Helping You Love Yourself into Success with Less Stress! Loving Yourself into Less Stress for Weigh-in Success Part IV: An Example of How to Love Yourself Forward with Small Steps by Ilenya Marrin, DSS HOME FREE NEWSLETTER PRODUCTS SERVICES ABOUT ME TESTIMONIALS RESOURCES CONTACT Quick Review for Weigh-in Success If you are practicing the principles from the first three articles in this series, you are taking responsibility for your life patterns, you're working to love yourself more consciously, and you are asking yourself "How?" and "What?" questions to explore new territory. You're applying forgiveness to self-judgments, you're taking time for you, and you're listening to the "hungry" part of you. Practical Applications from the Inside Out Now you are ready for some practical applications more specifically related to tackling stressors and redirecting your healthy nutrition and exercise plan. These are things you have probably read in a dozen magazines or newspaper articles already. You may have attempted to do them based on will power – the old New Year's resolution approach. Or they are things that you have tried a time or two with limited success, but on day three you had too many distractions and it didn't seem worth it to continue. Up until now, these strategies didn't work because you were not in a place to work them with loving from the inside out. How do you apply the principles you've been learning to specific diet and exercise tips? Below is a teaser list of a few typical pieces of advice, to get you started. You can expand this list and use our self-loving principles for any approach that seems to fit for you. Typical Exercise and Weight Loss Advice Get a good night's sleep, consistently. Cut cortisol, the "stress hormone." Start walking or another exercise program. See a nutritionist. Cut out three habitual carbohydrate foods from your daily routine to easily cut calories. You can probably add twenty items to this list without even working at it! If you need help, check any popular magazine, look for diet articles on-line, or check with your doctor. Let's look in depth at one stress-related item that might influence your weight, as an example of how to love yourself from the inside out into some positive changes. Example: Get a good night's sleep, regularly. In a ten-year study of sleep habits, researchers at Laval University in Quebec found that people who got a solid night of sleep (7-8 hours) were several pounds lighter than their counterparts who slept only 6-7 hours per night. Women who slept shorter nights were 11 pounds heavier, and men 16.5 pounds heavier. Apparently the reason for the difference is that a sound night's sleep boosts levels of the hormone leptin, which suppresses hunger. What You Can Do: If you don't get solid and regular sleep, you can "own the problem" by reminding yourself, "I'm responsible for my sleep patterns." You are now in a powerful position: if you are responsible for getting yourself into poor sleep habits, you can get yourself out of them and into much healthier patterns! Keep Your Attitude of Self-Loving Keep reinforcing an attitude of loving yourself. Remember those affirmations and continue to repeat them daily! Explore with the Right Questions Openly exploring with questions, you might ask, "What do I need to learn from this situation of not sleeping enough?" Maybe your answer is, "When I don't sleep soundly, I wake up late, skip breakfast, rush to work, buy snacks from the vending machines, have to buy lunch at work, and I start the day tired and stressed and never seem to recover. Then I judge myself for not eating right again, and I'm too tired and stressed to fall asleep easily the next night." While it seems obvious, you might simply conclude that lack of sleep has a big impact on your eating habits overall. Then you might ask yourself, "How can I approach sleep differently?" "How can I see this problem in a different light?" "How can I be more loving with myself about this sleep issue and how it impacts my life?" Answering the question about how you can approach sleep differently, you might decide to find an article with tips for how to improve sleep habits, and gently and gradually implement changes. In other words, don't try to leap from your current frustration to using fourteen new suggestions all at once. Take Small Steps for Success! A more loving approach – and more successful in the long run – is to take small steps consistently. This weekend, add room darkening shades and get rid of the clock that lights up the whole bedroom. Next Monday when you're at the drugstore, pick up some earplugs because your spouse snores. See what results you get with these changes. Find that article again and pick one or two more changes to try. Listen to Your Inner Wisdom. At each step, check with your inner self. Much as you dialogued with the "eat-seeker" or "hungry" part, check in with your inner wisdom, your higher self. You might write down the impressions and thoughts you get from this wise part of you and check them out on a practical level. Vividly imagine doing what your inner wisdom suggests. Does it feel loving and on track for you? If so, take a few action steps. Check it out. If you continue to get good results, keep going. If you don't like the results, make course corrections as needed. Maybe your self-help article or book suggests vigorous exercise several hours before bedtime, but your inner wisdom says, "Don't go paying a fortune for a gym membership. You won't stick with it. Instead, get some new walking shoes and see if your neighbor will walk with you twice a week." (Small steps again, literally and figuratively!) Notice that as you do each of these steps, you are taking time for yourself! Take Time for Yourself Maybe another step, a week or two later, is to block out two hours on a Saturday morning to assess your freezer and pantry, and plan menus and a shopping list so you can cook healthy meals ahead, freeze them in meal size portions (including breakfast and lunch foods) and make your morning less frenetic. Perhaps you spend Sunday afternoon doing a cookathon and now you have meals ahead for your busiest nights. And then two weeks down the road you do it again. Bring in Self-Forgiveness And if you find you are judging yourself, use self-forgiveness. Maybe you look at two weeks of addressing the sleep issues and find you are getting a bit better sleep but you haven't lost an ounce. You find yourself saying, "It's not working, I'm still nothing but fat, fat, fat!" The minute you notice you are judging is the time to start turning these thoughts and feelings around. You might tell yourself, "Now wait a minute, dear. What's the most loving thing I can do for myself right now? I can forgive myself! I forgive myself for judging myself as not making faster progress. I forgive myself for judging myself as not changing everything in two weeks. I forgive myself for judging myself as fat." You continue with what I call "free-form forgiveness," forgiving any other judgmental thoughts that pop up, until you heave a deep sigh of relief or feel like a burden has been lifted inwardly. Conclusion. These are all small steps in the right direction. They are steps taken in your loving consciousness. If you keep doing them over time, they make a huge difference in your lifestyle. By taking small steps, you don't add a huge burden of stress to your already stressful life. Your loving intention helps you keep going with the many small choices for a healthier, less stress-filled lifestyle. Your loving intention keeps you coming back to you – the inner you – over and over until making choices from your personal center is easy and natural. One day you may look back from your slimmer, more active self and be amazed at how much easier it is now to stick with the program that you know works for you -- all because you learned to love yourself from the inside out! Click on the links below for the rest of the articles in this series. Part I: Overview Part II: Basics of Loving Yourself from the Inside Out Part III: How to Love Yourself and Your Weight Loss Process Part IV: How to Love Yourself Forward with Small Steps Back to List of Articles

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