Excluding the small proportion of people that have a genetic predisposition or perhaps a chronic illness, weight-loss is a choice that we are making, or not making, every single day.
Our entire life is governed by the choices we make. And the cool thing is, we get to make choices right up until the day we die. Today, you are going to choose what you eat, how you move and what interactions you have with your environment. Granted, we sometimes get put into situations by chance or accident. However, your perception and how you react to those situations is absolutely, 100% your choice.
We are fortunate enough that we have fresh, healthy food at our fingertips year round. All we have to do is go to the supermarket and stock up. What you buy at the supermarket is totally up to you. You could choose to walk straight past the confectionary aisle, or you could choose to take advantage of the 2 for 1 Cadbury chocolate deal. This is where you have to have your fitness goal and what you want to achieve in life at the forefront of your mind. So that when there are mouth-watering brownies on offer at your local café, you can make a choice true to who you want to be.
The same goes for exercise. We can choose what exercise we do, or do not do. We choose how active we are on our days off, or how much Netflix we’re going to watch this weekend. We can choose how many days we are going to make a conscious effort to exercise. We also make the choice to go out for after work drinks instead of getting that second or third workout in for the week. Now I’m not saying sacrifice your social life and all the things you love to do. For example, you could get a quick workout in before you meet your friends for drinks. That is a potential choice you could make. You might even then make the choice to ease up on the drinks and fast food that night because of the hard work you just put in.
This is when the excuses usually start rolling in. I’m too tired to workout today. I can’t be bothered to prepare a healthy meal. I don’t have time to prepare a healthy meal. Do any of these sound familiar? We can choose to listen to the excuses we’re telling ourselves, or not. I could choose to accept that I am too tired to workout today, or I could choose to train at a lighter intensity so that I’m not burning out but I’m staying on track towards my fitness goal. I could choose to accept that I don’t have enough time to prepare healthy meals for the week, or I could choose to prioritise my time so that there are enough hours in the day to prepare healthy and nutritious meals.
Essentially it comes down to choosing what is more important to you. Do you choose something that over time will get you to where you want to be, or do you choose something (usually the quick, easy or tasty!) that is going to prevent you from getting where you want to be?