Ep #39: Quilting Fairies and Weight Loss

Are you convinced that weight loss is never going to happen because you followed diets to the tee before and never got the results you wanted? What if I promise you that you would never have to count a single calorie ever again and I would guarantee you that you will lose all the weight you ever want, and it will never come back on again? What if I told you that I calculated calories wrong for years and still lost the weight? This episode is for you.

I am Dara Tomasson, and this is Weight Loss for Quilters episode 39: Quilt Fairies and Weight Loss.

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.

Alright, welcome. This title and concept came to me over a month ago and I am so excited to share it with you today. Bear with me as I walk you through my brain on how this all works together. So, we all are super unique and different. And we all have beautiful brains that work in different ways. And one of the things that happens in my brain is I don’t really like piecing. And I feel guilty saying that because I am a professional quilter. I have written quilting books. I have written over 20 patterns.

And I don’t really enjoy piecing. And I always felt guilty about it. I always felt kind of embarrassed, a little bit of shame because really what I wanted to do was just free motion quilt. And I have this beautiful longarm and it just brings me so much joy now. I mean when I first started it didn’t always being me joy because it wasn’t where I wanted to be. But I felt guilty saying that because there’s this manual that says a quilter needs to piece. And a quilter needs to have very good seams and they have to line up perfectly.

And a quilter should do at least five different kinds of quilting, paper piecing, or improv, or whatever that is. And there’s all sorts of rules, or manuals, or books, saying what a quilter should or shouldn’t be. Now, when I realized something, and I call this the workaround. And we’re going to talk about the workaround for this podcast.

So, when I realized that I loved free motion quilting and I had clients when I was quilting for people professionally, they would say things like, “I just love the piecing, it’s so much fun for me.” And I thought, wait a minute, it’s fun for you. It’s not fun for me. So, hey, why don’t we do something? Why don’t you take this fabric of mine, and you can piece this gift for my dad and this for my mom, this for whatever project I was working on. And how about you do that and then as an exchange I’ll quilt for you?

And you bring me two quilt tops or whatever it was, and we would switch, we would swap, and it was amazing. I love quilt fairies. I just think it’s the greatest idea. And so when I was thinking about weight loss I had the same idea. I thought, okay, I don’t like counting calories. And yeah, I like exercising, but I don’t like feeling like I have to exercise. I have such a love hate relationship with exercise. And so, I thought to myself, okay, I don’t want to be reliant on exercise.

I also know my personality that I don’t really like all the numbers as far as tracking things and all of that. It’s just not my jam. And it doesn’t feel sustainable to me. It’s not something that I’m going to do forever and ever. And so, when I was learning from my weight loss coach back in August of 2018, I started seeing how I could do the same idea of the workaround with weight loss. So, today’s episode, I’m going to show you how you actually have a manual for weight loss but it’s so engrained in your brain, it’s so habitual, you don’t even see it.

So, you’re following these rules that you don’t even know how they got there. And they don’t really make any sense. And they’re obviously not getting you the results that you want. So, we’re going to uncover them. We’re going to write your weight loss manual. And then we’re going to get out a big old red pen and we’re going to start editing it. I’m going to help you create the manual that you want for you. It’s going to serve you. Isn’t that fun?

So, before we get into the bulk of the podcast, I just wanted to share just a quick little win from one of my clients. And I just thought it was so powerful. And even coming to the masterclass that I have coming up on April 18^th to the 21^st, even just coming to that is going to help you, that the next time that you bake cookies with your grandkids, you’re not going to worry about eating any of the batter. Isn’t that fun? So come to that popup group and you can be able to make cookies with your grandkids or just for yourself and not eat the batter.

You guys, I make pancakes for my kids all the time and I never eat any of them. It’s so amazing how great our brains can become when we give them all the right tools. Alright, so let’s go for it, let’s figure this out. And in this podcast I’m going to be talking about how the process is for me as well as my clients. And I’m going to show how when you learn this process, the Love Yourself Thin process it is the guide, it is the way, it is the path to creating a body that you love and that will lose weight on demand.

And you can get to your goal weight without all the hassle, and problem, and stress, and strain, truly. And so, I’m going to give some of my personal experiences in this podcast and that of my clients as well. So, when I first approached weight loss in August 2018, my life coach, what she did was she actually showed me my brain. And this is what we do in life coaching. You tell the story how you see life and then I am able to show you back of what you’re really thinking.

And so, what this does is it makes so much of our unconscious thinking become conscious. So, when you have these really unhealthy, unintentional, really you’re not meaning to be a jerk to yourself. You’re not really meaning to sabotage what’s going on. Then you can actually see what’s happening. And so, I started writing down what I was thinking. And I was able to see that of course that’s not helping me. So, these are the things that I have seen for myself and for my clients and I’m going to share them for you.

And as I’m sharing them, I want you to think about what your manual looks like for weight loss. What have you been believing, not even realizing it? And so, if it’s helpful to think about when you buy a brand new sewing machine it has the instructions. So, you can go to the instructions, and you can get help and support. And then you don’t have to go to the instruction manual, after you’ve gone through it once or twice you can kind of learn the process and then it just becomes automatic. You don’t have to go every single time.

But if there’s a new function on your sewing machine that you don’t really know how to use or it’s new to you. That’s when you get to open the manual again and you get to figure out if it’s working for you or not. So that’s what I mean about this manual, you just keep operating this way. So, for example if you are feeling sad maybe your operating manual is go get ice-cream. Or when you’re feeling discouraged maybe your operating manual is do some baking. Maybe when you’re feeling overwhelmed you just go and buy some fabric.

It’s so automatic, you don’t have to open the manual anymore, it’s just your way of doing things. You get really upset with your husband and you’re driving and immediately you find yourself at a Starbucks, or a Dairy Queen, or at a fabric store. Or someone is rude to you at the bank, and so you find yourself having a Blizzard. It’s become so automatic you don’t even realize. And that’s what we call the manual.

So, one of the manuals that I see a lot in my clients is that when they step on the scale and their weight is more than they want it to be they go automatically to punishing themselves. So, they say things like, “What’s wrong with you? Why have you let yourself go? How could you have done this to yourself?” And they speak really negatively. And they say things like, “You’ve got to shape up. You’ve got to pull up your bootstraps. You’ve got to get that willpower going.”

And I’m going to tell you right now, you will never lose weight and keep it off with willpower, it is impossible. It is emotionally impossible. It is physically impossible. It is not a sustainable resource. Just like I was talking about in a previous episode. So, then they go on the scale or they’re at an event or they’re at a dinner or something and they look at someone who is thin and who is how they want to be. They think that comparing themselves is going to be motivating.

Another thing I see them do is I see them getting a picture of themselves when they were thinner, and they put that on the mirror, and they think that’s going to motivate them. Another operating manual I see quite often in my clients is they use exercise as a form of torture and punishment. And so sometimes you’ll even see, it’s nine o’clock at night and they’re wearing one of those watches that count their steps. They go and they walk up and down their steps a whole bunch of times, I’ve got to get these steps in. I’ve got to do this.

And so, the emotion behind it is very detrimental, it’s very punitive. So, as I’m saying this, what is resonating with you? What about the idea of using perimenopause or menopause as an excuse or a reason, excuse and reason are kind of interchangeable. That if I haven’t lost that weight by the time I hit menopause or perimenopause I’m out of luck. So now they have given away all of their responsibility forever losing weight. They have just completely given up and so now it’s not even on the table to ever be thin and to feel good about themselves.

Another one I see a lot is when something happens like maybe their husband, or their mother-in-law, or their daughter-in-law, or their child says something to them, and it makes them feel really bad, but they don’t want to feel that discomfort. They blame them. I have to eat this cake. Or I have to stay this size because I just don’t have time for myself. I’m always helping other people and other people aren’t, you know, they need me, and I can’t take any time for me.

What do you think is your weight loss manual? And when I’m saying this, it could be really unhelpful, blame other people for your negative emotions, blame menopause. But if that is what you’re doing that’s actually your manual. So, if you say the Quilt Guild show is canceled and you were really excited about it. The manual is, I feel disappointment, I’m going to get ice-cream. That is your manual.

Okay, so you’re going to go and you’re going to – I gave you some prompts there in the handout. So, for example, when you feel sad, what do you do? Do you turn to ice-cream? Do you go on Instagram? Do you scroll on Facebook? If someone says something rude to you, what do you do? Okay, so that will help you find out what your manual is.

And then we’re going to take out the red pen and that’s a really helpful visual for me since I was a schoolteacher for 10 years and I edited stories and marked lots and lots of things. It gives me an opportunity to just decide, I’m going to edit this. I’m going to take what I am doing and I’m going to make a decision now that I’m in my higher brain, when you have that red pen in your hand. And I’m going to edit and decide on purpose what I want to do.

And as you’ve been listening to this podcast you are seeing the Love Yourself Thin principles. So, number one is weight loss science is simple. So, weight loss is just all about balancing hormones. There is three hormones, leptin, ghrelin, and insulin. And so, when you think about just I want to balance my insulin, I mean you can go and do a Google search on balancing insulin. It’s pretty straightforward.

And so, when you think about what is my weight loss manual, I want to balance my hormones. I want to balance my insulin hormones. I want to make sure I’ve got my leptin working. I want to make sure my ghrelin’s working. So that is really what weight loss is. But then number two is you learn to create your own protocol. You learn to be in charge of the food that you put in your mouth. And you get to see how it’s helping you or not. And so now you get to learn to troubleshoot it.

So, the reason I’m saying this is that when you start taking responsibility for the manual that you have, which by the way, so many of us didn’t even know we had it. Then you now have the opportunity, you have the privilege of creating one that works for you. I didn’t like piecing quilts, I didn’t like that. And I didn’t want to feel guilty as a quilter for not liking to piece quilts. Will I piece some quilts? Yeah. And sometimes it’s okay. But I don’t beat myself up for it.

I don’t say, “You know what, Dara, you’re not a good quilter. You’ve really disappointed the quilting world. You can’t really say you’re a great quilter.” Because there’s other people whose manual, their quilting manual is you must piece x number of hours a week. You must make sure that all your points are this. You must make sure that you know how to English paper piece, how to paper piece, foundation piece, improv piece. Everyone has their own rules. Everyone has their own operating manual.

I’m Dara Tomasson and you are you. You have your own unique, just like when you buy a new sewing machine, it has its own unique sewing manual. And even though there’s basics with every sewing machine that are common, they all are super unique and different, and you are too. And so, I’m allowed to be called a quilter. And if I don’t like paper piecing, or if I don’t like piecing in general, I’m still a quilter. It’s okay. I just get to make my own manual.

And so, this episode has been really, really helpful to show you that you’re allowed to have quilt fairies. And if you don’t like binding and if you have a friend that does, you can just swap, totally fine. And so, this is my invitation to you. And my invitation is to go and explore what your current weight loss manual is. And then if it’s not really what you like then just get out a red pen and say, “Yeah, I’m not going to do that.”

And even the episode previous to this one where it talks about just allowing yourself to feel the feeling, and not having to react to that feeling, not having to seek relief from that feeling but just saying, “Yeah, here I am, I’m feeling this feeling.” Even that, that could be your manual. You’re like, any time I feel an uncomfortable feeling I put my hand on my chest, I say, “I’m feeling discomfort. I’m actually feeling frustration.” Okay, you’re allowed to be, welcome to being a human.

This is the vibration I feel in my body, alright, it’s almost gone. I’m processing it. It’s there and it’s gone. Okay. And now you don’t have to turn to food. Even if you did that one thing, I promise you, you would lose weight and you wouldn’t have to worry about putting it back on so much.

So, thank you for joining me for this episode. It’s always such a pleasure for me to know that I am able to help you. I look forward to preparing these and recording them for you. And I was so excited about these ideas that are always coming to me. And I always want to help my clients and all of you who aren’t my clients yet, to have less stress and less strain about food and about your bodies that I created a master course, four days starting April 18^th going through the 21^st. I’m going to take out the mystery of weight loss in three steps.

I’m going to show you that weight loss is attainable, that means it’s totally within your reach. It’s doable. It’s so practical. You don’t want to paper piece, you don’t have to. If you just want to free motion quilt all your day long, you can. I’m going to show you how doable weight loss is and sustainable. It’s going to be something you’re going to want to do over, and over, and over again. You don’t have to count the calories.

I did a workaround and just like I have quilt fairies to work around my displeasure or not even displeasure, but just I’d rather be quilting, then we can do the same thing with weight loss. And that’s what we’re going to do in this popup group and that’s what we do all day every day in Love Yourself Thin. I cannot wait to have you come in the popup group.

And as an added bonus, and I know because you’re so excited to get started right away, I created the ultimate late night snacking guide that you will get as soon as you purchase the master course starting April 18^th to the 21^st. I can’t wait to have you join us. I will see you next week. Bye bye.

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