Just a Little Bit More ... Or Less

"My new goal," she said, "is to run one minute farther today than I did yesterday. Then add a minute every day."

I love this idea. I love this idea so much I can't even tell you how much I love it.

She has been doing interval running. She has been battling some injuries. She has been trying to get over the psychological hurdle of being "able" to run X number of miles. She was stuck. She was not making the progress she wanted to make.

But she decided to take a new approach.

Just add one minute today. She knows she can keep going for one minute more. What's one little, tiny, short minute?

This concept is so clean and understandable. And it works for eating (one side of the equation) and exercise (the other side).

Go one minute more. Eat one thing less.

I think much of the success in any weight loss story is making small changes that are sustainable. I also think one of the biggest reasons for weight loss failure is trying to make too many big changes that are NOT sustainable.

I've told you before that in my adult life, I had really, truly, honestly tried to lose weight one other time before this one. That first time, I chose to exercise like a lunatic. Two hours per day minimum. The problem was I didn't really learn to eat properly. And when I stopped exercising, because it was simply unsustainable long-term, I put the weight back on.

This time, I chose a more balanced effort. I started making small changes to my diet. I started walking. Then walking faster. Then walking farther. I threw out all of the processed, prepackaged, full-of-chemicals crap in my pantry. I started running. Then running faster. Then running farther. Then I hopped on my bike. Rode faster. Rode farther. And then I started swimming.

And so on, and so on, and so on.

You get the idea.

Find something you CAN do instead of thinking of the 100 things you can't do ... or don't want to do.

Then do it. A little bit at a time. Before you know it, those little bits will add up to a whole bunch.