You've set a goal to lose 20, 30, 40 pounds or more. You exercise. You eat clean. But, you're struggling with motivation a bit. There are a few things you can do to help make yourself subconsciously WANT to do more and get to your goal.
Look around your house. What do you see? Is your house designed to help you reach your goal or help you make excuses? Do you avoid putting pictures of yourself on display because you're unhappy with the way you look? If you have pictures of yourself displayed, are you hiding behind a person or furniture to hide your excess weight?
When I first started on my fitness journey, I started working out at home. I did the majority of my workouts in the living room because that's where the good T.V. and the DVD player was, and that room has the most available floor space (for push ups, burpees, etc). I knew I'd be doing some killer exercise and want to quit at any moment. So, I put the fattest picture of myself up on display in our living room. Do I love that picture? Absolutely not! I hate it. I am huge in that picture. I am obviously not happy. I am everything I don't want to ever be again. But, that's the point. I put that picture up to remind myself of how fat I was. Seeing that picture every single day, especially during workouts, pushes me to work that much harder and dig that much deeper. I don't ever want to look or feel that way again.
Some people do it the opposite way. They put up a picture of themselves when they were thin, or a picture of some skinny model from a magazine, and that pushes them to work harder. Whichever way you choose to go, putting up a picture either at your worst or your best can definitely motivate you to work harder.
Another trick I used was the jars of marbles you see here. I got two glass jars at the dollar store. I bought some marbles (also at the dollar store) and used them to represent the pounds. I just used a sharpie to label the jars. I took the total number of pounds I wanted to lose and put that many marbles in the jar labeled "Pounds to Go." And, every time I lost weight, I'd move the appropriate number of marbles to the "Pounds Lost" jar. I put these jars on display in my house where everyone can see them. It's a way to keep yourself accountable because everyone can see your progress spelled out in marbles. And, it's a visual cue for you to see not only how far you've come, but how far you have to go. That way, you both acknowledge your progress and also take seriously the amount of work you have left to do. When you start losing weight, it can be easy to get comfortable and complacent and think you've done so well that you don't need to push yourself anymore. As simple as it might seem, having jars like this can keep that complacency from happening.
What kinds of visual motivation do you use?
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