If I Could Pay to be Skinny!

When talking about weightloss, people always say things like:

• You have to do it for yourself
• You have to hit rock bottom
• You have to do it for you, or it won't work
• If I could pay to be skinny I would!

Well, this last one is something I had always said, but it wasn't until last October that I really understood what it meant. I am not sure exactly what day it was, or what triggered it, but a light bulb went off in my head! Shannon, if you could pay to be skinny, you would... so pay for it! Now you are wondering, what does that mean?

Let me go back a second. I have struggled with my weight all of my life. Five years ago I had Gastric Bypass Surgery. I weighed over 420 pounds. In less than a year, I lost 140 pounds, but then the weight loss stopped. I knew why it stopped, but I didn't want to admit it. Well, actually I would admit it, but for some reason it did not change anything. So, for the next 3-4 years, not only did I not lose anymore, but I gained 20-30 pounds back!

So now we are back to my light bulb. I said to myself, "If I could pay to be skinny I would." Then I asked myself, "Would you really? Would you pay $5,000 to be skinny? Yes! Would you pay $10,000 to be skinny? Yes!" And then I asked myself, "What is keeping you from losing weight? Exercising. What is keeping you from exercising? Discipline." Then it came to me. If exercise is keeping me from losing weight, and discipline is keeping me from exercise, I need something or someone to force me to exercise. A PERSONAL TRAINER!!! I had never gotten a personal trainer before because I couldn't afford it. I couldn't afford it now either. But I just said I would pay to be skinny, so why not pay for a personal trainer! LIGHT BULB!

So that is how I changed my life. Honestly, I can't afford a personal trainer, but if I am going to use my savings or a credit card for anything, this would be it! There is no price tag on being healthy, and happy with yourself.

I am not suggesting you go out and spend 1000's of dollars on a personal trainer (They really are expensive, over $60 a session). What I am suggesting is that you do some soul searching. We are all the way we are for a reason. I learned about root causing in my leadership training. As a manager or coach, a technique to help your employees, is to get to the root cause of the issue. In most cases when we are talking to others, or even talking to ourselves, we assume we know the problem, and then we create a solution. Maybe the solutions aren't working for us because we haven't found the root cause. I challenge you to look deep and find your root cause. My root cause was the discipline of exercising. Another strategy in coaching is asking open ended questions. Ask yourself open ended questions, or better yet team up with a friend and ask each other. Find your root cause for being overweight, or whatever you are unhappy about. Then, do what ever it takes to fix it.

We sacrifice so much every day for things that don't take us to our ultimate goal. We need to quit wasting energy on things that are not that important to us, and focus on our priorities.