Healthy Habits: A Plan, Accountability, & Focus

A few of years ago, I watched my visiting teacher, Vickie, lose 65 pounds over the course of a year. With each monthly visit you could see her shrinking, and she even did it while recovering from a horrible snow mobile accident that meant she couldn't exercise.

~She had joined Weight Watchers.~

Over the course of the school year, I watched the PTO president drop at least 50 pounds or more.

~She had joined Weight Watchers.~

The following summer I watched my sister drop 25 pounds after giving birth to her second child.

~She had joined Weight Watchers.~

These were also the ONLY people I knew who had lost a significant amount of weight AND then kept it off for years.

"Okay," I thought, "I can take a hint." I decided to look into Weight Watchers more seriously. By now you know me well enough to know that the program has to be in harmony with the Word of Wisdom or it's not for me. So I started by talking with my sister about the program to learn if it fit with my beliefs. It fit. In fact, it was very in harmony with the Word of Wisdom.

They changed the program just as I reached "Lifetime" status, but the new program is actually an improvement and even more focused on plant foods. For instance, the PointsPlus system gives all fruit & vegetables zero points to encourage members to eat more of these foods. (i.e. You don't spend any points to eat a banana, but it will cost you to eat those potato chips - and you won't be nearly as satisfied.) Weight Watchers has a strong understanding of LIFELONG NUTRITION and weight control, not gimmicky short-term weight loss.

And it provided a place me to be ACCOUNTABLE. That was big! Knowing that I would go step on that scale in front of an employee who wrote my weight in a book, was a serious motivator. They didn't criticize me or say anything to make me feel bad, but they would ask how my week went, and it forced me to be honest with myself. I had to ask myself, "Did I live the way I know that I should?" They wrote down my weight and did the math - the weight was up or down. Simple tracking and accountability. It. Is. Powerful.

The weekly meetings helped me FOCUS. Let me be clear. I liked certain discussion leaders more than others. One was boring, one was obnoxious, but most were good created good discussion among the group.  But I'll be honest, the content wasn't always new or life changing. In fact, I started drawing an analogy of why the meetings were important to me. I began comparing them to the principles behind weekly church meetings. (NO! I'm not saying that Weight Watchers is akin to the gospel. Hear me out on this.)

I think God has us go to weekly church meetings to have a place to refocus and recommit to the gospel. Some weeks, we may not hear anything we haven't heard before, but we walk away refocused on true principles and recommitted to living it.

Weight Watchers meetings were my place to refocus and recommit to healthy habits. I wasn't there to be entertained or hear something new and exciting. I didn't believe it was there job to MAKE ME want to be good. And it didn't matter if the topic was something I desperately needed to hear that week. I went to my weekly meetings to be accountable, to focus and recommit. Simple principles, but my attitude was crucial.

Now, I'm not saying that, "You HAVE to join Weight Watchers to lose weight!"

But I can tell you that Weight Watchers has a solid plan that will teach how to make lasting and healthy changes in your life.  It takes time & work to re-evaluate the way you eat and translate recipes and calorie info into their PointsPlus system, but once the initial work is done and really commit to it, things become second nature. For example, I know that I should typically eat only 1 slice of pizza during a meal when trying to lose weight.  I know that I should have 1/2 cup of brown rice and 3 oz of meat at dinner to stay within my points. I also realized that we are creatures of habit, and once you've calculated the healthy stand-by foods that work for you, then you write them down, and it's easy to keep track. You also have the tools you need to calculate new things so that you don't get bored or stagnate. The plan allows for individual taste and personal flexibility. I like that. It means it can be used for a lifetime.

There you have it. The third key that helped me to really lose a lot of weight -
Weight Watchers.

A Healthy Plan.

Accountability.

A Place to Focus & Recommit.