I'm reading Joe Cross's 'Fully Charged'. I follow him on Facebook since watching 'Fat, Sick and nearly Dead' on Netflix just over a year ago. I loved the movie and immediately became a fan of him, even though I am not a juicer. I did try some of his juices, and they were great, especially the recipe in the movie, but I am not really a liquid person. I also have only a few lbs to lose so doing a reboot hasn't made sense for me. I do like the work he has done though, with his grassroots efforts, the many ways he has helped so many people, and most of all love his honesty too.
So back to the book ... Joe is very honest in this book about the challenges he has faced, not only with getting his weight down, but really with keeping it down. And I think this is something that we will face soon too. That getting the weight down has been the easy part, that having the sense of community from being in dietbet has helped tremendously but where do we take it from here? Do we always engage in dietbet? Different groups also bring forth different energy - so will the energy we have from this round continue to be the same energy drawn from other groups, even if the focus is essentially the same?
Joe talks about his struggles with stress, travel, very little money and financial hardship, battling to keep relationships going that resulted in loneliness and just overall being painted into corners by trying to balance life continually that made sticking to a diet or healthy eating lifestyle exceedingly difficult.
And I think we have all been there! This is what does us in ... it isn't always the food part - the food part is the result of other things that make up the bigger picture. Things that we often cannot control. It is very difficult to always be on top of things, to always be that super person who works out every day and cooks clean and manages money and stress and balances all the things that life throws at us to manage within a 24 hr timeframe, only to get up the next day and do it all over again.
What Joe discusses in his book and his 7 identified factors that influence how and why we eat, tie heavily back to The Willpower Instinct that I spoke about a few weeks ago, written by Stanford Psychologist, Kelly McGonigal. She talks about acting simply based on personal primitive behaviour versus using the pre-frontal cortex to control reverting to integral behaviours and habits that exist for the individual. She states that stress is usually the number one cause of not being able to stick to 'the plan' so to speak, as well as that exercise, mindfulness, making time for relaxation and tapping into community are factors that help one manage these behaviours that are ingrained in us. The Power of Habit also states much the same, that stress plays a huge factor in people getting off track. Habits are able to be retrained and maintained, until stress throws us for a loop.
I don't have a plan in place yet for maintaining ... I have yet to reach my goal! But I think that being mindful towards that dietbet is ending in July and somehow we want to stay on track is important through these rounds. Simply stating that the food and exercise plan works and that you will stick with it is not enough ... there are also other factors to consider!
Here's to the journey and beyond!