Be clear, not confused

Hello, lovely ladies and welcome to the emotion series on the podcast. So we have talked about the feelings of curious, we've talked about the feelings of committed. We've talked about the feelings of compassionate and calm. And today I wanted to talk about one of my favourite emotions in weight loss, and that is the emotion of clear.

Now I specifically thought of these emotions and they all start off with the letter C. So whenever you're thinking. About the emotions that will be useful in weight loss. Always think of the seas because they all start with C. I know there's other emotions as well, but I love these ones because it's just easy to remember.

Okay. So today we're talking about the emotion of clear and coupled with the emotion of clear, I love the sentence. I'll figure it out. So that reminds me of maybe the emotion of resource. but you need to be clear to be resourceful. So sometimes I think about, if I was clear in this decision, what would I do if I couldn't make it about a character floor in me when I failed at something or me being unworthy or lazy, then what could be the reason?

So one of my mentors, Stacy Bowman talks about when you have a dilemma, you could write out what is your hypothesis? What do you think the reason is that this happened, then make a guest, answer it, then decide, okay, how much do I believe that this solution will get me? The result that I want, then go out and try.

And then come back and evaluate it because when you are doing that, you are getting to work to solve for the problem. You've got the thought in your head. I'll figure it out. You are being clear because you're not making it about your worth. So many of my clients struggle with this because when they fail at something, they think it's a character flaw in them.

They think it's because they're not meant to lose weight. They think it's because they are being lazy. They think it's because they're not committed enough. They think it's because weight loss is just not meant for them. And when I coach them, it's always about separating the story from what they make the story mean, because if they couldn't make their weight gain or their plateau about them and about them being unworthy or a character floor in them, then what could it be that gets them being curious about. Hmm. Okay. If I can't make it that there's something wrong with me, what could it be? Could it just be that I overate for the last three nights in the last week? Could it be that actually, I was feeling a little bit lonely because my partner was working late and I normally, watch Netflix with him in the evening.

Could it be that I was not going to sleep on time and I was actually a little bit more exhausted throughout the day. So I was using food to give me more energy. what could it be if it wasn't about you being weak or being, lazy or whatever story that you create in your head, because when you are writing out what your.

Hypothesis may be. You are being that scientist instead of judging yourself, you're thinking, Hmm. I trust my own answer. I'm figuring it out. You make a guess as to what the problem could be. You answer it with, okay, what do I think could solve for this problem? You decide how much do I believe that this will actually help me create the result that I want to create, and then you go out and try it. You try it for a certain amount of time. And then you evaluate, this is what the mind and body food planner will be really useful for you to start using when you join the group coaching program, because it makes it very clear and very easy to be this scientist, rather than this judge in your weight loss.

You figure out, okay, what could it be? Could it be this, could it be that? Hmm, these are the things that I would try. How much do I believe that these will work? Okay. I'm just gonna go out and test them and then I'm gonna evaluate them, right. It just gets the drama out of weight loss. Because when you are clear in your weight loss journey, you're not confused.

And how does confusion show up? Most of my clients, a lot of them, they. Should I eat this or should I eat that? How much should I eat? Oh I need to ask Amruti because I trust her wisdom more than my own. This is why if you're one of my clients and you're on a coaching call with me, I always get you to answer your own question first, and then I coach you through it.

And that is because when I give you the answer, my brain gets better at looking for answers. Whereas when you. trust your own brain to come up with an answer, then your brain gets better at figuring it out and looking for solutions. One way that I find is really useful in this is to consult with my future self.

So for me, when I was losing my weight, I would often consult my future self. What is it that my future self thinks feels and. how does my future self show up? So when I thought for myself, my future self was calm around food. She wasn't really too fussed about food. She didn't really think about it that often she was living her life.

So she didn't need food to be at the center of her life because she was already joyful in the rest of her life. She didn't need the food to, to be the main source of joy in. Right. She was getting high on her life. She didn't need the food to give her that high in her life anymore. Right. My future self, she was just really eating to live rather than living to eat.

And when she did eat, she enjoyed it, but she didn't need to eat more and more and more to get more and more enjoyment. She was actually satisfied with the enjoyment she got from eating to enough. So when I was able to consult that future self of mine, when I was still trying to lose weight, I would ask myself, how could I bring this into my life now?

How could I start being my future self now? so I would think about, okay. And I would test it out. Like when I was in certain situations, if my future self wasn't really that fast, for example, at parties, she wasn't really that Fu about eating the cake all the time. She was more interested in being connected to the people in having fun with her kids, with actually talking to the people she hadn't seen in a long time with like really connect.

So, this is what I started trying out. When I was at parties. It was hard initially because my old self would've been so fixated on the food and I have to eat. And what would people say if I don't eat? And the cake is obviously the best thing about the party. I've been doing this for decades of my life.

So I did have a lot of mental chatter, but the more I started thinking about how would my future self think feel and what actions would she take in? situation. I was able to start practicing being her now, because remember the only way to become your future self, that future self who has lost all of her weight, who just isn't that foster about food, who is able to live her life for the life that it is rather than, food being the main source of joy in her life.

That's when I could become her. Right. So. a lot of my future self work was around the scale. So previously when I was trying to lose weight, I would freak out when my scales would go up. But when I thought about it, when I consulted that future self of mine, she wouldn't freak out. When the scale went up, she would track her data.

She would look at the information in her tracker, in her journal. And she would just kind of be like, okay, what's looking off here. Where can I see that I was overeating? Where can I see that? I wasn't planning my food or evaluating? Where can I see that I was actually overeating in these particular instances, she would know that the answers were in the data.

so she would evaluate it and figure it out. She wouldn't wallow in herself, pity. She would be like, Hmm, I wonder why. And she would go and, figure it out.

She wouldn't make it about herself worth. She would be clear and decide that, yeah, I'm gonna figure this out.

She wouldn't stay in indecision. And that was a huge. she would make a decision and she was clear about that decision. So she would plan so that her pried brain didn't think, ah, I didn't plan. So it's okay to be X, Y, and Z.

She would be clear on this being the last time that she would ever have to lose weight and she was willing to figure it out until the. she would use some of the other emotions we've talked about this month. Curiosity, commitment, compassion, feeling calm. And she would actually make sure that she was making that decision and being clear in that decision.

She would realize that no decision is set in stone and that she would make a decision. and then she would review the decision in the timeframe that she set. So I'll give an example. What I suggest in the group coaching program is no sugar, no flour for the first six to eight weeks. And this is because sugar and flour are very concentrated carbohydrates, and they really interfere with the secretion of the hunger hormones.

So it makes it much harder to pay attention to your. hunger signals. So you tend to overeat, you tend to get more urges. You tend to feel more hungry. And so this is why I suggest to cut out sugar and flour for six to eight weeks. Now you then get to decide if you want to bring it back in a lot of my clients.

they say, yeah, actually I do want to have sugar and flour in my diet, but I just don't want to have it as often because they have now given their bodies the chance to notice what it feels like in their body. They often feel tired and sluggish. And this is what happened for me. Like I personally prefer not to eat sugar and flour.

It feels so much better for. , but I wouldn't have known that had I not given myself that break and decided that I'm gonna give myself a break for six to eight weeks and then reassess. So when it came to my, reassessment time, the end of my six to eight weeks, it was my, that I wanted to eat it now and again, but not.

so generally now I do eat your grown flour, but maybe once or twice a week, if that it's because I prefer my energy levels without it. I prefer how I. Live my life when I'm not constantly thinking about food when I'm not constantly feeling tired when I've got so much more energy to do things that I want to do when I'm able to be more present with my kids and not constantly thinking about food and urges and hunger and all of that, it's just, just so much easier for.

But if it hadn't worked for me after the two months of not liking the sugar and flour, then I would reassess and I would say, Hey, maybe I do want to, eat it four times a week. And then, I'll reassess that in a month or two months, whatever you get to decide and no decision is set in stone. So you can just.

Say I'm gonna evaluate it. And then I get to make another decision if I want to. Right. So a few examples of this, I coached one of my clients on what would be doable for her when she went on holiday. So I asked her what would be doable for you? And I gave her what she was actually seeking. She was wanting her own approval to think that that was good.

And then reassess. So she decided that on holiday, instead of eating dessert every single day for the seven days, she would eat dessert three times. She decided that instead of fasting to 16 hours every day, she would fast to 14 hours every day. Instead of having two meals a day, she would have three meals a day for the seven days that she was there.

So when she was able to make that decision. She knew that she could reassess that after the holiday. And then for the next holiday, she could, if it didn't work out for her, she would evaluate it anyway and see what worked, what didn't work and what did she want to do differently. So remember, no decision is set in stone.

If you decide I'm gonna have three desserts on a holiday, that doesn't mean for the rest of my life on holiday. I only have to have three. It may mean, actually I, I preferred to have dessert every day, but, I wanted to eat two meals a day whilst I was on holiday. Like you get to decide and also no decision is set in stone.

Right? Another client, I coached her on her schedule. So she was struggling with the decisions that she had made. So she would allocate 30 minutes for planning her food and doing her thought download, but she wasn't sticking to it. And when we dove into it, she said that 30 minutes was too long for her.

Her brain would freak out and then she would not do it. So I asked her what would be doable for her? And she said, Doing it for five minutes every day. So I said, okay, why don't you make the decision to plan your food and do a quick thought, download in five minutes a day, and then you can reassess after a week.

And you could just see her breathing a sigh of relief because you want to make a decision where your brain is actually on board with you, rather than thinking it's just completely unattainable, freaking out. And you being in air fairy land saying you're gonna do something, but knowing you're never going to do that.

Right. So you want to actually partner with your brain and make it doable for you so that you are actually, doing what you say you're gonna do, cuz that's the thing that's gonna build up trust. And the way you can get clear on that is to decide, decide that even when I want to be confused, I'm gonna figure it out.

I'm gonna think about. If I had to think about a hypothesis for this, I'm gonna answer the question with the solution that I think would work. I'm gonna decide how much I believe that solution, and I'm gonna go out and try it and then come back and evaluate it. And then I give myself the permission to reevaluate after the time period that I've set and make another decision.

If that seems the kindest thing to do for. Okay. So this is that time for you to start getting clear in your weight loss journey. Just deciding that I will figure this out and I'm gonna keep going until I figure this out. So it's bringing in the curiosity of, oh, I wonder what's going on for me. The commitment of I'm gonna figure it out.

Otherwise, I'm not stopping the compassion. Of course, I'm gonna go off protocol, but you know what I'm gonna be kind to myself through this, the calm, I know my brain's gonna wanna, freak out, but I'm gonna create the safety in myself to be able to feel that freak out and create calm for myself.

And you know what, I'm gonna be clear. I'm gonna decide that I'm gonna figure this out and I am gonna figure it. Okay, ladies, this is your time to use all of the emotions that we talked about in your weight loss journey. And I would love to hear from you about how you used it and how it is going for you.

Okay, ladies, I will speak to you next week. Take  care. Bye.