Have you ever gone through your week and believed that you have done everything you needed to do to lose weight and then you step on the scale and it doesn’t budge? At that moment, what do you feel? Sadness, anger, disappointment, revenge or possibly a combination of all of them? In that split second of time, all your energy is drawn into a negative state. You start negative talk such as, “I can’t believe that, I know I exercised, I didn’t eat cake at the office party etc”. Fine, I might as well just go get a gallon of Ben and Jerry’s. Seriously we start beating ourselves up over a simple number on the scale.
A motivational speaker and NLP presenter, Dr. Topher Morrison, explains it like this: Two men get on the same plane for a business flight. During the flight, however, a severe storm breaks out and the turbulence on the plane is almost nauseating. The flight attendants can’t serve drinks, snacks can’t be served, let alone eaten and everyone is on edge. At the end of the destination, both men call home to let their spouses know they have arrived safely. The first man, when asked about the flight, goes into a loud tirade about the flight. His face is red, his voice is irate and his heart is pounding. He just can’t state emphatically enough how horrible this flight was and that he will never fly that particular airline again. The second man, when asked by his wife how the flight was explained very succinctly, “It was great, the plane took off and it landed. Couldn’t have been better.” His voice is calm, he is smiling, his heart rate is stable and he quietly goes on about his business.
I ask you again, are your weight loss expectations zapping your positive energy? Every time you allow a situation, that you can’t control, to take up space in your head, you waste time and energy trying to defeat it. Energy that can be used to make careful choices about your day that will help you reach your goals, whether they are weight, financial, emotional or business goals. If your mind is stuck in a place that keeps you there, you can’t be in the present and you certainly can’t be making choices in the present to create the life you want to create.
As humans, we automatically set expectations on ourselves as well as others. It is those expectations that bring havoc to our lives. In our relationships, I have heard so many couples say, “I know they do that on purpose, just to make me mad.” Perhaps in some instances that is so, but what if you didn’t get mad. What if you went on about your day and never paid a second thought to the situation. Or, we place expectations on others and we don’t even tell them about it. Then we get angry and upset when they are not met. What if your boss gave you an assignment to do that you have never done? He handed it over and said, “Here, bring this back in a week completely finished.” When you muddled through it, handed it in and all you received was angry statements about the unprofessionalism throughout the project, how would you feel? Yet, we do that every day with our family members as well as our co-workers. Then we house the anger and resentment and make further bad choices because of our anger.
So, let’s lower our expectations. Let’s concentrate on the small moments in our lives that we can control. Take the week and try it. See how productive your life can be when you do the best you can do with every second of your day.
