Ep #40: Discomfort Either Way

Are you convinced that you have made so many wrong turns with weight loss that you will never get to destination weight loss success? Well, this episode is for you as I will show you the GPS coordinates for permanent weight loss when you are starting from weight loss discouraged town.

I am Dara Tomasson, and this is Weight Loss for Quilters episode 40: Discomfort Either Way.

Did you know you could lose weight and keep it off for good? After 25 years of hiding behind my quilts, I have finally cracked the code for permanent weight loss, and I’ve lost 50 pounds without exercise or counting calories. I’m Dara Tomasson, professional quilter turned weight and life coach, where I help quilters just like you create a life they love by losing weight and keeping it off for good. Let’s jump into today’s episode.

Today’s episode is what you have been waiting for if you want proof that you are not beyond hope to create permanent weight loss. I have created this tool that is the only navigational system you’re going to need to get to this permanent weight loss that you so desperately want. It’s called directed decision. When the stakes feel so high, decisions are frightening and truly, when you go to the doctor and he says or she says, “Your health is at risk, you are needing these medications, or you’ve got to lose weight, or your hip, your diabetes, all that, it is actually serious.”

But when you are wired to be constantly looking for danger this makes decision making even more scary. However, when you don’t make a decision that is a decision, not deciding has a consequence. When you make a decision you are now in control.

Alright, so in this episode be prepared to explore inside your brain, why decisions have been so difficult for you to make. You’re then going to learn the three steps on how to truly make them powerfully. And then I’m going to end off with a very helpful visual on how to help you build decision making tools that I have created for you.

So, before we go into the episode I just can’t believe it. My master course is happening right now, and it is on how to make weight loss attainable, doable, and sustainable. And I am loving all of the breakthroughs these women are having. One of the things that surprises me when I bring these women together is the level of compassion that they get for themselves because they are no longer spending their time judging themselves, thinking about how terrible they are. And now they’re realizing that they’re no longer alone. They’re not the only ones who are suffering.

They realize they aren’t broken, and they realize they aren’t deficient. It is so awesome to get them all in this Facebook group and they’re all learning together. They are just so many other ladies, this is wonderful. I do love creating these courses and experiences for all of you. There are only going to be more three left this year. Even though it’s happening you can still join the Facebook group. You can watch all the replays. They’re going to be available till midnight Sunday. And we do have a final class, if you’re listening to this on Wednesday April 20^th, on Thursday at 11:00am Pacific.

And as a sign-in bonus you will get the ultimate late night snacking guide. It’s super comprehensive and amazing. So, let’s dive in. Now, I have created a handout for you because I know for me I really love to kind of slow things down and get really into my brain especially now that I know how much weight loss is all about our thinking. As you’ve been listening to this podcast you’re figuring them out. And so, I have created this handout for you. And I want to just go through some of the questions.

And what I want you to do when you just have a moment or when you make a moment for yourself because that’s what we do, we make our own moments. We decide on purpose how we want to spend our time. I have 10 questions here and as I’m reading them I want you to think if it’s one. One would be that’s not me at all. Five is that’s totally me. And then anywhere in between I want you to kind of gauge that for yourself. And it’s going to be really helpful as you start investigating yourself and investigating where this difficulty with decision making really came from.

So, first question. I worry that there is one right path and if I don’t make the right decision I will be out of luck for achieving that outcome. So, I kind of contribute this one to Disney princesses or fairytales of the one true love. So, if you don’t go to that one university, and if you don’t do that one job, or you don’t move to that one place, or whatever that decision was. You think now it’s over for me, I’m out of luck. And so, this question is important to consider if this is one of the things that your brain thinks about.

So, if you don’t make that one right choice then you’re never going to have that success, or that’s going to be taken away from you. And so, it feels really, really serious and weighed very heavily in the decisions that you make.

Question number two, I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feeling or cause ripples. Number three, I am not used to saying what I really want. Number four, I don’t always have all the information that I want to make the decision from a clean place. Number five, I don’t like the options that are before me. Number six. I don’t think that there are many great choices. Number seven, I feel overwhelmed by the responsibility. Number eight, I don’t want to take responsibility for the consequences. And number nine, I’m afraid of the outcome. And ten, it’s super stressful to think about what could happen if I make the wrong choice.

So, when you go through these questions and of course you can take a moment after the podcast and gauge them from one to five. And you’re going to start seeing where your brain goes to when we make decisions. So, this is a really great diagnostic tool for you. So, then I have some more questions for you now that your brain has warmed up, let’s explore a little bit more in your brain on how your decision making skills are affecting your weight loss results.

Now, one of the things that I want to let you know is that if you have not spent time developing your decision making process you are making your decisions from the same brain. You haven’t evolved your brain to how you made decisions when you were five, seven, eight, ten years old. So, this makes so much sense when it comes to weight loss decisions. And I just have a few questions for you to think about.

How long does it usually take you to make a decision? Why do you think you are overweight? What decisions do you make on a daily basis that contribute to your weight loss efforts? What do you think is holding you back from losing all the weight you want to lose? How do you feel about your potential to change the way you have made decisions in the past after listening to this podcast and learning this tool?

So, I’m bringing these questions to you now so that our higher brain wants to solve problems. Our higher brain wants us to be at our thinnest most healthy weight. And so, I like this idea of me asking you the questions beforehand so now you can be prepared. And then what further direct questions do you have about making decisions that you would like to ask me directly? And I do want to invite you, I have my calendar open for 20 minute discussions. And I would love to have that discussion with you.

I also have my email that you can always ask me questions. And I will make a point of answering them directly to you. So, with these questions in mind, we’re going to go back to the directed decision. So, what this concept is, is basically we’re always making decisions. And when you don’t make a decision that’s actually making a decision. Isn’t that crazy?

So, if you say, “Hey, I don’t know, I don’t know if I want to go to the retreat,” and you’re not answering the question, you’re not making that decision. So, you have made a decision you’re not going to the retreat. And you have made the decision of not having the connections with the ladies that you would have been there with, not completing quilts that you might have completed at the retreat.

So, when you say, “I don’t know. I want to think about it,” the same thing with, you know, you have 30 pounds, or 50 pounds you want to lose, and the doctor says, “In order to be at your optimum weight you need to lose this weight.” And so, when you eat that donut, when you say, “I don’t know. I don’t know if I should do keto, or I don’t know if I should do Weight Watchers, or if I should do Love Yourself Thin,” or whatever that is. So, when you’re eating that donut you’re making the decision to just keep having an unhealthy body.

So not making the decision is making the decision to continually gain weight, to put on weight and to affect your insulin levels and all of that. So, number one rule for the directed decision tool is there is no right or wrong decision. It’s such an interesting concept. Whenever you make a decision it’s just a decision and then you’re going to have consequences of that either way. So, if you can just get it really clear, there is no right or wrong what that’s doing is it’s allowing you to say, “There are decisions.”

And my business coach, she says, “You make the decision right.” And that really does take a lot of pressure off. And knowing that there is no right or wrong means I’m just going to make a decision and I’m going to just go down that road a little further and I’m going to see where that takes me and then I’ll see what happens.

So, the second rule of the directed decision, you are either winning or you’re learning. And I have this concept called quilters not quitters. And when you learn to learn from your failing and you’re evaluating from your failures, and you’re really seeing why you turned to the donut when you were discouraged, or how did you find yourself at the Dairy Queen drive-thru. If you quit on yourself you don’t get the opportunity to say, “When I feel disappointed by what my son-in-law said I find myself not allowing myself to feel uncomfortable, so I go and get ice-cream as a solace.”

So fascinating, now you’re learning. And then if your son-in-law said something and it really hurt your feeling and you say, “You know what? I’m not going to go to the ice-cream this time, I’m just going to let myself feel it.” Then you’re winning.

And then number three, when you don’t make a decision to act, that inaction is your decision and now you don’t have any control over the outcome. This puts you into a victim mentality. It puts you into a victim position. And so, what happens with that is now food, or the other person, or whatever that decision was, they are now the villains.

And so now food is scary, and having difficult conversations are scary, and doing something different is scary because when you don’t make a decision that decision has the consequence, the inaction of you making the decision has a consequence. So those are the three rules for directed decisions.

So now we’re going to go into some common scenarios. And I wrote these on your handout because I know how helpful it is to kind of take a minute, take a breath, and see what happens. And I’m going to walk you through some different scenarios with the filter of there is no right or wrong decision. You’re either winning or learning. When you don’t make a decision to act that inaction is your decision. And now you don’t have control over the outcome and now you’re a victim.

So, case scenario number one. You’re at a quilt retreat and you’d made a decision to really honor your body and eat food that either walked the earth, was grown from the ground or swam in the ocean. That was your decision, you’re like, “I’m not going to eat anything processed. I’m not going to eat any refined flour, sugar. I just really want to feel good in my body.” So, you’re at this quilt retreat, you go for breakfast and all there is, is baked items and some yoghurt that has a lot of sugar in it. So, what decision do you make?

So, if you eat the food then you didn’t honor your plan to eating healthy. And if you don’t eat the food then you’re hungry. So, what decision feels like love and do you like your reasons? This was on another episode that I did about, does it feel like love and do I like my reasons. And then what other choices could you have made? Could you have brought your own food? Could you talk to the chef? Could you ask them for alternatives? Could you just allow yourself to be hungry and allow yourself to use the fat that you’re storing on your body?

There are so many different options. So, you’re either winning or learning. And when you don’t act then you become a victim.

Number two case scenario. You are on a family vacation, and everyone wants to order pizza. You don’t want to rock the boat, so you go along with what everyone else wants. But you know that that pizza always makes you feel bloated, and it affects your sleep. What decision do you make that will feel good for you? So, remember there’s no right or wrong answer. You’re either winning or learning. So, I really want you to spend some time with that.

There is a great analogy. So, Brooke Castillo is the founder of The Life Coach School where I’m a certified weight and life coach. And she wrote a book called, If I’m so Smart, Why Can’t I Lose Weight. And I feel this really sums up how I felt about weight loss. And I have so many intelligent, accomplished, amazing women in my program.

And it is always amazing to them because they think, how could I have run a company, or how could I have been this level of, you know, with my family, or my spouse, or my level of work, or even my accomplishments with my quilting. And I still can’t figure out this weight loss thing. And so, I’m going to give you this analogy and it was really helpful to me, and I wanted to share it for you and to really help you see that making decisions and being trusted, it’s just a journey.

So here we go. She says, I love to use the mountain metaphor when talking about the journey to weight loss. We all start at the bottom of the mountain and see it looming up before us. It seems daunting and difficult. If we continue to take one step at a time each day we will be at the top of that mountain before we realize it and the view is wonderful. On this climb we will fall down, we will trip, we will lose our balance and tumble sometimes. This is not a reason to run all the way down the mountain to the bottom and say that the climb did not work.

This is a time to get back up, keep our eye on the top and start stepping again. Many things will come to the edge of the path and tempt you to veer off in another direction or take a break for a week or a year to catch your breath. You just put up your hand and say, “Your opinion is noted,” and keep climbing. No matter what the scale says, no matter what your mother says, no matter what mistakes you have made or how slow your progress is just keep moving forward. If you keep moving you will get closer every day.

It is not necessarily a bad thing when you have a slip up in your plan. I actually like it when we slip up and my clients mess up because it gives us an opportunity to learn something and create a new tool and a new way of the learning of the weight loss tools. So, if they missed a day of walking we get to discover what was going on, how can we see what we can do different. So, when we slow down and look at why we tripped, and why we fell many times we find something that the client, so one of you and me wasn’t really aware of.

We learned something new and now we can make a plan to deal with it or change the belief system. Because of the slip up we are further along than we would have been. Sometimes it will feel like you are leaping and other times it will feel like you are just inching along. As long as you are moving forward you will get there eventually. The alternative is to give up and not get there at all. This is not a good alternative. It will come. When you get there you will be glad you kept moving and trusted in yourself to make it.

We want to lose weight right now because we have been sold a story of instant results. There is nothing instant about losing weight. If you find yourself wanting to be thin now you must realize that what you really want is to feel good now. You believe that thinness will make you feel better. It’s you who will make yourself feel better. So, setting the goal is not just about achieving the goal. It is about building the strength that is required to achieve it. It is a great view from the top of the mountain, and it has a nice prize.

But the feeling of accomplishment and strength is the real prize. You can use that strength and believe in yourself to climb your next mountain. You will see how much you have to look forward to.

So, I want to just finish this podcast and I want to just encourage you with a few thoughts that you can borrow that have really helped me. And one of this is an analogy that I think of quite often. When I first started to drive I was super scared of turning left because I was in the lane, and I had to go left which meant I had to go through the intersection, and it was really scary.

And so, when I was first learning to drive I just wanted to make right turns all the time. And the problem with going to a destination only turning right is, one, you can keep on going in circles. And two, you kind of eventually get there but it takes a lot longer. You waste a lot of gas and a lot of time and energy. And so when you are making a goal you are going to be uncomfortable either way. You’re going to be uncomfortable climbing that mountain and tripping and falling like Brooke said. But at least you knew that you were going in that general direction.

And I remember one time driving with my brother, this was before we even had GPSs. And I was heading somewhere, and he said, “How do you know where to go?” And I said, “Well, I know the general direction. And it’s like going the way a bird would fly.” And so, a lot of us with weight loss we feel like it’s really daunting. We feel like we’ve failed so many times. But I want you to know that every time you ‘fail’ at least you know when you’re making that decision that you’re going in that direction. But when you quit, just like my quilters not quitters, when you quit you don’t ever to get to learn anymore.

So that visual is really helpful for me. So, I want to offer that to you. And I want you to believe that everything is rigged in your favor. And as you make these decisions and as you keep working at going to your goal, you will get there. It will happen. It just will be an amazing adventure. And then the last thing I want to share with you is that when you make the decision to lose weight people think, I want to always be feeling amazing. And it feels so great. And I just feel so much better in my body.

And just like the directed decision, it’s not always going to feel amazing. And that doesn’t mean that you aren’t making the right decision. And so just like when you’re making a quilt, you’ve sewn the two seams together. You had the two rows, and you sewed the rows backwards. It doesn’t mean that the quilt is terrible and awful and that you’re a bad quilter. You just didn’t pay attention to the direction, that’s all. And so, I want to invite you to stop making wrong decisions or decisions that you weren’t happy about mean anything about you.

I really want you to believe, and you can take my word for it, that you’re never too old. You’re never too far gone. You’ve never failed more times that will disallow you to having weight loss success. I have seen it over and over again in my clients. And so, I do want to invite you to take advantage of this program that I created, weight loss is attainable, weight loss is doable and weight loss is sustainable.

The Love Yourself Thin process is the way for you to lose all the weight you want to lose and keep it off for good. It is a lifetime membership to give you love, and support, and encouragement all along the way. The process is there, it’s just waiting for you to learn it. And inside Love Yourself Thin that is where you will. It has been such a wonderful experience sharing this podcast with you. I do get a little bit teary because I do know that it is scary. It is scary to be overweight and to feel terrible in your body.

And it feels scary going to new things, and going out for dinner with friends, and going on quilt hops, and going to the doctors, and having that reality of I’m not as healthy as I want to be. I’m not able to get up off of the floor the way I want to for playing with my grandkids, or being with myself even. I know that’s scary but the alternative, starting Love Yourself Thin, it’s scary but at least you know that you are going to get the results that you want. I am so confident in that that I have a money back guarantee.

I want you to know that you can have that success and it is truly a pleasure to know that you’re listening to this podcast right now because I once was you. And so many of the ladies that I share their successes they were once you. And they got that glimmer of courage and I want to encourage you to just take that and join us. Have an amazing day. Goodbye.

Thanks for listening to Weight Loss for Quilters. If you want more info, please visit daratomasson.com. See you next week.