Overweight | Triumph Wellness

When A Loved One Won’t Change

February 14, 2013 by Emily Segal 1 Comment

Subtitle: ”Why Can’t You Do This For Me, for the kids, for yourSELF?!”

Here is the Mad Libs version:

Your _____________________

(spouse / partner / sister / father / best friend / child)

Needs to____________________

(lose weight / get his blood sugar down / get her cholesterol down / stop smoking / stop drinking / wear a seat belt)

Although he/she insists it has nothing to do with you, and that your nagging is only making things worse, you feel______________________

(betrayed / angry / worried / massively betrayed)

Sound familiar, anyone? I bet it does!

Today, instead of telling you what to do from my standpoint as a health practitioner, I want to share with you the other side of the coin.

I was your spouse. I was the one who was willfully disregarding my health and my family’s future all in the name of getting my next binge. I hope that if you can see things from your loved one’s perspective, you will be able to find some peace and clarity.

Several years ago I tried eating myself into oblivion while my husband was the one to be angry about my growing body and frustrated by my resistance to change. The more he pushed and threatened me, the more I ate and the fatter I became. I truly felt that it was MY business and had nothing to do with him. I seriously resented him making it his problem, even though somewhere in the dim recesses of my mind, I kinda-sorta understood how my health and weight ultimately WOULD impact his life and the lives of our children.

I was in Stage One: Pre-Contemplation (click that link to read the post I wrote about the 5 Stages of Change). I was only dimly aware that there was some sort of a problem but feeling like I was a victim of intolerable levels of stress with food as my only lifeline. I could no sooner have given up over-eating than I could have gone without oxygen.

You can read about what advanced me from Stage One to Stage Two HERE. Basically, I finally understood that my actions were causing my outcome, plain and simple. Change my actions and I’d change the outcome. But more than that, here was this man, Tony Robbins and he had done it himself. And all the thousands of people who followed him, they were taking this kind of action in their lives. I understood for the first time that it could be done and people were doing it. I could change my story and change the way my story would end.

So this is my message to you (and when I get around to publishing that post about overweight kids it will be the same message):

Shut Up and Walk Your Own Talk.

End of story.

People do not hear what you say as much as see what you do. Ghandi said “Be the change you want to see.” You – be the change. Model the behaviors you want others to adopt. SHOW don’t say. Work on Yourself. Be the best you can be. Be Inspiring. Make the people around you WANT to reach higher. Show people what is possible.

Married folks: I realize how painful it feels for you, that your partner is betraying the agreement you made when you got married. He/she is digging an early grave and will leave you holding the bag. But go back and read the stages of change. People who are not changing likely do not believe that it is in their power to do so. No amount of screaming and threatening is going to change that.

Those Stage Oners need hope and belief. They need to come to understand that they CAN reverse their problem. They need to move from helpless victim to artful designers of their own destiny.

Model it for them and then butt out.

P.S. I am not suggesting you stay with a partner bent on self-destruction. You may decide that you need to leave a relationship in order to take care of yourself. That is modeling healthy self-care as well.

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Filed Under: coaching exercises, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Love, Positive Thinking, Rants Tagged With: Obesity, Overweight, Self-Improvement, weight loss

Redefine Hard

January 24, 2013 by Emily Segal Leave a Comment

On a typical morning, I wake up, walk the dog, feed everyone breakfast, pack lunches, and get the kids off to school. Then I put on my running clothes…

…and spend the next 30 – 60 minutes whining to my husband about why I do not want to go running!

My husband, observing this phenomenon in me for years, and now experiencing it for himself while training for his first Half Marathon, has sagely noted:

The training is not the hard part. Getting out the door to DO the training is what is really hard!

Often when a client first comes to see me for weight loss or diet change, he or she holds the belief that “Weight Loss is Hard”. This belief has probably formed during past attempts where it either felt hard to diet or to maintain the weight lost.

Now imagine for a minute how much motivation and excitement to get started you feel when you think “Weight Loss is Hard.”

Ugh, not very much, right?

So we re-frame the belief that “weight loss is hard” by listing all the things about being overweight and food addicted that are hard:

Finding clothes to wear that you feel good in each day
Clothes shopping (nothing you want looks good on you)
Being without food for several hours (start to get crave-y and hypoglyecmic)
Having heartburn
Having a stomach ache
Taking medications for diet-caused illnesses
Being out of breath
Feeling insecure or even ashamed
Walking in to a room and assessing if you are the biggest person there
Being tired
Feeling depressed
Worrying about your own health
Worrying about passing these food problems on to your kids

I know that not every overweight person feels these things. These are things my clients say or things I experienced myself when I was overweight.

When we re-frame the question “What is Hard?” we can now see that being overweight and food addicted is really pretty hard! Look at that list! Is it just possible that, in comparison, sticking to a healthy food plan might not be so hard after all?

As for we exercisers, what is the re-frame we do to get us out that door? Personally, I think about the things that would be hard in my life if I did NOT workout:

feeling depressed
achy muscles
low energy
muddy thinking
flabby legs
being out of breath
setting a poor example for my kids
and the one that gets me most right now, 8 weeks from my race day: failing and/or suffering in front of thousands of people.

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It’s all in the re-frame!

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Filed Under: coaching exercises, Exercise, Goals, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Positive Thinking, Running, weight loss Tagged With: Achievement, Dieting vs Lifestyle, Exercise, Goals, Obesity, Overweight, Running, Self-Improvement, Sugar Addiction, weight loss

Don’t Rush Weight Loss

February 19, 2012 by Emily Segal 1 Comment

OK, I know I trot this statistic out a lot, but apparently I have not said it enough for some of my readers:

Of people who have lost weight via dieting, only 3% will maintain that new weight for longer than one year. 97 out of 100 people gain back what they lose, often with extra.

So, as a coach who helps many people with weight loss, I spend a lot of time reading studies on the 3% who ARE successful. It helps that I myself am one of the 3% and understand just what it takes from my own personal experience. In this post I will share with you some of the “secrets” of the 3% who succeed:

One of the reasons I believe people gain the weight back is that they lose it too quickly. Just as nature abhors a vacuum, your body is designed to see rapid weight loss as a survival emergency. Your thyroid will dial your metabolism WAY back to conserve energy. You often become tired, lethargic, you exercise less, you MOVE less. All the while, your brain is in overdrive encouraging and pushing you to eat more, to crave more, to give in to your rumbly tummy, and faced with the buffet of calories we face each day, to eat, eat, eat.

When I lost 70lbs for the very last time, I did it fairly slowly. It took me a year to lose the first 50, at a rate of less than 1 lb per week, and the next full year to lose the final 20! The third year was the most intense of all, as I struggled the most with the factors I mention above. I had to focus harder than ever before to learn to keep my balance.

But when most people start a diet, they want it off FAST! They have lived with their creeping overweight by denying it for years, but when the curtain of reality is ripped back, they cannot WAIT to jettison their fat asap. Thus begin the calculations: ”OK, I have a wedding in 5 weeks and I need to lose 20 lbs, so if I can just lose 4 lbs each week, I will be fine”. Of course to lose 4 lbs per week you need to generate a 2000 calorie deficit per day and if that doesn’t start ringing your body’s alarm bells, I don’t know what will!

That’s an extreme, but true example. Most people come to me wanting to lose 1-2 lbs per week (.5-1kg roughly). STILL, in order to do that, you need to generate either a 500 calorie deficit each day to lose the .5kg, or a 1000 calorie deficit per day to lose the 1kg per week. I still hear alarm bells clanging my body’s homeostasis. That’s a lot of calories to cut and requires you to be in caloric deficit EVERY day – no days off, no special occasions.

In the last month I have received 2 letters from former clients, thanking me for teaching them to live healthier lives, and in both cases, the women reported having lost 10 lbs over the course of the past year “without even really trying.”

Did you realize that if one were to just cut 100 calories from their maintenance level, each day, either by eating one less snack, one less slice of bread, a few less spoonfuls of ice cream, soda or alcohol, OR by burning just 100 calories through a daily walk or a restful yoga class, one would lose 10 lbs in one year! That’s all it would take!

When I work with a client, we make tiny changes each week. So tiny that we are both certain they can be accomplished. Things like, take a 20 minute walk every day. Or swap one apple for one candy bar. The clients who succeed in this approach stick with their small changes and have the big picture vision to understand that, over time, it is these small changes that will create major shifts.

But every once in awhile I get a client who says “No, that’s not enough. That will never work for me. My body is so messed up that I have to make DRASTIC steps like going from zero exercise to 2 hours in the gym everyday. And 1500 calories?? I can’t lose unless I keep my intake at 1000.”

Yet, 97% of the time, these changes are so big and so hard that the client will abandon them within a few weeks, (or never even get them started in the first place!)

And most often, without even realizing it, they eat a surplus of just those same 100 calories per day, and in reverse, instead of losing 10 lbs that year, they GAIN it. Then I hear ”I gained 10 lbs last year and I barely eat anything! I swear, I don’t eat half of what my friends eat and I just keep gaining!”

That’s right. You ate only 100 calories more than your friend did each day. That’s one candy bar instead of an apple, that’s one soda instead of a glass of water, that’s one daily walk you didn’t take…

Small changes, done every day, lead to big differences over time.

But remember that this theory works in both directions!

Don’t be in such a pants-on-fire hurry to lose weight that you set yourself up for failure right from the start. We don’t say Slow and Steady wins the Race, for nothing!

Oh, and the TOP habit the 3% of successful maintainers usually credit their success to? Daily food logging. You can’t know how many calories you are eating – deficit or surplus – if you don’t record what you are eating.

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Filed Under: coaching exercises, Exercise, Goals, health coach, Rants, weight loss Tagged With: Dieting vs Lifestyle, Obesity, Overweight, weight loss

What Do You Call Yourself?

December 26, 2011 by Emily Segal Leave a Comment

I learn a lot of Hebrew from the gym. In fact, my Hebrew vocabulary is overly represented by words for body parts. I know how to say “butt back!” ”elbows straight!” and “roll up vertebrae by vertebrae”, not to mention the ever useful “inhale” and “exhale”.

But sometimes I will hear a word and not know what it means. I catch it in my mind and repeat it over and over so that I can look it up when I get home. Case in point, last week after a Spinning class:

I burst in the door and confront the kids with the word I have been mentally repeating for an hour:

ME: What does “shiur smolet” mean?

KIDS: (snickering) There’s no such word.

ME: No, there is. I know it was “smolet” because I remembered that it was like “solet” (semolina) but with a “m”.

KIDS: No, Mom. You heard wrong AGAIN (rolling eyes). Context. How was it used?

ME: OK, so the teacher was describing the stages of the workout and said it wouldn’t be our usual interval workout, but rather a “shiur smolet”

KIDS: Ohhhhh. Not smolet, “sebolet!”

ME: OK, cool, what does that mean then?

KIDS: (shrugging) Can’t remember what it is in English.

ME: Nu, come on! We’re so close…

KIDS: It’s like when you have to work really hard without a break.

ME: Endurance. An endurance workout.

(pause)

ME: But that’s funny, because it wasn’t very hard at all.

KIDS: (more eye rolling) That’s because it’s YOU!

And that got me thinking. They think I’m a bad-ass athlete. My kids. They think that. They see me heading out for runs, lifting weights, challenging them to sit-up and push-up contests, going to and from the gym, leaving behind a trail of sweaty, stinky gym clothes, heart rate monitor straps, ipods and headbands.

But am I such a bad-ass? And am I even an athlete? When did I start thinking of myself as such? When did I include the word “athlete” in my twitter profile?

I mean, let’s be truthful: I shy away from every group sport involving a ball. I couldn’t “catch” a ball to save my life. I literally flunked out of tennis camp (yes, it is possible). I throw a Frisbee like I’m flinging poo. I have a somewhat mushy body. I cannot do a single chin-up.

And yet, when I was looking today at a friend’s photos of the Tel Aviv Night Run which took place on November 11th, I thought “I should run that sometime. It looks fun. And it’s only a 10K. I can chew up and spit out a 10K for breakfast.”

When did THAT happen?

At some point along the way, I changed the story I think about myself. I changed “I am an unathletic loser who flunked out of tennis camp” to “I am an athlete.”

Well, hot diggity!

Guess what? You get to change your story too. What story do you currently tell about yourself that is no longer quite true? That you can’t lose weight or stick to a diet? That you don’t ever finish things you start? That you are not athletic, graceful, artistic, creative…? That you are ugly? Fat? Average? Nothing special?

For just a minute, try on a new story. I mean, can you know for sure that the old story is even still true? Maybe it’s not. Maybe you can write a new ending this time.

I didn’t even understand the word “endurance” in the above example. But because I think of myself as a bad-ass athlete, I listened to the Spinning teacher’s opening monologue with one thought in my head:

I don’t know what you’re saying but… Bring It.

Free your bad-ass athlete! Free your creative, beautiful, successful, see-it-through, winner self! See who you become when you change the story of who you think you are.

Filed Under: coaching exercises, Exercise, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Positive Thinking, Triumph Race Club, weight loss Tagged With: Achievement, Anti-Ick Techniques, creativity, Exercise, Overweight, Success, Team Triumph Race Club, weight loss

Tasty Now, But How About Tomorrow?

December 14, 2011 by Emily Segal 2 Comments

When strangers start asking you how the training is going and why there haven’t been any updates, you know it’s been too long since you’ve seen the inside of your website.

Training is going WELL dear readers! I officially have Thighs of Steel.

Yeah, just like those except bigger and steelier.

The big advancement this week has been the move from 3 running days a week to 4. That means one day is back-to-back running, which was scary, but seems to be just fine. Four shorter runs that focus on either speed, hills, or form, and one long run that just focuses on the distance.

Three days a week I’m also at the gym working upper body and abs so that the rest of my body doesn’t completely atrophy as I build up the legs of an Olympian. That would look weird, right?

As for my Nutrition Plan, well when you burn over 1000 calories in a workout, there is a VERY STRONG desire to eat lots and lots of food afterwards. I could easily throw back 2500 calories post-long run and end up actually gaining weight. Huge bummer but not uncommon and I wrote about this danger HERE.

So, I am being as careful as I can to log everything I eat over at sparkpeople.com and to stay in line with my actual calorie requirements, as well as macro and micro-nutrients. I keep telling myself ”Whatever you eat extra, you’ll have to carry with you for 42.2K.” That tends to dampen my desire for over-eating. But sometimes I still goof up and I’ve got the story to prove it:

One day, perhaps I was pms-y, but I really wanted to eat a lot of chocolate. I bought myself a 100g Vered HaGalil Dark Chocolate bar and portioned it out for myself over the course of a day. Sounds reasonable, right? I thought so at the time, even though I could read as plain as day on the label that my little treat contained 500 calories. I burned at least that much in my workout so I “deserved” this and could “absorb” it.

Well, next day I went out for a run and had a horrible time of it. Total Bonk-City. And for the Brits who think bonking means I had whoopie while running, in Yank English, a Bonk equals terrible joint pain, legs slow and lead-filled, racing heart, gasping for breath. I mean, seriously unpleasant. Not at all like British Bonking. Or maybe… nah, I’m not going there.

Anyway…

I reviewed my previous day: Sleep? great; Rest? plenty; Back-to-back workout? no; Mental state? fine; Nutrition? all fine except for that big old Bar o’ Bliss! I started thinking “I really enjoyed that chocolate bar, but seriously, I used 500 calories on pure junk, nothing at all that my body could use and probably quite a bit that caused it harm. I wonder how this run would have felt if I had eaten 500 calories of something healthy like protein, complex carbs, veggies, greens, sprouts…?”

At that moment I promised myself that if I feel the need to eat 500 calories, then I will, but I’m not going to waste it on crap when it can mean the difference between a great run and awful pain and suffering.

I don’t know how many of you can see it, but that is a pretty huge mental leap forward. When you start looking at the long-term effects of your food BEFORE you put it in your mouth, you are well on the road to a healthier body and life.

Back when I first began my weight loss journey, I remember making that mental shift from “ooo, this is so good and so tasty and I just LOVE eating it!” to “Hm, so this is going to taste great for like 20 minutes, but then there is going to be too much sugar in my blood, which is going to start damaging my organs for Pete’s sake, not to mention giving me a tummy ache and heartburn and that sinking sense of disappointment in myself for throwing my plans and goals away yet again…” Whoa, Bummer Train!

I am not saying that food should not equal pleasure! Eating is delightfully pleasurable and I’ve got a recipe index on this website to prove it. But you must look beyond the immediate pleasure and evaluate what you put in your mouth for more than just it’s immediate return.

There’s definitely a time for chocolate. You just have to be prepared to carry it’s bags.

Filed Under: coaching exercises, dessert, Exercise, Goals, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Running, Tel Aviv Marathon, Triumph Race Club, weight loss Tagged With: Achievement, Dieting vs Lifestyle, Exercise, Goals, Overweight, Team Triumph Race Club, Tel Aviv Marathon, weight loss

Getting Uncomfortable

October 9, 2011 by Emily Segal 1 Comment

Just a few words before we get to today’s MoFo recipe:

As most of you know, yesterday was Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, which we spend in prayer and in a 25-hour fast. No food, no drink, not even water. It’s 90F in Israel by the way. So fasting for 25 hours is pretty horrible feeling, especially the no water thing when it’s so hot. But most of us just suck up the pain and do it anyway. We do it because it’s actually mandated in the Torah and given the utmost of significance and importance.

We do it even though it’s very hard. We do it even though we want to quit a million times. We do it because we have a Big Why and understand the benefit of doing it. We do it because it is important to our view of who we believe we are and what we believe ourselves capable of doing. We do it because our children are watching us and learning from our choices. We understand that this is as much a mental and spiritual challenge as it is a physical one.

I was still thinking about all of this when I went to a strength training class at the gym this morning. There were several times during this class that were SO unpleasant, both physically and mentally. My muscles were aching and shaking and the negotiation monkeys were jabbering on and on in my brain: ”I can’t do another rep.” ”The teacher isn’t even counting these! I am going to DIE here and she isn’t counting!” ”This is SO painful!”

But on I pushed through the pain because I understand that through this pain, my muscles will grow. ONLY through this pain will my muscles grow, my strength improve, my health improve and my body look better. Those are my Big Why’s and they are why I pushed hard through this weight class, the same way many of us pushed hard through the fast yesterday.

People become my clients because they want to improve their health, or that of their family, and they want to do it through healthier habits with food and exercise. Quite often they think that they will be able to accomplish this without any pain. Or they expect some pain, but then panic and give up the second it gets too hot.

Now, as approaches go, mine is actually NOT that painful. Under my plans, you get to eat whatever you want. (What you WANT starts to change, but that’s another story). The hardest thing a client of mine ever has to do is to journal her food for me for a couple of weeks.

What amazes me is that the task of “write down what you eat and how much and send it to me” is SUPER hard for a lot of people!! I didn’t tell you to change what you are eating, just write it down and share it with me.

Of course people find it hard to write it down because then they have to face it. They don’t want to write that they ate a box of cookies and then have to send that to someone because that is painful to admit and they probably haven’t even really admitted it to themselves yet. I get that. I am compassionate about how hard this all is and I never push a person forward. I stand by her side, give her my hand, and suggest we step forward together, fully supported.

Changing your food and exercise habits; changing your body’s health or appearance; changing the way your family eats – none of it is entirely without pain, both physical, mental and emotional. Some people will find it very difficult actually. I know I did! But with the proper support, it’s a lot easier to make these changes.

Just as you wouldn’t expect to become a doctor without struggling through medical school and an exhausting residency, or any other long-term life-changing goal you go in pursuit of, you have to steel yourself for the difficulty. You must remember WHY you are doing this. You must push through even when things get tough and you want to quit. NOTHING will change if you stay inside your Comfort Zone.

I mean, if it were all easy, you would have done it already. Right?

OK, on to week 2 of Vegan MoFo!

Green Salad with Tofu Croutons and Tomato Paprika Dressing

This makes enough tofu croutons for several salads. The tofu will keep in the fridge for several days and can be tossed into any dish you want for an added shot of protein and calcium. I always keep cooked tofu like this in my fridge.

Ingredients

The Salad

Washed greens and veggies of your choice

The Tofu Croutons

1 block of firm tofu
1/2 T oil
few dashes of soy sauce

The Dressing

4 large ripe tomatoes
3 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 date, pitted (or 1-2 tsp brown sugar)
1 tsp sweet paprika
1 clove garlic, roughly chopped
1/3 cup olive oil, or other favorite oil
sea salt to taste

Instructions

First, make the tofu:

Heat the oil in a saute pan over medium heat
Cube the tofu into bite-size cubes and dry on paper towels (In Israel it is not necessary to press tofu dry as it is dry already. In other locations where tofu may be more watery, press as much water out as you can).
Toss the tofu cubes into the heated oil.
Let cook without touching it for 1-2 minutes.
When the bottom surface starts to brown, turn each piece to another side.
Repeat until all sides are golden brown.
Turn off the heat and toss the golden cubes with a few splashes of soy sauce.
Set aside to cool.

For the Dressing:

With a paring knife, cut a shallow X in the bottom of each tomato.
Bring a medium size pot of water to boil.
Add the tomatoes and boil for 30-60 seconds.
Drain
When cool enough to handle, peel off the skins and cut into quarters.
With your fingers, remove the seeds and discard.
Put the tomatoes in the blender.
Add the vinegar, date (or sugar), garlic and paprika and blend until smooth.
With the motor running, drizzle in the oil slowly through the opening in the center of the lid.
Taste and adjust seasonings to your liking.

To assemble:

Top a plate of salad with tofu croutons and dress it! (I've tossed some leftover quinoa on top in case you were wondering what was in the picture)

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Recipe and Photos Â© Emily Segal www.TriumphWellness.com

Filed Under: Growth, health coach, Recipes, vegan, Vegan MoFo, What Was For Dinner Tonight Tagged With: Achievement, Dieting vs Lifestyle, Exercise, Goals, Overweight, Self-Improvement, vegan mofo, Vegan Recipes, weight loss

The Paleo-Vegan-Raw-Slimfast-Macrobiotic-Cabbage Soup Diet

August 14, 2011 by Emily Segal Leave a Comment

Diets don’t work. Honestly, they don’t. Statistics show that only 7% of dieters will ever reach their desired weight and of those, only 3% will maintain it for longer than a year.

Basically, you have better odds of recovering from heroin addiction that you do of losing weight permanently via dieting.

Why is this? Is it human nature? Are we just destined to be stuck in our ingrained patterns and habits, unable to change?

Well, I wouldn’t be worth much as a weight loss coach if I didn’t study this question in depth. I pour over research looking for the elusive success stories and then I study what they did and do in order to achieve AND maintain their success.

And I’m not talking about what the success stories ate, or didn’t eat!! I’m talking about their behaviors and mindset! More on that in a sec…

It also doesn’t hurt that I am living my own 3% success story. I know what I have had to do to maintain my weight loss for these past 10 years. And again, it has nothing to do with veganism, I was an obese vegetarian. It all has to do with behaviors and mindset.

So, diets. What’s the deal? Well, as I already mentioned, it’s not really about the food, it’s about behavior and mindset. As long as you’re in a calorie deficit you’ll lose weight no matter what diet you follow. Or, gasp, don’t follow! Yes, you can actually modify your own current diet and learn to just eat less of it! Some people like a higher carb diet, some like a higher protein diet, some like vegetarian/vegan, some like low fat, or high fat or whatever. You get to design your OWN diet that suits you, not anyone else. When you do that, wow, it gets a lot easier to comply doesn’t it?

The next problem with diets is that they are temporary in nature. You want to know what the death kiss is for most of my clients? ”I’m losing weight for a wedding/bar mitzvah/family reunion/trip” Guess what happens when that event is over? Yup, regaining it all back. Yuck.

So we’ve all heard that it needs to be a Lifestyle, not a diet, right? But what does that mean? I personally think a Lifestyle is just a Diet you can maintain for the rest of your life! Really get comfortable with that idea folks, because you are NEVER going to be able to go back to eating/living the way you are now! You’ve done that and you see the results.

Which brings us to the 3rd, and I think MAIN reason diets don’t work: They are unsustainable. ”I will never eat carbs again for the rest of my life, not even tomatoes or fruit or carrots….” said by the carb lover. Or “I am hereto-forth a 100% Raw Vegan. Cooked food will never cross my lips ever again.” said by the Junk food & meat lover. Extreme examples, but I hear them uttered in all seriousness by people EVERY DAY.

Within a month, that diet has been discarded and forgotten.

Did I mention that I used to do and say these very same things? It got to where I had to wake up and remind myself what diet I was on and what was permitted and forbidden! I used to start a new plan and totally clean out my cupboards and embrace all the allowed foods and recipes and then when the diet honeymoon wore off, and I moved on to something new, you know “This is going to be IT this time!” and I changed over my cupboards yet again.

And that goes for extreme calorie depletion also. You can’t go from eating 2000 calories a day to 1000 and expect to stay with it long. You are going to rebel and rebel BIG TIME, all the way to the ice cream store! Eating Disorders specialist Geneen Roth says

The fourth law of the universe is that for every diet, there is an equal and opposite binge. Diets aren’t free. You will rebel, and when you do, you will gain more weight than you lost. As fat as you feel now, you will feel–and be–fatter after the binge that follows the diet.

Not to mention the fact that if you lower your calories too far below your BMR, you will slow down your burn rate and be sitting on one of those super frustrating plateaus for so long that you’ll probably give up and go back to your old habits, concluding that diets don’t work.

Because they don’t.

But then time will pass and a friend will lose 25kgs for her daughter’s wedding by eating nothing but cabbage soup for 3 months and you’ll think “THAT’s it! This time is going to be IT!” and off you go throwing away everything in your kitchen that isn’t a cruciferous vegetable.

My darlings, you lose weight permanently by:

Learning why you over eat in the first place and coming up with ways to not do it anymore

A modest calorie reduction through eating less and/or exercising more. (This also depends on your current body weight. A 100kg person should not be on the same calorie level as a 80kg person!)

Eat more vegetables. Agreed on by everyone. They fill you up, are low in calories and give you better health and energy. My only food “rule” that applies to everyone.

Understanding how YOU want to be eating in an ideal world and working towards that in small, incremental, doable steps. DOABLE steps that you can sustain… say it with me… forever.

Finding REAL LIFE solutions for how to live a different, yes, Lifestyle. You still need to cook for your family. You’ll still be invited to other people’s house. You will still go on trips and get sick and have stress and you need to have a doable plan for each one of those.

Not trying to do it alone. Get help and support. It makes a world of difference. (And NOT the kind of “support” that enables your continued undesired behaviors!)

Being in it forever. There is no finish line. You have to make permanent changes even after you lose your weight. (You actually have to eat LESS in maintenance to tell you the truth, not more!)

There is a lot more individual stuff for different folks, like Limiting Beliefs or Self-Sabotage that trip people up. Or dealing with addictions and emotional eating issues. Or sometimes bringing balance to a life that is heavily skewed to anyone direction (too much working, too little working, not enough self-care, not enough quiet time…)

And really that’s why diets don’t work. Because it’s about SO much more than just the food. One size definitely does not fit all!

Filed Under: coaching exercises, health coach, Rants, weight loss Tagged With: Dieting vs Lifestyle, Obesity, Overweight, Success, weight loss

Why Your Mind is More Important than your Scale

August 8, 2011 by Emily Segal Leave a Comment

“Make it so that today is not like yesterday, and tomorrow will be different forever.” – Tony Robbins

Last week I stumbled upon an online video interview of Tony Robbins by Frank Kern and John Reese. If you don’t know who any of these people are, Tony Robbins is a motivational coach and speaker (and the man I credit with starting my own personal transformation). Frank Kern and John Reese are very successful internet marketers.

Frank and John came to Tony with a problem. As they have learned to make oodles of money on the internet, Frank and John have packaged it all into information products that can teach any average Joe/Joanne to do the same. They feel strongly that they give out every step, in precise order, and that all their clients need to do is implement.

But they don’t. Implement.

And then these clients start making excuses about why it won’t work for them. “You guys are richer. You don’t have kids to support. You’re better looking. You have charisma. I can’t do it because, X, Y, Z, 1, 2, 3.” And some clients even get MAD at Frank and John, complaining that it is THEIR fault that they are not getting the promised results.

Ahem.

So, Frank and John come to Tony to ask “What is it in Human Nature that makes so many people unable to implement change? And what can we do about it?”

Now, I highly suggest you take 38 minutes and watch the interview HERE. It is SO content-rich, I am sure I can’t do it justice, but I will try. (Just go watch it).

Basically Tony’s answer is this:

We all have potential to achieve. But what we believe about our potential is what will drive the kind of action we take. This level of action we take, causes the kind of results we get. And finally, the results we get confirm the beliefs we have about our potential. And around and around we go.

Example from my field: Jane comes to me because she wants to lose weight. She has already tried a million ways (some crazy and totally unsustainable things – Cabbage Soup Diet, No Carbs, Fasts and Supplements…) and she is quite skeptical than she can really succeed. And if she doesn’t succeed, well, she has already lived with this body for years and although she doesn’t love it, whatever, it’s livable.

With this mindset, what kind of action do you think Jane will take? Will she take massive forward momentum or will she take some tentative, skeptical steps?

Right. And when those tentative skeptical steps lead to luke-warm results, is Jane going to say “I can do better than that!” OR will she say “See, I told you I don’t lose weight. It’s my metabolism. It’s my genes. It’s my thyroid. It’s my family who always want to eat junk food…”

And NOW what does Jane believe? Did she just strengthen her belief in her ability to succeed or did her perceived potential spiral even lower?

This is the negative spiral most people are trapped in. Low belief leads to small actions (or big actions but soaked in the spirit of defeat) which leads to luke-warm results, which confirm low beliefs.

Yuck!

Now let’s imagine it the other way: Sue has had the same experiences as Jane, but she decides “The Buck Stops Here!” and adopts the attitude “I will do whatever it takes to succeed at this, for as long as it takes. And no matter what the obstacles, this time I succeed.”

Wow, what kind action will Sue take?! What kind of results will Sue get? When she hits a bump in the road will Sue crumble and retreat, or will she re-double her efforts and push on? What will her amazing results teach her about herself? Yeah, “I can do whatever I set my mind to.” and she will certainly go on to set her mind to something even higher and greater!

So, how does one escape the circle of mediocrity and failure?

You tone your mind, Baby! You got to see it to achieve it!

What if you CAN’T see it though? Then get around people who CAN. Find the people who have done what you want to do and study them. Get inspired by their results. We humans have a deep “if she can do it so can I” gene so put it to work for you!

If all your friends and family sit around eating junk food and not exercising all day, then find some new folks to hang out with. The internet is full of them. So is the library. So is the gym and the tennis courts and the track. I listed my personal resources HERE.

After you get yourself fired up a bit, spend time conditioning your thoughts and your beliefs every. single. day. Vishen Lakhiani calls this “Bliss-ipline”. See yourself succeeding over and over again. Then reinforce that vision with daily steps you take towards your goal. Condition your body with exercise. Condition your mind with positive thoughts and meditation, or art or journaling or whatever floats your boat.

Keep at it and build up those mental muscles of certainty and potential. Tony says the Holy Grail of Success is Certainty and that even if you don’t currently have it, you can acquire it.

You either have results, or you have excuses.

Disappointment can derail you or it can drive you forward.

Athletes use mental training to improve performance and so can you.

It’s not practice makes perfect, but Perfect Practice makes Perfect.

Thank you Tony!

Filed Under: coaching exercises, health coach, Inspiration, Positive Thinking, Recommendations, weight loss Tagged With: Achievement, Dieting vs Lifestyle, Goals, Obesity, Overweight, Self-Improvement, weight loss

The Day of Reckoning

August 3, 2011 by Emily Segal 3 Comments

cue dramatic music…

Last week I laid down the gauntlet. I challenged my readers to join me in training for an athletic event, a race, triathlon, dance-a-thon, whatever. Your assignment for the past 7 days has been to find an event in the next 12 months to train for and to make the commitment to do so.

Quite a few of you wrote to me right away with the events you chose. I salute you, People of Action!

Some others wrote that they would definitely be participating but were in the midst of a vacation/work/family visit etc and would get back to me when you had a chance to look over the possibilities. Awesome, I am waiting to hear back from you.

How did the rest of you make out? Motivated but still too scared? Or just plain convincing-yourself-that-a-sporting-event-isn’t-for-you-ever-don’t-talk-to-me-about-it anymore- resistance-resistance-resistance? Fine. You can lead a horse to water and all that. Just stick around and allow for the possibility that your thoughts may one day change. Or not. Up to you.

So, here we go:

1.) Tell Her About It! If you have not yet told me about your participation, comment below, facebook me, or email me. If you want to participate but don’t want to be public about it, you can tell me that also and I will keep your confidence.

2.) Take a sheet of paper out and write a sentence or two of WHY you are training for your event. Even if this seems totally obvious to you, trust me, there will be dark, cold mornings when, for the life of you, you cannot remember why you need to get out of your warm bed and put your sneakers on. So write out your “why” and put it on your bedside table, bathroom mirror, alarm clock, fridge, the wall next to your bed, taped to your forehead… Your reasons could be anything really, but some common ones might be:

To prove to myself that I CAN
To prove to someone else that I CAN
To be a great example to my kids
To fight back from disease, disability, depression
To raise money for charity (more on that later)
To lose weight (more on that below)
To get fit
To get out of my comfort zone
To have fun
To meet new people
Because Emily pressured me into it (hello, you need to pick a new WHY)

A few words about weight loss:

I don’t know why this is, but I have seldom known anyone to lose weight while training for a long-distance endurance event. When I train for a half marathon, I burn up to 1000 calories per workout and STILL don’t lose an ounce! This may be because long-slow-cardio is not the best fat burner or because our bodies are magnificent machines that turn up appetite to exactly match our expenditure.

Truthfully, I don’t even think trying to lose weight while training for an endurance event is even such a great idea in the first place. You need to fuel yourself well to prevent injury or burn-out. Being in constant calorie deficit is probably not a good training state.

So… if you’ve got weight to lose, start that NOW, before your official training begins. ”But Emily, HOW do I lose weight? I’ve been trying to lose weight for YEARS with no success?”

(giant yawning silence)

Um, hi, my name is Emily Segal and I’m a weight loss coach. You are reading my blog as we speak. Not to be obnoxious, but if you need to lose weight, why are you not working with me? I can get you there without putting you on a diet or yucky meal plan or demanding that you eat food you hate. I design each person’s program to be what THEY want, to hone in on their strengths, and fortify their weak spots. We work together to correct all those misconceptions about weight loss and all that black and white thinking about the “right diet”, this idea of suffering through someone else’s limited plan, and to address any addictions or destructive habits without which, you literally soar right on down the scale for once and for all.

And as a last teeny tiny kick in the pants – more like a punt really – you need to know that at the end of September I am raising my rates. But clients who begin programs BEFORE Sept 28th stay at the current rate for as long as they work with me. It is NOT expensive now and you CAN afford it (actually how can you afford to keep putting this off?). But come Sept 28th, you will need to dig deeper into your pockets, so no more procrastinating!

To make an intro appointment just to give it a whirl, fill out the contact form HERE, or email me at healthcoachemily@gmail.com. I work with people all over the world via Skype. Or in person for those in my area.

So, your assignment for the week are:

1.) Notify me of your participation if you haven’t already

2.)Write your WHY

3.) Get started on a weight loss plan if you need to lose some weight

4.) Watch the videos below (get a kleenex!)

Next post will be about training plans.

For now, I leave you with my most favorite inspiring videos of all times. If you are receiving this via email, you will need to click on the title to view it on the blog. Please do take the few minutes to watch these videos because they may just change your life. If you can watch the story of Dick & Rick Hoyt and not feel a stirring in your heart and a call to action in your own life, well… Just watch:

Filed Under: Exercise, Goals, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Running, Tel Aviv Half Marathon, Triumph Race Club, weight loss Tagged With: Achievement, Exercise, Overweight

Motivation by Lentil Loaf

March 8, 2011 by Emily Segal 8 Comments

If you are on my mailing list, you already know that last night I sent out a newsletter that contained some very personal and painful details of my own health history. I sat on that email for three days, hand hovering alternately over the “send” and “delete” buttons.

In the end, what pushed me to “send” was a conversation I had with someone about the death at age 29 of Blair River, weight 575 lbs, spokesperson for the Arizona restaurant The Heart Attack Grill. Yes, that is the name of a real restaurant and you can read about it HERE. The conversation went along the lines of “well, I could get hit by a bus and die tomorrow, so I’m going to at least enjoy my life while I can.” And by “enjoy my life” this person meant:

Eat whatever I want and not exercise.

Boy, that rattled my cage. So my newsletter was an impassioned response to that. It basically pointed out that being overweight and out-of-shape and “eating whatever I want” was the worst sort of existence I have ever experienced and I detailed all the gory points of it.

It garnered a lot of responses. Many folks wrote expressing love and admiration. Some told me it inspired them and got them thinking. One person said she hates me and I should never email her again (not kidding). Another unsubscribed from my mailing list.

But a few wrote variations of the following (not a direct quote from any one person): Emily, it is understandable that because you were suffering so much, it was a no-brainer for you to want to change your life. But really I am just a little overweight or not overweight at all, and it doesn’t bother me so much. My cholesterol is just a little high. My blood sugar has risen steadily each year, but it’s still OK. I am not so uncomfortable and therefore, just can’t find the motivation to do anything about it.

Yes, I understand that. But here’s the thing. I didn’t realize how much of the suffering I had back then had anything to do with my weight or my eating habits either. I knew I was obese, but had no idea my wild mood swings, cracked heels, or chronic heartburn had anything to do with what I was eating.

Only when I started eating better and exercising did I look back and say “Wow! I had no idea how GREAT I could feel!”

So, maybe it is a leap of faith for you now, but let me tell you, how you will feel on healthy food and regular exercise is FRICKIN FRACKEN ROCK THE CASBAH AWESOME! All those little aches and pains and random annoying things you are just kind of living with will go away. If you have done my 30-day detox, you will know how different just 30 days can make (and if you haven’t, what are you waiting for??)

So yeah, know what? You can feel that good

All. The. Time.

OK, now go make some lentil loaf. Because it is delicious and astonishingly healthy and will help you get to Awesome.

PS: If you are not yet on my mailing list and would like to see what all the hub-bub is about, then go HERE and fill in the form for the free starter kit. You get put on the newsletter mailing list that way and yes, obviously you can unsubscribe when I offend you.

The following recipe is from ohsheglows with minor modifications.

Lentil Walnut Loaf

Ingredients:

1 cup dry lentils
3 cups vegetable stock or water
3 TBS ground flax seed
1/2 cup warm water
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup onion, chopped
1 medium carrot, grated
1/3 of an apple, peeled, grated (makes 1/3 cup grated apple)
1/4 cup raisins
3/4 cup toasted walnuts, roughly chopped
1 tsp kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1 tsp dried thyme
1/2 cup regular oats, ground into a flour in the food processor
1 tbsp ground flax seed
3 slices of toasted whole wheat or spelt bread, ground into breadcrumbs (3/4 cup total)

Sweet Glaze

2 Tbsp tomato paste
1 Tbsp Balsamic vinegar
1 Tbsp maple syrup
1 Tbsp apple sauce

Directions:

Cook lentils: In a medium sized pot, add the lentils and 3 cups of water or stock. Bring to boil, and reduce heat to low and simmer until liquid is absorbed and lentils are tender (about 40 minutes). Once the lentils are cooked, remove from heat and set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 160C and line a loaf pan with parchment so that parchment paper hangs over the edges by 2 inches.

Walnuts: Toast 3/4 cup of walnuts at 160C for about 6 minutes and then set aside to cool.

Flax egg: Mix 3 tbsp of ground flax with 1/2 cup warm water and stir well. Set aside for at least 5-10 minutes so it can gel up.

Prepare vegetable mixture: In a large skillet over medium heat, sauté onion and minced garlic for about 5 minutes on low-medium heat, being careful not to burn. After the onions are tender, add carrot and sauté for 2-3 minutes over low heat. Add grated apple, raisins, and chopped walnuts and sauté another minute or two. Add thyme, salt, and pepper to taste. Remove from heat and set aside.

Process 75% of lentils and Mix everything together: Once the lentils are cooled, take 75% of the lentils and place into food processor. Process until mostly smooth. Plop processed lentils and whole lentils into a large bowl. Add the breadcrumbs, flax egg, veggie mixture, oat flour, and ground flax seed. Stir well with a spoon and then remove the spoon and mix well with your hands, pressing it through your fingers. Taste and adjust seasonings if necessary.

Dump the mixture into your loaf pan and spread out with a spoon. Press it firmly and evenly into the pan.

Preparing Glaze: In small bowl combine all glaze ingredients. Spread evenly over loaf and bake, uncovered 45 minutes at 160C.