Last Day - First Day - Any Day

I was going to wait a few days before posting another one of these, but I just received an item on my e-mail ("Weight Loss Tea" PartnerAd@partner.beliefnet.com) which is for a tea that someone has starting promoting. And yes, there are testimonials galore about how fast it worked, how easy it is, how many pounds were lost, etc., etc., etc. And I believe them - I truly do. As I mentioned before, almost any eating program you try will get rid of the excess weight - some better than others, but they all work if you stick with them - but, therein lies the problem - how many of us "stick with them"? What I like about these ads is that they all have a free trial for 30 days, and if you are not satisfied, you will get all of your money back with no questions asked."money back guarantee" - I don't know about you, but it was more trouble that it was worth to send back the empty bottles and wait six to eight weeks to get my money back. I just chalked it up to what my daughters just absolutely hate for me to say to them "another learning experience". I've had more than my share of those, but I still bite once in a while, with the same results. The ad that really invited close inspection by me was the one using Hoodia. Hoodia has been touted for several years as the "magic pill" and when I first started looking into it seriously, I learned that because it was a special herb and only grew in certain places, the quantity was not great enough to bring it to the market en-mass. What a wonderful pre-marketing tool. Now that I knew it was not available, I wanted it even more. Now, it seems that enough can be grown to feed the millions who really want to get rid of their excess weight, but now I don't need or want it. But, if you look carefully at the directions, you will find that in order to get the best results you must eat light, healthy meals, with lots of vegetables, get a lot of exercise and drink water. Is there a diet plan on earth that doesn't require this? Yeah, there is, the cabbage soup diet, the bird seed diet, the grapefruit diet, and those other diets that pare your choices down to only one or two items of food. But by and large they are all about the same as far as I am concerned. I guess the gist of this is, whether you start today, the last day of 2007, or tomorrow, the first day of 2008, or any other day thereafter, you will not find that "magic pill" that will allow you to eat whatever you want, when you want and as much as you want and still reduce your body weight - It just ain't there, my friend. I am lucky, I have worked on my plan for a long enough period that I don't have to look for the latest and greatest diet on the planet. I went to the Texans football game yesterday (I live in the northwest part of the Greater Houston, Texas area) . My daughter Kathy and her husband Karl have season tickets, so we go to all of the home games. Normally I don't eat anything at the games because I really don't want most of what is available. I really don't want it, but yesterday I was hungry and ordered a foot-long all beef hot dog with all the trimmings. I ate most of it and was o.k. with that, but when I got home last night I felt absolutely horrible. I was bloated, I still had that stuffed feeling I always used to have when I ate too much, and I felt almost ill all night long. That's how far I've come. There was a time when I could have eaten all that, plus a fully loaded chocolate milkshake, french fries, a beer or two and still want dinner when I got home. Since I have been following my program religiously, I have weaned myself off of large portions of food, most fried foods, most sugar laden foods and most breads. Notice I said "most"? I have my sweets, my breads and my fried foods whenever I want them, but they really don't taste as good as they used to. The one important thing I learned about a good maintenance program is that if you stay on it long enough, you lose your taste for what you once considered "must have" foods. Hamburgers are greasy and tasteless to me, milkshakes are too sweet, as are most desserts that have sugar, breads are too filling and nothing tastes like I remember it did when I was eating those foods all the time. But what is really great about my plan is that I have no desire to eat these foods. I committed to a perfect body weight when I started my last eating program, and really worked on my frame of mind while I was on the plan - I didn't want to get back up to 195 lbs or any other weight above what my current weight is, so I changed my way of thinking about food and about myself - and it worked - for me. Anyone can reach this point if they really want to. I'm told that DESIRE, a true, unrelenting, compelling desire, is the first step to having what you really want. I have that desire and it has worked for me. I end this year as I did the year before, with a "HIP - HIP - HOORAY - I'M AT MY PERFECT BODY WEIGHT (THE WEIGHT I FEEL MOST COMFORTABLE WITH) and beginning the next year with a continuation of my success. Happy New Year! Talk at ya later. Nida

A New Day

As we come closer to the end of this year, I feel rather melancholy. I have spent almost an entire year thinking about creating a way to reach people like me who would like to learn how to make their lives happier. Thinking certainly isn't doing, is it? So, at the end of the year, I finally get around to "doing" it. I received a wonderful gift for Christmas this year from my daughter, Pam and Doug, my son-in-law - an i-pod. As I said before, I love this world of technology. The first thing I did was get out all my old c.d.s and load them onto my computer so I could get them on my new i-pod. Today I starting listening to some of the albums that I had forgotten I even had - one being some albums by Jana Stanfield. After listening to all three albums that I have, and becoming saturated with inspiration and love, which is what she is all about, I now am ready to start the new year. The lyrics to one of Jana's songs, "Wings of Eagles", so fits my mood today. "Deep inside me there’s this longing like a bird that needs to fly I’ve been captured by indecision but I was born to sail the sky. And I will fly on wings of eagles. I will sail on wings of change Unencumbered by the past, I face the new day unafraid Life is rich with possibilities. This is my moment, my time to shine. All it takes is a leap faith and on wings of eagles I will fly. There’s a stirring in my spirit telling me I’m free to fly. There’s a small voice, I can hear it telling me it’s time to try. And I will fly on wings of eagles. I will sail on wings of change, Unencumbered by the past, I face the new day unafraid Life is rich with possibilities. This is my moment, my time to shine. All it takes is a leap faith and on wings of eagles I will fly. I am ready to let go of the fear that held me back. I am ready to spread my wings and make a difference that will last. And I will fly on wings of eagles. I will sail on wings of change, Unencumbered by the past, I face the new day unafraid Life is rich with possibilities. This is my moment, my time to shine. All it takes is a leap faith and on wings of eagles I will fly." Is that not beautiful? It gives me courage today to push on toward my dream of helping others who really have the desire to release unwanted excess body weight and learn how to keep it off for the rest of thier lives. First, let me tell you a little about myself and my journey to success in this area. As I stated before, I have been on practically every diet known to man, and got rid of the excess pounds I wanted to get rid of, only to have them come back again with some unwanted friends. I think I have three or four Lifetime Weight Watcher Pins - you know - the ones you get when you have achieved your weight goal and kept it off for a certain period of time. When I reached my maximum weight of 195 lbs. it scared me and then when I went to the doctor for my regular check up and he told me that my blood pressure was too high and I needed to start taking blood pressure medicine, I had thyroid problems and would have to start taking thyroid medicine, my chloesterol was too high and would need to take medicine for that and that I was overweight and needed to lose weight. Well, I knew that, but the other - that is when I really started getting scared. I was not a pill taking person. I was extremely healthy - "was" being the operative word. But, that was when I woke up to the fact that I was ruining my health with my poor eating habits and just had to do something about it. And I did. I found another eating program (that's a more acceptable way of saying "diet") that got most of the weight off - but I still hadn't found the secret to keeping it off - not until I read some very insightful books and learned that my problem was not with the foods I was eating, or the amounts. Of course, only common sense would tell you that if you put more into your body than you used up your body would expand to hold the excess - but that still was not the problem. The problem was in the way I thought about food and myself. Once I had accepted that fact, I was then ready to move on to the steps that needed to be taken to change my thinking. A few simple steps was all that was necessary to change my entire preception about myself and my body. During the next several weeks, I am going to share with you my experiences regarding these changes. But, for now, I want to wish you all a Happy Ending to 2007 and a very Happy beginning to 2008. Happy New Year! Talk at ya later! adinear P.S. By the way, I no longer am on any medications. Because I got rid of those excess pounds, my blood pressure and chloestral went down and my thyroid went back to normal. That is one of the successes I have found in my quest for a "Perfect body weight".

Design Your Own Body

Once upon a time, a long time ago, there was a young teenage girl who was 5" 7" tall and weighed a delightful 135 lbs. Like, I said, it was a long time ago. That young girl matured, married, had two daughters and learned how to turn that 135 lb. body into a 195 lb. body. Now, it wasn't easy. There were a lot of ups and downs - more ups after the downs, however. She became what is now known as a Yo-Yo dieter - that was long before the name was coined. Over approximately 40 years, she had tried almost every diet known to man, and they all worked. She got rid of the extra weight each time she dieted, no matter which diet she chose - yes, even the "Cabbage Soup" diet, which almost did her in. But, true to the name, what went down soon came back up, just alike a yo-yo. Then, one day, in fact it was the day she got on the scales and that 195 figure jumped up and hit her in the face, she decided that she really, really was going to do something about the weight. But, this time she was going to find a way to keep it down - for the rest of her life, and she found the secret. So you see, this story really does have a happy ending. There may not be a handsome prince who swept her off her feet and took her to the castle to live happily ever after, but there is a built in Genie who has shown her the path to follow to find that perfect weight body and keep it perfect for the rest of her life, which is as far as she is concerned is as good as a castle filled with riches and a handlsome prince. Who knows, the handsome prince may not be far behind. Not only that, she now knew that since she had found a way to maintain her perfect body weight, she could now be the Genie that could pass the secret on to anyone and everyone who was interested. You have probably guessed that I am that once young, slim, trim girl and I have many stories to tell, which is why I set up this blog. I love this technological world - a year ago I had never heard of a "blog" and now I have one. The end of the year seemed like a good time to begin a new activity, so I will have the entire next year to share my journey with you, and get you on the track to your perfect body. Before I sign off today, I want to let you know what my definition of a "perfect body" is. It is not what you see on TV or in the magazines as those thin, beautiful models who wear those beautiful, revealing clothes - it is someone who is pleased with the way they look no matter what size they are. Your perfect body weight is whatever feels good to you. No one else's opinion matters - just your's. So, whatever feels good to you is what you are striving for - cause, if you're happy, everyone else around you is happy. Talk at ya later. Nida