Want to lose weight – Yusra Training & Therapy

Want to lose weight? Then don’t!

Instead, Gain Health…

…and enjoy life!

By Abu Yusra

NLP Trainer and Hypnotherapist

Contents

What will this e-book do for you? 4

It’s all about the weight, isn’t it? 5

So, what’s the solution? 6

PRECISE™ Goals 6

P State Precisely and Positively what you want 6

R Is it Realistic? 6

E Is it Exact and Ecological? 6

C Is it as if it is Current? 7

I Is it for you? (I want this.) 7

S What’s the Small but Significant first Step? 7

E What’s the End step / Exit point? 7

Top 5 things you must do to ensure ‘Health Gain’ 8

Must do # 1 – Visualise your goal 8

Must do # 2 – Focus 9

Must do #3 – Take responsibility 9

Must do # 4 – Stick to your plan 10

Must do # 5 – Chew your food slowly 10

Final remarks 11

About the author 12

What will this e-book do for you?

There are many health programs out there which help with weight issues and many of them work quite well – when we decide to follow the instructions!

The problem is that the majority of us don’t follow the program – we lose motivation, become sidetracked, or just give in to temptation and become lazy.

But funnily enough, the solution to all of this is also very simple – we need to change our focus. By implementing a very simple strategy, you will find that your desire to change yourself will be much stronger. You will find that you will want to improve your health. You will notice how your target will no longer be a challenge, but rather it will become a joy, a thing to be achieved.

However, I must also warn you – there are some side-effects. You should only adopt this method if you’re prepared to:

Amaze yourself and others by your success
Become a ‘happy’ person
Have a positive attitude towards all things in life
Notice improvement in other areas of your life too.

You have been warned! And if you’re brave enough to accept the possibility of facing these side effects, let me be the first to congratulate you – well done! Well done for deciding to take action and taking responsibility for your health.

Let’s start our journey…

It’s all about the weight, isn’t it?

No! It’s about the focus and the motivation.

Consider this: you weigh yourself and decide you must lose some weight. So you go and set yourself a target. You plan meticulously about what you’re going to eat, when you’re going to eat it and as well as that, when and how much you’re going to exercise.

So far, so good.

Your routine starts and you do really well for, let’s say, a week (that’s generous, believe me!). You’re feeling a little fitter, you seem to have a little more energy and vibrancy. So you get out the weighing scale, pop up onto it…and immediately get off again to adjust the ‘zero’ position because “..that can’t be right!” You get on again and find yourself looking at the scale in disbelief – despite all your work, virtually no weight has come off. And that’s when the ‘plan’ goes to pieces.

So what is the problem?

Believe me, it’s all to do with the direction of your focus and motivation.

Put simply, there are two main motivating factors – the motivation to do something because of what you want, or the motivation to do something because of what you want to avoid.

The first is known as ‘toward’ or ‘positive’ motivation and the second is known as ‘away from’ or ‘negative’ motivation.

If you have a ‘toward’ motivation, your focus is on your goal, it’s forward looking. If you have an ‘away from’ motivation, your focus is on what you’re trying to get away from, it’s backward looking.

There is one more aspect which is key to success in achieving any goal – belief. One of the world’s leading personal development experts, Napoleon Hill, said: ‘What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.’ If you add the power of visualisation to this, you will almost certainly achieve every goal you ever set.

With this information in mind, what do you think goes on in your mind when you decide to lose weight? Even though the intention may be good, the goal is negative and unfocussed. I would venture that in this instance, weight loss will not happen and, if it does, it won’t be sustained.

So, what’s the solution?

The simplest and best thing you can do is to have a PRECISE™ goal, make it positive and toward, visualise it and then go for it, one step at a time. Let’s take a specific look at how we might apply this to the issue of weight loss.

PRECISE™ Goals

P State Precisely and Positively what you want

R Is it Realistic?

E Is it Exact and Ecological?

C Is it as if it is Current?

I Is it for you? (I want this.)

S What’s the Small but Significant first Step?

E What’s the End step / Exit point?

P State Precisely and Positively what you want

Instead of just saying how much you want to weigh, think about the all round impact of weight loss and word it in a way where you will be gaining rather than losing something. So, precisely and positively…

I want to gain health and weigh 75kg

If you currently weigh more than 75kg, then although you will lose weight to get to 75kg, your overall feeling will be a positive one – you’ll be feeling better and gaining health!

R Is it Realistic?

Be absolutely honest with yourself. Is what you want realistic? Goals should always be stretching so that they make you step out of your comfort zone. If, however, they are over-optimistic, then your inability to reach them will be de-motivating. So, have stretching but realistic goals.

E Is it Exact and Ecological?

If all you had said in setting your goal was that ‘I want to gain health’, that would not be exact, would it? Always be as exact as possible with your goals.

Ecology in these terms is about the wider impact of your actions. It is about being aware of the benefit, or downside, of your actions on those close to you or those you interact with. When you think of gaining health in these terms, there are many other positive benefits that you’ll highlight and therefore be even more determined to achieve your goal. So, ‘I want to gain health and weigh 75kg’ is both exact and ecological.

C Is it as if it is Current?

Word your goal as if you have achieved it already. The purpose of this is that the unconscious mind does not know the difference between reality and imagination. If you therefore imagine your goal as already achieved and really notice how you feel in that moment, then the conscious mind is driven towards it again and again. So, positive, precise and current:

It is now 31 December 2011, I am healthier and I now weigh 75kg.

I Is it for you? (I want this.)

Your will only achieve your goal and sustain it if it is self-initiated, self-maintained and self-sustained. In other words, you’ve got to want it for yourself, not because your partner / parents / siblings etc wants you to, for example, lose some weight.

S What’s the Small but Significant first Step?

Most people fail to achieve their goals because they never get going. They plan, amend the plan, rewrite it and plan again but never take action. So the key to achieving your goals is to build into your goal the small but significant first step you will take to get started. With this, add in what regular small steps you will take to stay on target. Remember, these are not part of the goal, but part of the plan. Think very carefully about your small but significant first step and then do it!

E What’s the End step / Exit point?

In order to really make the goal desirable and motivate you, you must have an evidence procedure for knowing you have achieved your goal. You should state clearly how you will know you’ve done it. You should visualise your outcome: it will be a much more powerful goal. Visualisation involves seeing an image of yourself in your mind’s eye exactly as you wish to be on achieving your goal. So, with the end point, this is how your stated PRECISE™ goal would look like:

It is now 31 December 2011. I am standing on the weighing scale wearing clothes I couldn’t get into two months ago and the scale shows that I weigh 75kg. I am healthier and fitter than I was and feel much better.

So there you have it! You now have a precise goal that’s going to help you to achieve your desired health targets. In the following pages I will discuss some specific things you can do to ensure you reach your goals.

Top 5 things you must do to ensure ‘Health Gain’

Must do # 1 – Visualise your goal

Napoleon Hill said: “If the mind of man can conceive it and believe it, it can achieve it. One of the best ways of getting the mind to believe something is to visualise it.

Visualisation in this context is not some vague, airy-fairy image. It is actually a very specific, clear and desirable image.

Here’s how to visualise:

Relax – take a couple of deep breaths and allow yourself to become calm and relaxed
Close your eyes and bring up an image of how you’d like to look. (If you can’t imagine yourself, bring an image to mind of someone you’d like to emulate)
As you have that image, add (or reduce) colours to it so it becomes really desirable
Adjust the contrast, increase or decrease the size of the image, move it nearer or further, up or down, from side to side until it is just perfect and really desirable
Next, adjust the sounds. Is it better without sounds? Or perhaps with sound? How loud or soft should the sounds be? Add in any of your favourite sounds until auditorily, it is just perfect.
Finally, tweak the feelings you have about the image. Ramp them up or remove them – try both to get a feel for what seems to be better. Again, adjust until the feelings in the picture are just perfect.
Now, as you have an image that’s visually, auditorily and kinaesthetically perfect, lock it in place, just as you would with a master lock going ‘Click, click’.

Now, how does THAT feel?

Must do # 2 – Focus

Are you so desperate to become fitter and healthier that you’re consumed (no pun intended) by this drive?

Are you really sticking to your plan or are you getting frustrated at the lack of progress? Are you jumping from diet to diet?

If you are, relax! It’s natural – in our eagerness to ‘make it work’, we become impatient and resort to chopping and changing our plans. That only leads to more frustration and a vicious circle has begun…

So, to reach your goal, focus.

Focus on what you’re doing and do it well. Trust your plan, trust yourself and be patient. It takes – on average – up to two weeks for the body to start reflecting outwardly what’s going on internally. When you focus on your goal and constantly ‘see’ how you’d like to look in your mind’s eye, then you will feel much better and less frustrated.

What’s most important is how well you do today…

Must do #3 – Take responsibility

Most of the excuses you make to justify your lack of progress are just that – excuses!

Take responsibility – now! Know and believe that you, and only you, will be either the cause of your success, or the cause of your failure. Taking responsibility for your goals is the most empowering thing you can do – try it now!

When you take responsibility, you have only yourself to blame if things don’t work out. You are responsible for looking after yourself or not, you are responsible for what you eat or what you don’t eat, you are responsible for the amount of exercise you do or don’t do.

Anyone who has ever achieved anything worthy of the name did so because they were committed and accepted full responsibility for they wanted to achieve. For example, the story of Thomas Edison is well-known. He experimented with over 700 methods before he succeeded in making the electric light bulb. When challenged by his peers as to his hundreds of failures, he simply responded that he hadn’t failed even once; he said he had documented each attempt as another way of how not to make a light bulb. That’s accepting responsibility and being focussed. Remember failure is not not succeeding, it is giving up.

So if you absolutely value your health and life, then take responsibility for it!

Must do # 4 – Stick to your plan

Believe it or not, the key to health gain is to control what and how much you eat! For a really simple plan, work out how many calories you burn in a day, work out how many you put in and that will show you whether you’re overeating, under-eating or are eating just the right amount of food.

If you’re overeating, reduce your intake! Simples! If you’re eating just the right amount, and still find yourself overweight, introduce some light exercise into your life to burn off the calories rather than store them – and the body does that by storing it as fat.

In the first part of this book, I discussed how we must always have a ‘toward’ motivation. In much the same sense, our plan should be fun and easy to follow. So I advise my health coaching clients to make an eating plan and stick to it – at least 90% of the time.

Why 90%? That’s because this allows you some flexibility in emergency situations, as well as an opportunity to reward yourself if you’re ahead of the plan / target.

So remember, to gain health, whether you need to take weight off or put it on, you need 100% commitment, and only 90% compliance.

Must do # 5 – Chew your food slowly

Eating slowly is recommended for health. Slow eating reduces the amount of food that you will eat. It does that by allowing the body to begin absorbing the nutrients so that you begin to feel full.

Slow eating also means that you will chew your food well. This allows the saliva to mix with the food and, therefore, gives you better digestion as the food particles become much smaller through the extra chewing.

Finally, take your time whilst eating and – here’s that ‘f’ word again – focus on your food. Think about the food you’re eating because if you do, you’ll eat less but be better nourished. If you eat while you’re doing something else (watching TV, doing your e-mails etc), you will actually take in more calories and enjoy them less. Not only that, but you’re more likely to eat again soon after thereby increasing your overall calorie intake.

One of the best things you can do is to eat at the dinner table with your family and have a pleasant time and experience – you’ll enjoy your food, eat less, and gain health!

Final remarks

So, there you are – the best way to set your ‘weight’ goals and then the top 5 things you must do to propel you towards them.

It’s easy to get drawn into a new regime of health awareness and dive into it only to run out of steam very quickly. By far, a much better approach is to take small steps regularly, keep motivated, accept full responsibility and have the health / body / weight you so desire.

One final thing: keep a visual chart to remind you of the progress you’re making. There is nothing as powerful as a visual reminder to keep you on track. The only difference is that I suggest you draw up your graph in such a way that it shows how you’re gaining health. It’s just a psychological thing but an upward graph is more motivating than a downward one! I’ve given an example graph below.

Now when you plot this graph, you will see the graph going upwards as you make progress towards your goal.

Let’s gain health!

About the author

Abu Yusra is a Master Trainer of NLP, Hypnotherapy and Success Coaching. He is the founder and Lead Trainer of Yusra Training and Therapy, a management and training consultancy company.

Abu Yusra has trained thousands of people from all walks of life – professionals, civil servants, volunteers, students and home workers – in ‘brain friendly’ personal development. He is particularly proud to have trained over 5,000 pre-GCSE students and helped them achieve better than predicted grades.

As well as training in the corporate and public sector areas, Abu Yusra also coaches private clients to set and achieve success in whichever area they want to achieve it.

Previously, he was a Senior Executive in the UK Civil Service, where he worked in a number of Departments for nearly 20 years.

He is married with three sons.

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