Meet Our Members and Goals

We are so excited to get going on this journey! Stay tuned for pictures of our 3 members in attendance today and follow along to see our progress throughout time. The three of us added a motivational strategy that we all decided to participate in. This strategy will be applied only to those wishing to participate. Sadly, money plays a huge role in our lives, and therefore in our motivation. Each weigh-in, we'll each be paying $3. At the end of the month, if the member has maintained their weight or lost weight, they'll get their money back. However, if they have a gain at the end of the month, that money goes towards future contest prizes. Our hope is that we can recycle the same $12 every month :)

Today's meeting was about goal setting. Most of the info here came from the site www.mindtools.com.
Goals give us direction in life and when achieved, they peak our motivation. We need to have a life-long goal that we divide into smaller more achievable goals. For instance, if our over all goal is to be healthy, we need to determine in our lives the things we need to change in order to get closer to that goal. For me, I need to give up sweets, exercise more, look on the bright side, and be careful about my portions. There are many more, but these are just some examples. I've even made food journals that have a section for daily goals at the bottom. We can achieve almost anything a day at a time.

Now, since this group is about overall health, I would encourage you to make goals in all areas of life. A well-rounded person is a happy person. Besides, if you're like me and struggle a lot in the weight-loss field, you need to have other goals you are achieving to empower you, so you feel you can accomplish your health goals. Some areas for goal setting include (but are not limited to)

• Artistic
• Attitude
• Career
• Education - not just school, but educating yourself in all areas
• Family - Do you want to be an example to your family? Do you want to be a good, active parent?
• Financial
• Physical
• Public Service - this group is one of my public service goals. I would like to help as many people as possible, as well as myself.

Make sure you prioritize these goals so you don't get bogged down. If you're struggling with one of your higher priority goals, go after a lower one, so you can feel successful. Remember, success is the best motivator. Also, make sure these are goals YOU want to achieve, not that OTHERS want you to. You have to learn to do things for yourself, with or without validation from others.

As you make progress towards your goals, make sure to go back and review what lessons you've learned in trying to obtain those goals. I would encourage you, as you write your goals down, to make a section for "lessons learned" so you can see you are progressing, even if your goals aren't always met.

Here are some goal setting tips:

• State each goal as a positive statement
• Be precise - not "I want to be healthy", but "I want to be healthier by..."
• Set priorities
• Write goals down - I would suggest sharing them with a friend (or on here) to help hold you more accountable
• Keep operational goals small - If you have 100 lbs to lose, break it down into smaller segments, like 5-10 lbs. That way you don't get swallowed up and overwhelmed.
• Set performance goals, not outcome goals - I can't stress this enough! Back when I was training for a marathon, all I could think about was losing my last 20 lbs. Well, my body rebelled and I couldn't lose weight to save my life. I got so frustrated that after I did my marathon, I gave into temptation more often, and you guessed it, I slowly started to gain my weight back. I couldn't control the outcome of my efforts, but I could control my efforts. I overlooked the fact that I was happier and healthier than I had ever been. If I was happy that I was eating the way I was supposed to and exercising the way I was supposed to and saw those two things as my goals (rather than trying to reach a certain outcome), I would be much closer to that healthy, happy place than I am now.
• Set realistic goals - I could never set the goal to be a size 0, because I'm just not made to be. You want your goals to be achievable... You also want them to push you so you feel accomplished when you achieve them :)

An easy way to remember how to set goals is to remember SMART:

• Specific
• Measureable - not "I'm going to eat more veggies", but "I'm going to eat 3 servings of veggies a day"
• Attainable
• Relevant - they must be important to you
• Time-bound - give yourself a timetable to keep you on track.

If you've achieved your short-term goals too easily, make them harder the next time. If you're having a hard time achieving them, make them a little easier. Don't forget that your goals can and need to be flexible.

I challenge you to come up with some goals for the month and break it down into weeks (or days). Let us know what they are and let us know at the end of the month how they worked out for you. Here are our weight-loss and health goals for the month. (Remember, everything posted on here is done with permission from each member. If you choose to join, it can be completely anonymous.) 

Meet me at my current weight (no, I'm not happy about posting these, but it will motivate me to get back to the way I looked a few years ago).

My goals this month (for health) are to lose 8 lbs, to not eat sugar (except ONE dessert on Thanksgiving Day), and to leave at least 2 bites on my plate every time I eat (to get rid of my mentality that I need to clean my plate).

Meet Rebecca

Rebecca's goals this month are to eat 5 servings of veggies per day in week one, she's also on the NO sugar NOvember bandwagon, and she too, would like to lose 8 lbs.

Meet Clarissa

Clarissa would like to lose 8 lbs this month and is also not eating sugar this month.

We've set a group goal for the month to lose 12 lbs. The group goal will always be 1 lb per week per member (only the members trying to lose weight).

Please join us on here!!! We want to hear your goals, comments, questions, encouragement, successes, discouragements, etc... Remember, we're all here for each other! Whether or not you can come to the actual meetings doesn't matter. Everyone who wants to participate is welcome!

Next week will be our "Healthy Thanksgiving Recipe Exchange" week. We are super excited!

If you would like me to send you goal worksheet ideas, I'd be happy to! You can email me at jerushka@hotmail.com. Just make sure you put Join Our Journey (or JOJ) in the subject heading so it won't get tossed out with the junk mail.