather bound book, fine, but don't stall on starting this exercise with the excuse you don't have the supplies. Use a scrap of paper you found on the ground if you have to, but starting today, you are going to track your hunger levels all day long.

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BIO:

~~ Kathryn Martyn, M.NLP, EFT coach and author of Changing Beliefs, Your First Step to Permanent Weight Loss lost 80 pounds over 17 years ago. Learn how she lost the weight and maintains that weight loss at http://www.OneMoreBite-Weightloss.com

The "The Daily Bites" http://www.onemorebite-weightloss.com/getnews.html for motivating mini-lessons and tips using EFT and NLP to end the weight loss struggle.

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