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Health & Fitness

What's The Payoff For You Losing Weight?

Understanding your emotional drivers for wanting change will take your approach from being motivated to change (so you can feel better) to being truly moved and inspired about where you are going.

I’ve talked about how important it is to be at peace with where you are so you stop focusing on your current condition and can then give your undivided attention to where you are going. However, just knowing what the physical results are going to be is still very surface-oriented. There is no real skin in the game. Just like when you thought your current body condition was the cause for you feeling bad you thought having a new body would be the reason for you to feel good. In fact, everything we want in this physical world we want for the reason we think in having it we will feel better. Hopefully you now get that the outside world is not responsible for how you feel, it’s your choice to feel how you feel about anything (including your body), and that the work is as much an internal one as it is an external one—if not more. What helps to make this journey more meaningful is to truly understand what the payoff is for attaining your goals. What is the emotional payoff? Once you understand what this is you will have something that ignites and inspires you since you will be driven by a conscious emotional payoff—this helps you become truly invested. The great thing is once you know what this emotional payoff is you can put yourself in this emotional state before you get there and that will help speed up your results.

To understand WHY you want what you want (emotionally) ask yourself “what will having this (your goal) provide for me in my life that I don’t already have?” Let’s say you want to be a lean size 6 with flat abs. What will being a lean size 6 with flat abs provide for you in your life that you don’t have now? Your answer may be something like “confidence.” Take a moment to feel what that would feel like to have that confidence. Are you truly moved and inspired by that? Chances are it will feel good but you won’t be truly moved and inspired (moved and inspired should invoke a feeling like elation, chills or even be moved to tears—you’ll know it when you feel it).

Since I have yet to have anyone get to a truly moved and inspired place on their first answer I always ask this question again—using their last answer to reframe the question. In this case, what would having more confidence provide for you in your life that you don’t already have? Let’s say you will have a better relationship with your lover. Imagine that for a moment. Are you truly moved and inspired yet? You should feel more positive emotion but chances are you are not there yet. Ask this question again using your last answer. Even if you think you have your final answer, ask it again just to make sure. Continuing with the same example, what would having a better relationship provide for you in your life that you don’t have now? Let’s say your answer is “a deeper feeling of love.” Relish in that for a moment. Something like this might be the end for you. You might be brought to tears from the thought of something like this but just to make sure ask yourself this question again. What would a deeper feeling of love provide for you in your life that you don’t have now? You might answer “a feeling of pure unconditional love and connection with not only my partner but myself.”

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Once you get to a place where you are truly moved and inspired (note: you may have to ask this up to ten times to get there—it is not an easy thing to do your first time) take a few moments to play with this emotion and all the general things that come with it (like various actions and other words to express the feeling and experience). Try to stay in this emotion by rambling on about this in your own mind for about minute to ninety seconds. Allow yourself to resonate with this emotion. This is your payoff. You want what you want because you want to experience this. This is really what you want. You are simply using your body and health as the carrot to get there. But you should now understand that in order to accomplish your goal you have to be this person first. You must be and feel the love and connection you want first. The more you can maintain this state the quicker your body will change. However, you should want to be in this state because it feels good to be in this state, not so you can just bring about the thing you want. The thing you want is the icing on the cake. It is the physical culmination of you being who you were really meant to be. Being who you truly are, which is love and connection, allows the things to change and come into your life with ease.

One way to help you practice being in this state is to think of moments in your life, past and present, where you experience or have experienced this state. It does not have to relate to your body. By finding moments where you felt this before—even if it was when you were six when you first learned to tie your shoe—you now have things to reflect on to put yourself in this state. Remember, this is what you want to experience. Focus on this state as often as possible. And as time goes, you can start to look for things in regard to your current body that allow you to feel this way. You can look for things in your current body that allow you to feel this love and connection (or whatever your payoff is). Let this be your driving force. I guarantee you that your actions, when done in the guise of this emotional payoff, will not only pay more dividends but you enjoy your actions much more. Taking action when you are inspired is effortless—the next logical step. Taking action to change your physical condition so you can feel better is a long, long road. You want what you want to feel better. You are an emotional being and everything you do is to incite a feeling. It is our nature to feel good. Get to the feeling place first and everything else takes care of itself.

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Lastly, when you spend time thinking about what you want in regard to your body or even when you notice things that show you bits of success pay attention to how you feel. You should notice the essence of this feeling. If not, get into that feeling place first by focusing on something that allows you to move into that state and then think about what you want or look for current bits of success.

For more blog posts visit http://fitness-werks.com/blog/

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