Quite often I find myself throwing away produce because I forget I have it. When I purchase it, I have every intention of making smoozies with it or juicing it or SOMEthing. By the time I get it home and put it away, I often forget my intention or something else takes my attention and I never get to it.

Also as many of us have partners who tend to eat less healthy than we do OR, just keep food in the house we tend to crave, here’s a quick suggestion to cover both scenarios ~

Take sticky notes and, on any food (package) or shelf of foods containing something you prefer NOT to eat, write something on it like ~ “Do You Really Want to Eat This? Options” (depending on what you have available):

Bananas
Apples
Grapes
Green salad w/
tomatoes
cukes
marinated veggies
carrots
beets (shredded)
Olives
Orange juice (maybe you’re really thirsty and not necessarily hungry)
Coconut water
Water with lemon juice
Water

You might also want to add on the note ~

“You’ve just eaten! Are you REALLY HUNGRY?

Also, remember my program “Fit or Fat?” Ask yourself before you reach for “comfort” food out of habits or cravings.

That may give you a chance to contemplate what it is that may be eating you which turns you towards stuffing yourself with food.

Please, comment here and let me know what’s working for you!

Injoy!

Revvell

Bodacious Living

Well, this isn’t the “tomorrow” I said I would write this ~ sort of “manana” time though.

The problem I’m finding with writing my blog is that I get up fairly early, do some mundane things, then get out and walk. After writing my “How I Gained Weight” blog, the next morning I walked for about 2 hours. The following morning, I walked for 90 minutes (over 8,000 steps). During that time I think about all the things I want to write about including how I eliminated weight.

The difficulty is that by the time I get home, everything I want to say has already been said (in my mind) so, nothing left for me to say. O.k., well, not nothing. I can pretty much always say SOMEthing.

So, here’s what happened.

As you may have read in my previous blog, I had put on about 30 excess pounds. Usually, when I’ve gained weight previously, I didn’t have to do much other than to move! Mostly go to the gym for about 6 weeks and voila! Done! PLUS, I’d be buffed! (I buff easily)

This time however, it was a bit more difficult for a number of reasons. One, menopause. I’ve NEVER had a weight issue I couldn’t eliminate easily yet, my head was wrapped around what others have said about it being harder to drop weight during menopause.

Two, I LOVE staying warm in bed and cuddling with himself which means I didn’t get up and out walking or doing anything else for that matter. No matter how many times I promised myself at night that I was going to do it, in the morning that didn’t happen.

Three, my computer addiction. When I DID get up, I’d turn on the computer, sit down, go through emails, facebook, twitter, RFT, etc., etc., etc. By the time I took care of that addiction it was either too hot out, too late and had to begin work OR, I’d eaten (overeaten) and just didn’t feel to train and remember, it was already hot!

Fourth (last, but not least), he’d be up and asking if I wanted to go somewhere. Uh huh! Yep!

In essence, it didn’t take much for me to be distracted from what I said I wanted to do… eliminate the excess weight!

So, what to do????

I don’t remember exactly what turned me on to it but I’d been hearing about (Emotional Freedom Technique) EFT for awhile. Even though I’ve had training in Polarity Therapy, Traditional Chinese Medicine including Taijiquan/Qigong, reflexology, etc. I kind of poopoo’d that something so basic could really make a difference (which is really funny because all the health I have is from “energy therapy” which is what EFT is.)

One night in class, I noticed that my teacher had some information on EFT that he was handing out to his students. I always figure he doesn’t waste time with something that doesn’t “work” so began using it with myself and my students. WOW!

Then I had a 4-week experimental group with 5 other overweight women who ranged from less than 50 pounds excess to well over 100 excess pounds they wished to eliminate. Each week we’d show up with new stories of how much weight we’d dropped or inches lost.

One woman told us on the first meeting that when she was stressed she’d eat a full carton of ice cream. She was using a sentence similar to … “I totally love and support myself.” She returned one week totally astounded. She said she’d never loved herself which is why she ate and overate yet during the previous week she’d felt stressed and instead of reaching for the ice cream she made some brown rice.. and overate it.

By the end of the 4 weeks, every one of us had eliminated 8-10 pounds. (I had already dropped the first 10 before beginning the study group). Not to say this will happen with EVERYone yet, it’s possible AND, just consider, if we can eliminate even 5 pounds per month consistently for a year, that’s 60 pounds!

So, EFT is one way. Another thing I included with the group were sentence completions which I’d learned many years ago during my training with my teacher. How that works is, we begin a sentence such as “One reason I keep the weight on is…” Then give 6-10 responses which may include “… I’m afraid to be seen”; “it’s too much work to eliminate it”, “I’ll have to purchase a new wardrobe”; “I wont know who I am”, “I’m afraid I’ll feel deprived”; “I don’t know what else to do when I’m feeling stressed”, etc. (All of which are addressed during my “Tap Into Your Ideal Weight” program.)

Two other things I’ve found help a lot are tapping while doing appreciations. I’ve found at the end of classes that when we do this, the women leave feeling calm and not stressed so they don’t go home ~ or out together ~ and eat late in the evening.

The final thing is visualization. Who are you when thin? What will people say? How will you look? How will you feel?

I wrote all this down for myself and am continuously adding to it. As I’m writing, I find how much of my life is interconnected and how it improves across the board.

Some of the things I worked on specifically for myself were ~ getting up and walking or training so, tapping on procrastination. I’d make a list of what I wanted to do and get it done.

Tapping on elimination of the desire for sweets. On the landing page for my program I have a picture of this overweight woman sitting with a place of chips (cookies?) beside her. The next picture is the plate behind her and she’s sneaking the chips. Been there, done that with sweets. I didn’t want the cake, I wanted the frosting! Now, cake with all that colored frosting doesn’t even look like food to me. When I go to functions I barely look at the sweets and when I do, it’s like they’re bugs under a microscope. It’s very weird and interesting. Almost as though I don’t recognize what they are as they seem to be from my distant past.

Tapping on elimination of the desire for what my husband eats including cheese and pizza. One night I was feeling very alone and he was gone so I cooked a pizza. Uh huh. I was physically done eating it by the time I was half-way through yet told myself I was going to finish it even if it made me sick. I did, it didn’t but I’ve not had enough desire to eat it again.

I eat salads! What I’ve found is, I can pretty much have the same ingredients in my salad every single day IF I have a good dressing so, 3 fresh dressings and, I have 2-3 different salads every day.

When going to a buffet, fill my plate with half of what I would normally. I can always go back for more and now, instead of going for pasta, I go for more salad!

When we go out to eat, I ask them to divide the meal and pack half of it to go. What’s good about that is, occasionally I’ll eat it as soon as I get home yet, many times I don’t because I’ve given myself time to know that I’ve been deeply satisfied with what I’d already had.

In the mornings, if I get up around 5, I get dressed (my clothes are either in the bathroom or my office so I don’t have the excuse that I didn’t want to wake him up by turning on the light) and head out.

Lately, I’ve been waking up around 3:30 so, I prepare my UStream show read all my personal emails, take care of Facebook and Twitter, might do daily appreciations THEN head out for a walk.

I’m much more consistently disciplined now that I’ve brought more focus on when, where, why, how and what I eat AND having eliminated most of the cravings, habits and eating patterns I’ve established during the past 6 years or so.

Thank you for reading all of this. It really wasn’t supposed to be this long. Guess I DO have something to say!

With that, I’ll say:

Remember, live bodaciously and always celebrate your potential!

Revvell

I awakened this morning contemplating weight gain. How fun is that? lol

There are a few ways and reasons I gained in the first place.

First was possibly menopause yet, I’m not sure of that one. I hadn’t gained before I got married at 55 and I’d gone into it a few years before OR, maybe I just didn’t notice which we’ll get into in a bit ~ the noticing, I mean.

One thing I’m sure of is going out and eating. Once I realized how much I’d gained since getting married (we could blame the marriage yet, that would be the surface, same as most dieters do ~ blame the food), being me, I had to really look at my habits, my new cravings and my emotional eating patterns.

What happened was, 6 years or so ago, I met a man I wanted in my life forever. I’d ALWAYS said, I saw no purpose in ever getting married and, that was true, until we met.

After knowing him for about 10 months or so, I was headed over to his home country to meet his friends and family as well as visit his country.

A few weeks before going over, he told me that he’d called the embassy about how he could come to the U.S. and stay with me. Their response “Marry her”. When he told me this, I asked “Well, do you want to?” He said “what”? Me ~ “Get married?”. I think he said something like “well, I guess so”. Anyway, he started the paperwork on his end with the outcome being we’d get married in Denmark, then go to Copenhagen where I had to file to get him over here.

So, that’s the background story ~ now, the fat part.

In all my life I’d never been in a REALY healthy relationship. Every relationship I’d been in, I gave up me to be with he meaning none of what I did was as important as what he was doing so, I’d always get involved.

This relationship began similarly. First, I dropped my healthy eating habits. I still stayed vegetarian yet, when we went out to eat, which was often, I’d eat things I normally wouldn’t and I’d overeat. If/when we go to buffets, I felt I had to eat enough to get his money’s worth. Even when full, I’d finish because I didn’t want to leave food I’d chosen, on the plate AND, I’d always have dessert. Not much but SOME!

Secondly, even when we went out to a sit-down meal and was given more than I could eat, I’d finish it because “it’s only a few bites” ~ no matter how full I was.. “it’s only a few bites”. Well, those “few bites” cost in weight gain. If we’d only gone out occasionally, there probably would not have been an issue. Since we went out often…

Thirdly, I use to get up and out walking every morning, first thing. Did not turn on the computer, did not eat, did not do anything but get up, get out and get walking! Where I lived, there was a mountain “loop” where I could go up one side, down the other. It’s about 4.5 miles. When I didn’t do that, I lived in a hilly area and could do a different walk almost every day of the week.

After getting married I loved sleeping in and cuddling with him. I vowed I’d get out and walk later. Well, “later” rarely came. In the summer it was too hot. If I didn’t get out early, I didn’t get out. We’d also moved to a “flat” area which to me, was boring so, I’d talk myself out of walking. If I wanted to train with kbs, ropes, etc. I really needed to take everything to a park. Being the lazy wench I’d become… that rarely happened.

One night in class my teacher said 4 of us, including himself were overweight. I was one. When he asked how much I thought I could lose I said “about 20 pounds”. He said “try 25″. Yikes!!!! (He was being generous. It was actually 30).

One thing I really got was how easy it is to gain and not notice! Previously it was SO easy for me to drop weight. So easy in fact that, I’d not notice until someone pointed it out to me (which is the same thing that happened with the gain). At that time, when I was emotional about something (which was often), I’d not eat, therefore, weight loss! Now, when I’m upset, I’ve developed patterns of eating and overeating; comfort and habitual eating.

If you do it slow enough, when you go clothes shopping and you’ve gone up a size, you can rationalize that it’s a different manufacturer and their sizes run small.

So, between eating out often, eating and overeating for emotional reasons, cleaning my plate and not moving ~ as I use to … weight happened.

Oh! the other thing is, as I’d mentioned, I’d not been in a really good relationship EVER! Think there might be some unconscious “protection” going on?

Tomorrow, we’ll talk about weight elimination. In the meantime, feel free to check out my program and find out how to eliminate weight, stay on a healthy food program and drop the cravings, habits and and emotional eating patterns that lead to excess weight gain and sabotage your new year’s resolutions.

Until tomorrow ~

Revvell

Bodacious Living

When I first began learning EFT, I had a hard time with tapping on the negative part of the sentences. For so many years, I’ve been saying “Acknowledge but don’t focus” and here, we’re saying something negative and tapping on it?? To me, that was like tapping the negative INTO myself and I had SO much resistance.

What I have found since then though is that the reason we say the negative is to acknowledge and accept where we are. For instance, if someone says, “Even though I constantly self-sabotage…” that’s just saying what we’ve done previously… up to now… then we switch to “…. I choose to stay focused on the results and support myself completely”. That changes the energy via our words AND the tapping.

What we’re saying is I know what I need to work on; I acknowledge and accept I do this and, now, I’m changing it. Make sense?

It’s as though I’m in Connecticut and I want to go to Nevada. Well, if I don’t know, acknowledge and accept where I am, how can I get where I want to go? If I “wish” I were somewhere else, it’s not going to help. Saying I “wish” I were in California and I want to go to Nevada, then I’d be traveling east yet, I’m REALLY in Ct. and if I travel east, I’m I’ll end up in the ocean rather than Nevada, correct? So! First step ~ Acknowledge and accept where you are now to get you where you want to go.

I understand many have an issue with the word “accept”, as well. They think if they accept something, that means they don’t/wont change it. One definition of accept is “…to regard as true..”. So, all we’re doing is saying “this is true ~ now”. It doesn’t mean it will always be true. Some examples of this would be: “currently I am 100 pounds more than MY ideal weight…”; “currently, I have a tendency to sabotage my successes…”; “currently, I’m in a less than ideal relationship…”. That’s it! Currently! It doesn’t mean you can’t, wont or are unwilling to change. It’s just a place to start.

I’ve also found many have a problem tapping on the positive… “I totally and completely love and accept myself.” There’s a little voice inside that says… “.. no you don’t…” which is why so many of us self-sabotage and cannot be the weight we’d like to be, have the health we’d like to have or the other successes. We feel we don’t deserve.

One of the high points for one of my students was when she stopped reaching for the ice cream whenever she was stressed because she chose that ending (or something similar) whenever she tapped. She came to class and she was astounded at her success saying she’d NEVER felt love for herself until she tapped on that for a week.

What’s interesting too is how so many wont do the tapping. They’re resistant and will say things like “this is silly”; “this wont work, etc.” which is fine. EFT doesn’t need to be believed to “work” or make a difference. All I say is, do it and find out for yourself.

I even have a couple of students who call themselves “shower tappers”. They’ll do it in the shower yet feel silly doing it in front of anyone. Others tap anytime, anyplace, especially when they’re feeling unhealthy (for them) cravings coming up or anxiety coming up which leads to self-sabotage.

A quick definition of Emotional Freedom Technique or, EFT is a simple, direct approach to release and redirect blocked energy patterns in the body/mind. Some call it acupuncture without needles.

Founder Gary Craig explains it thusly: In essence, EFT is an emotional version of acupuncture wherein we stimulate certain meridian points by tapping on them with our fingertips. This addresses a new cause for emotional issues (unbalanced energy meridians). Properly done, this frequently reduces the therapeutic process from months or years down to hours or minutes. And, since emotional stress can contribute to pain, disease and physical ailments, we often find that EFT provides astonishing physical relief.

What’s great about it is, once you learn it, you can tap on anything to resolve numerous issues which is why on my “Tap Into Your Ideal Weight” page, I tell you you’ll be able to keep and use the tools I’ll be teaching during the live, interactive teleclass. EFT is only ONE of the tools I’ll be sharing.

For those who are interested in eliminating excess weight and the habits, cravings and emotional eating patterns that constantly sabotage diet and weight loss endeavors, my “Tap Into Your Ideal Weight” teleclass series begins Tuesday, Jan. 12, 5 p.m. Pacific; 8 p.m. Eastern. As I work individually with each person throughout the program, space is limited AND you’ll save $50 if you register before Jan. 1, 2010 (if seating lasts that long). Let this be the last year you put “go on a diet” as one of your new year’s resolutions!

As I was out walking this morning, I was thinking about James Arthur Ray and the predicament he’s currently embroiled in and how it potentially came about energetically.

Previously, I’d heard his name but not much about who he is and what he does so I picked up his book “The Science of Success ~ How to Attract Prosperity and Create Harmonic Wealth Through Proven Principles”.

As I’m reading this, I’m thinking “Geeez, he says all the “right” things yet, what happened???” If he’s living harmonically, what the heck happened?

My guess at this point is, he hit what I call an upper limit. AND, he not only hit it, he slammed into it and BAM! hit the ground!

What happens when one hits an upper limit is, they’ve ignored stuff. They’ve usually ignored the underlying programs that will sabotage what one does, no matter their intentions.

For instance… if you’re looking to build an enterprise of some sort, pay attention to the little scared voices telling you you can’t, aren’t enough, don’t know enough, etc. Those voices are warning you of sabotage.

Be aware of injuries and accidents. These are warning signs that you’re headed for disaster.

Recently I injured my left hand AND my left knee. Energetically hands are about handling things. Legs/feet, about understanding, support and stepping out (although right side tends to be the stepping out more than the left). Left side is also (usually) feminine and receptive.

After doing lots of work with folks over the last few months I decided to take these last two months to just focus on me and what I’m looking to do. Even though I’m still working with private clients, I’d stopped doing teleclasses to take time to integrate what I’d learned and to make them better if possible. I took the time to explore why am I injuring myself? What am I ignoring? Yesterday I received a HUGE aHA! on that.

So, I’m thinking, with a business as big and lucrative as JAR’s, maybe he didn’t take the time to check out the warning signs so, the universe slammed him to the ground. I dunno.

Nowhere in his book have I read where he’s said to acknowledge the fears that come up when you’re making your plans. In my experience, if they are not acknowledged they’ll make their presence known one way or another. Acknowledging them and admitting them, one can usually bypass an accident, disease or injury.

Now, you don’t want to focus on them, just acknowledge.

Recently I had a former student call and ask me about upper limits. She felt that if she ignored them and basically said she didn’t have any, there wouldn’t be any. Well, you can’t say you don’t have something and there not be something to not have.

That’s like saying if I ignore the elephant in the room, it wont be there. Or if I ignore that I keep injuring myself, I wont do it again. Or, if I ignore that smoking makes me cough I wont have lung cancer. Or, if I ignore eating bad food makes me feel bad the next day that it wont…

Not having spoken with James Ray, I don’t know what, if any, indications the universe gave that he was headed for a fall yet obviously, he was not living in harmony with the universe at some level.

Revvell

Bodacious Living

Crap! Woke up this morning with mild headache, sore throat, stuffy nose and such. Got fires near us so, breathing smoke from two directions.

We saw the “Morris Fire” just as it was beginning on Tuesday when we came down from Big Bear Lake. The La Canada/Flintridge fire began yesterday afternoon. The first is only 10% contained; the second, about 20%. As long as the winds stay down, they should get a handle on them. The temps have been VERY high with very low humidity. I’d hate to be out there fighting those fire.

My nose started bleeding yesterday. Tends to happen when the weather is this dry. I have to remember to keep shea butter in it.

So great to be home.

Before leaving Big Bear Lake, I went shopping at their local farmers’ market and got organic fruit and greens. Stopped at Sam’s Club and got more fruit, so, I’m stocked up! Huge salad for lunch; fruit the rest of the day.

Last night was the final evening of the first Live and Local Pasadena “Tap Into Your Ideal Weight” class. I feel it was a GREAT success. Some of the women, when they began, were very resistant. They thought the tapping is “stupid” and they say they feel funny doing it so became “shower tappers”. Now, they’re buddy tappers calling each other on the phone to do it together. Way more powerful than doing it alone. We also used other techniques which they can use on their own as well.

On average, they’ve eliminated 8-10 pounds and that’s without having added movement to their program. They all said people are noticing the weight loss so, there’s got to be some body changes as well. They’re so excited they’ll all be getting in more movement to enhance their progress.

Many said they noticed they can get into clothing they’ve not been able to wear comfortably for quite awhile.

So, we looked at how they can continue on their own… adding movement; being more consistent; finishing the home-play I’d suggested…

Some have chosen to continue on with classes since they know how powerful group tapping is.

I’m all excited about taking this to teleclasses next week. This is such an awesome program! It’s inspiring to me to see changes in awareness from what they were doing before and what they’re doing now.

Many told me that, before the program, they were eating the same thing every day. One of the things I’ve learned about people who tend to be overweight is they also tend to be malnourished although, I know many thin people who are as well.

Just bringing awareness to how, what, when and where they eat; the triggers that cause them to eat and finding other choices; rewarding themselves with things other than food has been so inspiring!!! I love the group energy and how everyone was giving input to others as to what’s working for them and what MAY work for someone else.

I can hardly wait for the new classes to begin next week! I know some of those who’ve signed up so far are already tappers and on their way to their ideal weight and the tele-classes will give them the support they need to take it to a higher and deeper level. How cool is that? That’s cooooool!!!!

The newer folk will get a chance to hear what the others are doing and to share their fears, excitement, etc. This is going to be fun!!!

Almost out of greens already so, more shopping will be part of my day. I also have 3 tele-classes to listen to and participate in; create a video; finish an article someone requested; edit some book chapters… and prepare for next week’s classes. Would love to go out and get some “fresh” air but, at the moment, no such thing out there. Methinks we need to get back up to Big Bear Lake NOW! Actually, we are going up in Sept. The air is so different. Clean, crisp. The evergreens against that deep blue sky….

Oh! yesterday we were looking at some cabins ~ online. Maybe when we get back up there next month we’ll attend some open houses. We can get 3 bedroom cabins for under $250,000. Can’t even get a condo down here for that. We’re probably not going to purchase right now yet, it’s something that will be going on one of my vision boards.

Have an awesome day ~

bfn,

Revvell