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12 STEPS TO SUCCESS…
The 12 week program looks at the following specific areas
Week 1:
Taking the Most Important Step - Deciding what it is you want
Week 2:
Making it Real - Be clear why you’re here and what it is you really want
Week 3
What’s the Challenge?
Week 4
Progress on Progress - Chunk it down for even better results
Week 5
Building a Head of Steam - Seeing what you want & getting what you see.
Week 6
Reality Check - Using feedback to your advantage
Week 7
Taking the Brakes Off – Challenge & change your Limiting Beliefs and eliminate your inner critic
Week 8
The Greatest Help of All - Your coach
Week 9
The Success Habit - Getting what you focus on
Week 10
Sweet & Sour: Celebrations & Challenges
Week 11
What Works Best for Me?
Week 12
Journey’s End: A New Beginning…
Week 1
Taking the Most Important Step - Deciding what it is you want
At this stage of your journey, it is not necessary to know exactly how you are going to get to where you want to be.
The most important thing is to figure out where there actually is!
If you are clear on the what, your head will take care of the how.
Your Key Introductory Questions:
1. Why do you want to achieve a weight loss of —– lbs?
2. What does success look like for you? (Visualise)
3. How will that make you feel?
4. What specific challenges or concerns are you facing at the moment?
2 Steps for Success:
1. Take an “Ideal Weight Picture” (a picture of the way you want to look) and on the back of it write down all of the reasons why you want to be here again, all of the benefits and advantages of getting back to this weight and all of the positive feelings you will have as a result of achieving your ideal weight.
2. Now take a “Road to Success Photo” of yourself on day 1 and on the back of it write down the main reasons why you want to move away from this weight, the disadvantages of ignoring your body as it is today and what is driving the desire to change this picture?
Week 2
Making it Real - Be clear why you’re here and what it is you really want
“Decide on your major definite purpose in following the Weigh Less Program and then organise all your activities around it, what do you need to do to achieve your goal?”
Key activities include the planning and preparation for both eating and exercise, with time and emphasis given over to keeping and reviewing your diary and your behaviour.
The most important factor which dictates the level of success in the Weigh Less Program is the level of clarity around the “Why” you want to change your behaviours in relation to both eating and exercising.
Absolute clarity of vision gives clear direction in the steps that have to be taken
Through quiet reflection in the coming weeks you need to look at
· Your motives
· Your fears
· Your desires
· Your goals
o And most of all your possible solutions…
Don’t give up…you may never know success if you stop trying one attempt too soon…
Week 3
What’s the Challenge?
On week 3 our participants look at limiting beliefs and their coach will help them and motivate them to identify these. You can identify your limiting beliefs on our home program
Believe in Yourself and Believe You Can Do It!
“Whether your call it self esteem, self confidence, or self assurance, it is a deep seated belief that you have what it takes - the abilities, the inner resources, talents, and skills to create your desired results”
JACK CANFIELD
America’s Leading Success Coach
Confidence and self-esteem are not a result of genetics or intelligence and they are not a result of luck. They are mental processes and skills. The psychology of confidence is an extraordinary combination of techniques which are based on the principle that all behaviour has an identifiable structure which can be learned and changed, with remarkable results; but you must be willing to challenge your behaviour and change it.
Forget the phrase “I can’t” and any other limiting beliefs…
Using words like “I can’t” disempower and weaken you. …I can’t give up sweets, I can’t give up the things I like, I can’t eat smaller portions, I can’t get in to exercise
“If you can’t you must, if you must, you can”
ANTHONY ROBBINS
Author & Success Coach
Using the Weigh Less Action Change Technique (ACT), take every opportunity to replace an existing or former limiting belief with a positive affirmative statement (PAS). If you look for the positive you will find it, if you look for the negative; guess what; the same is true!
With ACT you turn negative statements in to more positive ones for example
Limiting Belief “I can’t give up snacking”
PAS “In order for me to achieve my goal weight, I am happy to allow myself a maximum of 2 snacks per day, one on the morning and one in the afternoon”
Week 4
Progress on Progress - Chunk it down for even better results
The best way to achieve your big goal is to break it down in to smaller steps that will bring you to where you want to be and then achieve the smaller steps one by one. So instead of saying I have to or want to lose 2 stone (13 kgs) think of it as losing 1.5 to 2 pounds (.5-1 kg) per week…how much more manageable does that sound?
We coach our participants and motivate them to assess and constantly improve their progress; you can now look at your progress through completing the following exercise.
Look now at your goal and what you have done over the last 4 weeks:
How have I achieved this, what have been my specific steps?
1. ———————————————————
2. ———————————————————
3. ———————————————————
4. ———————————————————
5. ———————————————————
Why have I achieved this, why has it been a success?
1. ———————————————————
2. ———————————————————
3. ———————————————————
4. ———————————————————
5. ———————————————————
How does it make me feel to have achieved my current level of success?
1. ———————————————————
2. ———————————————————
3. ———————————————————
4. ———————————————————
5. ———————————————————
Breaking Your Goal down in to Smaller More Manageable steps
If you look at other things you have previously planned such as a party, a holiday a business project, it is likely that you have taken small and specific action steps to achieve this. Let’s take for example a holiday, these steps include:
· Deciding where it is you actually want to go
· Deciding what you have to do to get there i.e. mode of travel, maps and destination routes, outbound destinations etc
· Deciding when you will go i.e. dates, times, length of stay, planning annual leave dates with your employer, planning cover for work etc
· Deciding how much your holiday budget is going to be i.e. cost of getting there, cost of living, entertainment, excursions etc
· Deciding what route you will take
· Deciding what tours, events, trips you will take when you get there
· Buying a guide book to research your destination
In other words you don’t just arrive at your destination and enjoy a holiday, you plan it!
“Failing to Plan is Planning to fail”
Look now at the steps you need to plan to take or continue to take for continued success
Week 5
Building a Head of Steam - Seeing what you want & getting what you see.
Your RAS is the automatic mechanism inside your brain that brings relevant information to your attention. Your reticular activating system is like a filter between your conscious mind and your subconscious mind. It takes instructions from your conscious mind and passes them on to your subconscious.
The Reticular Activating System (RAS) in our brain has received attention from Neuro Scientists interested in various pathological conditions affecting behavior. Your RAS plays a vital part in your ability to achieve goals.
There are some interesting points about your reticular activating system that make it an essential tool for achieving goals.
You can deliberately program the reticular activating system by choosing the exact messages you send from your conscious mind. For example, you can set goals, or say affirmations, or visualise your goals. Napoleon Hill said that we can achieve any realistic goal if we keep on thinking of that goal, and stop thinking any negative thoughts about it. Of course, if we keep thinking that we can’t achieve a goal; our subconscious will do the same thing… “Help” us…not to achieve it.
Our coaches help participants to create a very specific picture of their goal in their conscious mind. Use the following exercise to help your RAS now.
Close your eyes and visualise how you look at your ideal weight. It might also be useful to think back to a time when you were at your ideal weight and re live a specific situation in your mind. If you can’t remember that picture build a new one, a better one.
Think now about the following questions:
· Where are you (think about the place in relation to every single detail)
· Who is with you (every detail)
· How do these people make you feel (every emotion)
· What you are wearing
o Your dress or skirt
o Your top/your coat or jacket
o Your shoes
o Your accessories and jewellery
o Your hair
o What kind of material is in the clothes/accessories
o How are they designed (shape, look, etc)
· How do you feel in the clothes you are wearing
· What are the people around you telling you about how well you are looking
· How do you feel
During the above exercise keep focusing on the sounds, smells, emotions and feelings around you. Research shows that this accelerates your vision forward.
You can also use printed pictures to help you; this is why keeping focused on your Ideal Weight Picture is so important.
Week 6
Reality Check - Using feedback to your advantage
A participant’s weekly weigh is one of the measures of feedback on this program, increasing their accountability to themselves as they achieve their goal.
There is no such thing as negative feedback, all feedback is positive if you choose to learn something from it; as it can tell you whether or not you are on or off course, how near or far you are from your goals and what you can do to improve your specific actions to ensure that you reach your goals and maintain them when you do reach them.
Feedback on the Weigh Less Program include results (both on and off on the scales), assessment and evaluation of commitment to aspects of the program such as your daily or weekly diary and so on. On our home program you can use these tools to assess your own “Reality Check”.
It is vital that we look upon all feedback as very valuable information. One of the most important steps you can take on this program is to change the way you feel about perceived “negative feedback” and the way in which you respond to feedback to ensure you work it and it does not work you.
If you have perceived that you have had negative feedback from yourself, your family, your friends or any other person supporting you on the Weigh Less program ask yourself the following questions:
1. Where can I improve what I am doing?
2. What specific steps do I need to take to improve what I am doing in the areas identified?
3. What can I do better?
4. Where can I correct my behaviour?
Are you on course or are you off course?
Week 7
Taking the Brakes Off – Challenging Limiting Beliefs and Changing Your Behaviour for Good
“You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you”
JAMES ALLEN
Author of As a Man Thinketh
Congratulations on making it over half way though the Weigh Less Program!
Now that you’ve made it this far we are going to take the brakes off; help you to surpass your limiting beliefs and change the internal critic within you to propel you to achieving your goal.
There is evidence to suggest that our thoughts have a powerful effect on us and can actually control our behaviour. Quite simply Positive Thoughts have a Positive Effect on the body and negative thoughts have a negative effect.
Learning to talk to yourself in a positive way is one of the key factors to success in everything you do, including the Weigh Less Program.
So how do you go about challenging and changing negative self talk, negative thoughts and transforming them in to positive ones?
Firstly you have to become aware of what your limiting thoughts actually are. Secondly you have challenge them, why are they there, what triggers them, how do they make you feel etc
Finally you have to re program your thoughts and replace each and every one of them with more positive and affirming thoughts.
Remember ACT?
Have you taken every opportunity to replace any existing or former limiting belief with a positive affirmative statement?
Remember our example
Limiting Belief “I can’t give up snacking”
ACT “In order for me to achieve my goal weight, I am happy to allow myself a maximum of 2 snacks per day, one on the morning and one in the afternoon”
Week 8
The Greatest Help of All (Coach/Accountability partner)
When you attend the Weigh Less face to face meeting your coach will enable you to:
· Establish and clarify your vision for yourself
· Establish and clarify your Weigh Less goals
· Establish and clarify your top personal priorities
· Establish and clarify your Weigh Less action plan
· Establish and clarify your personal fears and mental blocks
Accountability is one of the most important factors for success on the Weigh Less Program and so you will need to nominate an Accountability Partner.
Accountability is a willingness to accept the responsibility for the goal you have set and do what is required to achieve it. Similar to a business mentor, coach or a personal coach an Accountability Partner is a trusted and respected person that will act as a goal-setting advisor and supporter. They should challenge, motivate, mentor, encourage and inspire you to achieve optimum results.
You may wish to nominate an Accountability Partner, someone whom you meet with or talk to regularly and agree to a set of goals that you are working towards. During your talk with them they hold you accountable for setting your goals, measuring your goals, achieving your goals and making further progress.
Week 9
The Success Habit (Staying Focused)
In order to lose weight there are some bad habits that you quite simply will have to change. They are what have contributed to you being overweight or unfit in the first place. But if we are unaware of our habits how can we change them?
One of the main reasons why people regain the weight they have lost on a diet is because they do not challenge their bad habits and take the necessary actions to try to make permanent and lasting positive changes.
Challenging and changing your behaviour includes the following process:
Defining existing behaviour, both positive and negative habits.
Replacing poor habits with good habits
Replacing good habits with better habits
In the exercise below take the key old bad habits which limited your success on previous diets and opposite fill in the new good habits which you have changed and successfully achieved on the Weigh Less Program. This exercise should be completed based upon your experience over the last 2 months and any changes that you have now effected in your behaviour.
If you have changed more than 5 continue this exercise on a separate sheet. If you have changed less than 5 use this exercise to re focus on your goal and look at what you are doing that you could do better.
OLD BAD HABITS NEW GOOD HABITS
1. —————————. —————————–
2. —————————-. —————————–
3. —————————-. —————————–
4. —————————-. —————————–
5. —————————-. —————————–
Have you identified your most significant bad habits?
Can you say you have changed 5 bad habits, or developed 5 good habits to replace them?
Did you have more or less then 5 habits to change or improve on? If you have successfully achieved more than 5 well done!
Week 10
Sweet & Sour: Celebrations & Challenges
Challenges:
· The Discipline Challenge (Resisting Temptation) Examples of this type of challenge may involve Social Events, Holidays, Festive Occasions, Lifestyle or Life Events
o Recognise the incident: STOP AND CONSIDER
o Assess the implications of proceeding or not proceeding (giving in!)
o Commit to a decision and enjoy the outcome
o Ask yourself “What have I learned”?
· The Maintenance Challenge (Maintaining Good Habits) Examples of this type of challenge might include maintaining focus and keeping up accountability with your diary or accountability partner
o Recognise the specifics of what has worked and why it has worked (in particular recognise the changes in behaviour that have brought positive results)
o Decide on the ongoing outcome you wish to achieve
o Define and confirm the specific course of action required
o Commit to that course of action, building in feedback and accountability
· The External Challenge Examples of this challenge might include People and Events
o Recognise the challenge
o Assess the challenge
o Confirm the outcome that you want to achieve, taking in to account the impact on the people or events
o Take action to achieve your outcome
Celebrations:
Celebration of your success is something that everyone should make time for on this program, as well as bringing excitement and fun to the program it gives it meaning and purpose thus increasing your chances of further and continued success.
It is of course important and more beneficial to you that on the Weigh Less Program you don’t reward yourself with food!
Make a list of the things you would like as a reward to celebrate your achievement, if you haven’t already done so reward yourself this week!
Remember to reward the small victories as they’re what get you to the big goal!
Week 11
What Works Best for Me?
“Our lives improve only when we take chances – and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves”
WALTER ANDERSON
Editor, Parade Magazine
In order to confirm the specific actions and habits that have brought positive results and have worked for you; reflect now on your daily and weekly diary, to establish the 5 things that have worked best for you on the Weigh Less Program in achieving your weight loss to date:
What Has Worked for Me?
1. ————————————————-.
2. ————————————————-.
3. ————————————————-.
4. ————————————————-.
5. ————————————————.
Successful people also face what isn’t working and address it. They look at the circumstances…the warning signs…the excuses…and no matter how uncomfortable it might be, they take action to change it.
Week 12
Journey’s End: A New Beginning!
Congratulations on completing 12 weeks of the Weigh Less Program.
Please Answer the 5 Concluding Questions following your completion of the Primary Program:
Compared to what I set out to achieve and what I have actually achieved, how have I done (Give a minimum of three answers!):
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What have you learned about yourself, your habits and your behaviour?
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What specific changes have you introduced in to your life that you intend to retain in each of the following areas?
Food
Fitness
Behaviour and Motivation
What are the next steps (detail the specific course of action required to complete objectives, maintain objectives or build on objectives achieved including process of review and feedback and accountability.
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We would really appreciate your views on the home program. If you have any feedback to give us please email it to weighless@healthforce.ie