196: Be Happy Without Losing Weight

When’s the last time you felt really happy, like, really happy and you didn’t have to earn it, you didn’t have to work towards it, you didn’t have to clean up or do anything in order to be happy. 

Is that even like a reality for you? My name is Derra Thomasson, and I am A Coach for Quilters, and this is episode 196, Be Happy Without Losing Weight, the Quilters Coach Podcast. 

All right, ladies and gents, but my stats say there aren’t many guys listen to this. I wanna ask you some questions. Let’s do this, and then we’re gonna share a win for one of my clients, and then we’re gonna get a really helpful tool. It’s gonna help you so much, I promise you after listening to this podcast, you can’t unknow what you learn, right? And this is gonna be so, so helpful.

Alright, so let’s do this little activity, so “when I blank, then I can blank,” so when I finish the dishes, then I can go sit down. When I lose the weight, then I can feel good about myself. When I get an award at the quilt show, then I can be a real quilter.When someone pays me to speak, then I’m professional speaker. I don’t know, when I’m retired, then I can be happy or I can relax or when this kitchen renovation is over, then I will be able to feel good about myself. When I’m married, when my kids leave the home, when when when, how and I’m going to be very bold here, but I have a feeling that a lot of people  have lived their life this way. 

So which means they haven’t truly lived  the plateau effect.Okay? When I’m this, then I can feel this way, but then when you get there, you still realize, oh, wait a minute, I’m not that happy or it hasn’t changed yet, or maybe I guess it’s something else. 

Okay, so we’re gonna teach you a tool today. It’s gonna help with that. Now before I do, I do want to share a win from one of my in the membership. 

So I have a membership, a lifetime membership called Love Yourself then.And in that membership, we learn that weight loss is never about the food. And in that membership, we have life coaching tools to help us get to the root of why we overeat or why we always feel exhausted and we feel like we don’t really get that much done, or why we keep saying yes to everyone else and never saying yes to us, or why we’re feeling guilty all the time. 

So these are the kinds of things that we work on inside my membership so that you can guarantee permanent weight loss.And in fact, I even have a 20lbs down in 90 day money back guarantee when people join my membership. 

So one of the ladies of my membership, she’s gained some weight back and she’s been trying to understand why now. In the past, it was blame. Well, with my husband, he just always, he just eats so much and he snacks all the time. So why can’t I? Is this not fair or shame of, I’m not good enough no matter what I do. Clearly, this doesn’t work for me. I’m not smart enough, I’m not good enough, I’m deficient. I, something’s wrong with me.

Okay, so the funnest thing about this member and the membership is that she’s put a little bit of weight back on, but guess what she’s not shaming herself, and she’s not blaming anyone else. She’s actually saying, why am I getting this weight back? Oh, my dad talked a lot about, weight, and I, you know, that was that there was a lot of connection with, like, if I wanted my dad’s approval, I needed to be overweight.Okay, that’s interesting, right? So now she’s actually thinking, and she’s able to be […0.6s] more neutral and more curious of like, hmm, I wonder what is keeping me, cause I sure I sure I like being someone who doesn’t have to worry about type 2 diabetes. And I sure liked it when I was 80 pounds down. I sure liked that. I don’t really like having this extra 20 pounds. Now that does it feel good to me. So what, what is it? And it’s been so awesome to watch, so awesome.

She’s finally changing the, she’s changing the way that she’s looking at things, which just brings so much, just so much  freedom, right? I love it. 

Okay, so in the when you think about this, “if, when,” what does that actually, what is that actually saying?

It’s saying you’re very conditional. Okay. And the, so when we are conditional, so it’s saying, when I am this way, then I can feel good. 

Now imagine that you talk to your kids this way. Imagine if you said, “oh, you’re just not as tall as I’d like you to be” and “oh, I was really hoping you’d get 10 points in that basketball game and you didn’t. I don’t think you’re gonna be getting those new basketball shoes,” Or, “ah, man, I you’re not, you are not as cute as those other kids and they sing better than you, so maybe we need to do some maybe you need to go live with someone else, right?” 

Imagine. Could you ever imagine talking to your kids that way?

Or to your nephews or to your friends. I was like, oh man, I am, “you’re embarrassing to walk with ’cause you’re wearing, you’re not wearing like super cool jeans.” 

But how often do you talk to yourself that way? So I have some questions here. So first, before I go to the questions, I want you to start thinking, what are my, when I blank, then I.

And I’m gonna share. I like stories. So I grew up with a mom who was addicted to renovating, which is, of all the things you could be addicted to, that’s actually not so bad, right? Because she had, I have five siblings. We learned how to work, we learned how to strip wallpaper. We learned how to sand.

We learned how to clean up after the workers. We learned how to do all sorts of jobs. And in fact, there’s no question like it’s, there’s no wonder that all of us, all of our kids have renovated lots of houses and we kind of like that. It’s a, it’s exciting, right? To take something that’s not so pretty.

Or it’s outdated and we can have a vision for it, and then we can make it happen. So it’s very exciting. 

But it also can be a curse. My husband and I have renovated how many houses? So many. Our first house we bought renovated that house, new kitchen, painted everything drywalled, the basement, did everything.

We did our house in. Yes, in Red Deer. We did two houses in Red Deer. Actually we renovated in Toronto when we lived there. Two houses in a small town in Alberta. And a house in another town in Alberta, like probably 10 houses. We’ve renovated. And it was interesting. So this is before coaching BC, Before Coaching.

And a lot of my worth, and I’m embarrassed to say this, but it’s the truth, had to do with how pretty my house was. And I gotta tell you, I had some really pretty houses because I renovated a lot of houses and I made them really pretty and I put a lot of work into them and I was really proud of them.

And then we moved here to the island and the house. The housing costs are, we’re crazy here. And we bought a very bland bungalow, tan everything with no granite countertops, no tile. It was all like, I know I sound like a snob. I do sound like a snob. I get it. But we lived in some really beautiful homes and, what we spent on this house was ridiculous, compared to what we had before. 

So anyways, my ego, my self-worth, my need for external approval plummeted. When we moved here, I was embarrassed. It was. So hard for me. I didn’t want to invite people over. The house seemed so small and it was so ugly, although we lived on a beautiful piece of property and we had actually like land that we’d never had before, but the house was not that great and it didn’t really fit our home, our family, and so we had to convert the garage into my studio and my daughter’s bedroom.

It was tough. It was and it was hard like going from a really pretty really pretty homes, lots of space and lots of beauty to blah. And we didn’t have the money. We’re not the kind of people that go into debt for anything really. And other than like just a mortgage. But even our cars, like we save for a car and we drive it till it pretty much dies.

So the reason I’m sharing this with you is that so many of us think that in order for us to feel good, we have to lose the weight and we have to grind it out and even for me, it was so interesting as I, had this house and we and we also had a, when we bought this house, we also actually bought a rental as well, because the people who bought our house had a house in Nanaimo. It was a rental upstairs and downstairs, and it was too small for our family. So we had this rental property, plus the house that we bought, which was amazing. But it also meant that we didn’t have the resources and we weren’t willing to get a take a loan and renovate. So I had to make a decision.

I had to decide, okay, am I going to enjoy my house or am I gonna mope? Am I gonna complain? Am I gonna whine? Am I gonna just be depressed and I’m just gonna feel sorry for myself? And actually, I did that for a while. I did. I know I’m a little embarrassed, but That’s okay. It’s okay. But then I found coaching and I started to see things in a different perspective, and then what started happening was I was able to get curious and we were actually able to sell our rental and that gave us an opportunity to. And actually the day we bought our house, we booked a contractor who was amazing and we knew it was like a year or two out, and we eventually got permission from the region to build.

And I just, I. I just went through it and got the plans and was able, and we were able to sell our other house so that we could pay for this addition. And but during that whole process I started realizing, “okay, this house is ugly. It’s the ugliest house I’ve ever had, but it actually takes care of my kids.”

Like they, we don’t have, it rains a lot here. It’s like they don’t have to sleep outside. And I’ve had, I had dinner parties of 50 people and the kitchen was so ugly and it was so weirdly designed and it was not great. Like they weren’t, it wasn’t super high end anything really. And but I thought I can have a dinner party for 50 people.

And these people enjoy themselves. They actually don’t care. I can take care of my whole, all of my kids. I don’t need to have a fancy this and a fancy that. I can have a lot of really great memories with my kids. We can do things outside that we never did before and it was really fascinating to watch because I started to appreciate this ugly house and it wasn’t so ugly anymore.

And now seven, almost eight years later, I’m just about finished with this renovation of this kitchen. And we took out a wall. We took out we had to, we actually had to get the floors all redone and we had to add new floors and bring them together where the, there was a front room and we took that wall out and then the kitchen had lino in it.

But then we got the matching floor and my husband and my sons, they. Put that in. And then we had to, we got these guys to come in and resend and then re-stain. And it’s all nice now. And we have this huge, beautiful kitchen. It’s crazy. I actually, when I designed it, I didn’t realize like how big and beautiful it was gonna be.

And yesterday was the first day that I put the groceries away and I came in and the countertops were all done. It was so pretty and I thought, “huh. This is my kitchen now,” and but I started to learn to love that kitchen as it was falling apart, as there were things that were degrading. 

I had, we had, like my son stepped on the bottom of the fridge, so we had water damage. And then the fridge broke, broke. And then we had this weird ugly black one and then the stove broke. So then I got this free one on Facebook marketplace that was so little but so powerful. It had, it was like the best pizza oven. It was so good. It was like a 1985 Jenair wall oven. But I started to really appreciate that kitchen.

And the fun thing is we gave that kitchen away to our friends who remodeled it and they sanded it and they painted it, and it works really well in their space.

Now I’m feeling some emotion because as I’m sharing this stories about the story about my kitchen. I am thinking about the way I used to talk to myself, the way my clients used to talk about themselves, and I just see now how beautiful they are and how they have really been able to, they’ve been able to learn to just be neutral about themselves and then learn to appreciate themselves. 

So I would, I teach them to say things like, I might not really like my belly and I don’t really like my chest, or I don’t like my bum and I don’t like this and that, but I really like my hands, ’cause my hands, they make things and I might not like this part of my body, but I like that. I can see, I like that I can hear, I like that I can smell and I like that I can change diapers and I can make quilts and I can hug people. And then I see my clients as they start to accept themselves exactly how they are, and they actually start buying bras that fit them and they start buying clothes.

They don’t wait to buy the nice clothes for when they lose the weight. They actually buy pants. They only have a few of them. I say just you can just, you don’t have to have lots. Just have a few of them that fit well. Then eventually in two months, four months, maybe next month. I don’t know. They might be too big for you.

That’s fine. You can just give ’em away.

And it’s interesting for me, when I see my clients who are in a plateau, guess what they’re not doing? They’re not loving themselves unconditionally. They’re starting that old thinking pattern of if you were skinnier, that you’d be happier. If you were this, then you would be this. Or when you get to this weight, then you can think good about yourself or think well about yourself.

I want to challenge you to learn how to be happy without losing weight. I actually learned to love my kitchen. I would say, oh, such a funny, silly kitchen, but look at all the memories.

Look at what I’ve been able to do. I taught my kids how to cook in that kitchen. During COVID, we would do theme ethnic theme nights. They learned how to do all sorts of different things. I created a really loving family. Cook together regardless of that weird kitchen. And I’m so glad that I let myself just accept that kitchen because otherwise I would’ve missed out.

And one of the things that brings me so much sadness or are those women. Who are sitting on the sidelines and they’re not enjoying their lives because they keep saying when I lose the weight, then I can be happy. 

I hope that the words that I’m sharing, I hope you can feel my sincerity. I hope you can feel my love. I hope you can feel. The, you can actually like the truth that I’m saying will resonate with you because doing another diet, keto, whatever that is. I know you, you’ll like whatever you put your mind to, I know you will do it really well for a while, but then life happens. Life is unpredictable. 

I have so many of the members of my membership that all of a sudden their mom needs to go into. I did this with my dad. I did this with my mom like I’d have to change my life so that I can go and take care of them and share like the responsibility and.

So now all of a sudden we’re like moving our parents, or all of a sudden now we’re renovating a kitchen or we’re helping a child has a baby. And so we go and we help them, and now we’re babysitting or now we’re flying here, or we have someone has a sickness or your kids are really good at basketball, so they play basketball every night almost. And now we’re driving all the time.

So learning how to love yourself. Be happy wherever you are, and the more that you can do that unconditional love, the more that you can, I can, I make this promise so solemnly, the more success you’re going to have. And if you are struggling with your weight, your physical weight, I would encourage you to come and book a free coaching call with me.

Let me help you see what is actually stopping you, because chances are there’s a lot of this happening, a lot of unconditional, sorry, conditional love, and so the way that you’re losing the weight. Impacting the way that you are actually able to keep it off or being able to do it again, you’re exhausted.

Okay. I’m so glad you’re listening to this podcast. I’m recording this on March 11th. My son is at a basketball tryout and I need to leave soon because I need to go pick him up with my other son and drive him to another basketball event. My life is very full. I woke up this morning, first thing, took my kids to the church for their church class, worked all day, and now I get to take them.

I don’t have a lot of free time. I have free time in my business how I choose, but there’s a lot of responsibilities. There’s a lot of things that are required of all of us. Like yesterday was getting the groceries, returning the hood fan getting the electrician to come. There’s and then today the guy’s coming to finish up this and I need to make sure I get the wall oven and the different colors, there’s all the things we like. We have an invisible load where we as women, I know most of the people here are women, and we need to change the way we think about ourselves. And the problem is, if you listen to last episode, we have a lot of routine thinking, habit thinking that is not healthy. And so in order for us to have permanent weight loss, we have to be willing to go into the brain and change those patterns.

And that is why I can say with so much certainty. I have a 20 pounds down in 90 day money back guarantee because when you actually start seeing what is required for physical weight loss, you gotta do this brain work first and then the weight will come off, I promise. 

All right. Take care everyone. Thanks so much for being here.

And again don’t not take me up on my offer. I don’t know how much longer I can offer these free coaching calls. So make sure you take advantage.