Won't Give Up

I am really proud of myself for never giving up. Even before I started blogging I was trying to lose weight. I'd get off 30 or 35 pounds and then gain it back PLUS some. And then when I started this blog, at 278 pounds, I thought that would be the final time I'd ever have to lose weight. When I got down to 214 pounds that first year, I was SURE I would never regain any of that weight and would keep working hard and keep losing. Imagine how shocked I was to be back up to 245 pounds only a little over a year later.

But still, I did not regain it all. For the first time in my life, I didn't gain it all back and then add more pounds. And that's because I didn't give up. I got back down to 234 pounds before I started Medifast two and a half years after I started this blog. And I stuck with that and lost almost 60 pounds in 8 months. And I *knew* I was never going back. I would never regain any of those hard lost pounds.

Except I did. I worked hard to stay in the 170's and 180's for 8 months, but losing more eluded me. I even got into the 190's for 2 months before getting back down to 184. But by the end of 2011, I was back over 200 pounds, and let me tell you, that sucked. It sucked that I worked so hard to lose in the first place, and it sucked that I felt powerless to keep on losing weight or even to keep off what I had lost.

Bur I never gave up. For all of 2012 and 2013 I worked to stay under 220, and succeeded in only hitting a high of 221 once. Yet at the very end of 2013, I broke into the 220's, hit 226... and never got below that again... until this month, when I got to 225. Almost four years at 226+... up to and including 260 pounds. And yet, even at 260, I did not give up. I kept fighting. And I am still fighting, and I will never give up.

Some may see this as a story of failure, an exercise in futility, an obese woman spending over a decade trying to lose the weight but never getting there. Still fat, still on a diet. But some will see the story of success. The determination to reach that goal even if it takes a decade, trying different things, working not to regain it all... and *succeeding* at that. That's how I see it. Success.

I won't ever give up or stop trying. Never.








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Five Ways to Increase your Self-Confidence

You're reading Five Ways to Increase your Self-Confidence, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you're enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

Trusting in your own judgment, abilities and personal power is the essence of self-confidence.  One of my favorite quotes is from Eleanor Roosevelt, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” It’s a great reminder that self-confidence is an inside job. Self-confidence can be like the weather. Some days your trust in your abilities and judgment may feel a little off and other days you may feel very confident. Hot, cold, cloudy or rainy, the weather is always changing.  Like the weather, some days I wake up feeling fantastic! Other days, I want to crawl back under the covers and wait for a new day. Yes, as human beings with thoughts, emotions, and feelings, we have moments when our confidence changes.  That’s life. And that is okay. Life is still happening all around. The sun rises. The seasons change. There will be traffic for most of us to consider. Your self-confidence is not controlled by the weather or traffic. These things may affect how your day flows; they don’t ultimately affect your confidence. I’ve heard older people say many times, “keep living.” My response now is, that is so true. As we continue living there may be factors that affect your self-confidence including:

• losing your job
• moving to a new city
• changes in your relationships

Our lives are filled with constant images, sights, and sounds that impact even the most confident person. The 24-hour news, tweets, posts and social media notifications can also take a toll on you. I’ve learned to be in my own head and to limit the voices of others in order to maintain a strong sense of self-confidence. I am the creator of my life experiences and I will have to live with the choices I make. Just remember that you have the power to maintain your self-confidence, it is not dependent on outside forces. Try these three tips to maintain or increase your self-confidence:

1. Breathe. Trust. – Stopping to breathe and check in with yourself on a regular basis allows you to trust your inner guidance system, your intuition. The more you practice this, the stronger your instinctive feelings become and your trust grows.
2. Go to Bed Early – Sometimes we are over stimulated by daily living. Sleeping can be the only time many people are still or quiet. Make sleep a priority by picking one or two days of the week you will go to bed early. Rest is restorative.
3. Be Adventurous – Make trying new things a regular practice. Buy music from an unknown singer or artist. Take a painting class. Buy something new from the grocery store. Take a different route home from work.
4. Limit Notifications – Check your technology to see what types of notifications you have turned on. Decide which ones are most beneficial and keep only one or two active. Turn all the other notifications off. You will thank me later.
5. Be Your Own Best Friend – Learn to enjoy your own company more than the company of others. In doing so you can take time for self-discovery, try new experiences and decide what you like and don’t like.

Enjoying your own company, being adventurous and getting adequate rest are great confidence boosters. Be kind and gentle with yourself as you remember to stop, breathe and trust your intuition. Trust and believe that you have the power, abilities and judgment to know what is best for you because you do.

You've read Five Ways to Increase your Self-Confidence, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you've enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

Self Help Gurus etc

Bumper Stickers Make Highways More Social

“You know how it is when you’re driving behind a car and you notice the bumper sticker, and you think to yourself ‘Oh, it’s that kind of person’ or, ‘Why would somebody put that on their car?’”

Walter Goettlich, a sociology graduate student at the University of Kansas.

“I was coming back from a vacation with my family…and I was behind a car and the bumper sticker on the car was almost illegible, the type was really tiny and it said, ‘When this baby hits 88 miles an hour, you’re going to see some serious s**t.’”

This was Goettlich’s AHA! moment. As you may guessed, the bumper sticker was a reference to the movie Back to the Future. It’s moments like this, on the highway, driving at speed, that can seem so solitary, but in fact there are opportunities to connect—and with perfect strangers. [Walter Goettlich, Interstate Interstitials]

“That’s’ what I’m trying to get at…the way that we think about the world, based on how we read what other people put on their cars.”

To sample the kinds of messages being sent on our roads, Goettlich drove more than 10,000 miles on interstate highways throughout the eastern United States. He says one major variety of bumper sticker refers to things nearly everyone knows about—an election, a church, a social issue. But other bumper stickers may require an observer to access what Goettlich calls “outside resources.” For example, the bumper sticker that says, “The Dude Abides” might drive some people to do a quick Google search. But a few viewers may feel an instant bond, being fans of the movie The Big Lebowski. 

“So, the kinds of stickers I tend to like are the ones that don’t make sense to me, because what they do is they challenge my preconceived notions of the world.”

Another type of care sticker is a response to other stickers. For example, you know those window stickers of stick families? Some even include a stick dog or a stick cat? “And then I saw recently another example which was ‘making my family,’ and it was what were clearly male and female stick figures having sex.”

And then there are the ones that say, “My son beat up your honor student.”

So, when you’re on the road, check the messages sent by other cars around you. You might just connect, in a way you never expected. And without even bending a fender.

—Emily Schwing

(The above text is a transcript of this podcast)

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December Challenge – “Don’t Wait for 2018” DietBet

We all want to avoid holiday weight gain. All the office parties, alcohol and calorie rich food means lots of temptation, but your weight loss journey doesn’t have to be put on hold. You can keep making progress. You don’t have to wait for 2018 and New Year’s resolutions. Join our December Challenge today. The […]

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1. October 2017 How I Eat, How I Feel Challenge
2. May 30 Day Time Crunch Intervals Challenge
3. Jumpstart June DietBet

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Olivia Munn dan Penyakit Trichotillomania

Sami Kidnaps Ben on Days of Our Lives

Sami Kidnaps Ben on Days of Our Lives  Daytime ConfidentialFull coverage

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Why you’re more likely to remember something that you read to yourself out loud

By guest blogger Bradley Busch

Dr. Seuss wrote “the more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go”. The trouble is, we forget so much of what we read. Is there a way to read that makes it more likely we’ll remember things?

Keen to answer this question, researchers Noah Farrin and Colin MacLeod, from the University of Waterloo in Ontario Canada, ran a study published in Memory. Their results shed new light on how to study more effectively.

It’s already known that reading aloud can aid memory, but it’s not clear why: is it the act of reading, or is it hearing oneself speaking, or both? To tease apart these possibilities, the researchers first invited 75 students to their psych lab and recorded them saying 160 words out loud. At this point, the students knew they’d be returning to the lab in two weeks’ time, but didn’t know why.

When the students returned to the lab, they studied half of the words that they’d encountered earlier, in preparation for an immiment memory test. They revised these words in four different ways: they read 20 of the words to themselves silently; they heard a recording of someone else reading 20 words; they heard the earlier recording of themselves saying 20 more of the words; and they read the last 20 words out loud to themselves (the participants varied in the order they completed these different revision methods).

The memory test that followed was a recognition test, made up of the 80 words they’d just studied and the other 80 words used two weeks’ earlier (it was assumed that these would largely be forgotten). On seeing each word, the students’ had to indicate whether it was one they had just studied or not.

The most effective revision method was reading the words aloud in the study phase. This led to, on average, 77 per cent correct answers (i.e. words correctly categorised as just studied or old). In order of decreasing effectiveness, this was followed by revising by listening to a recording of themselves, hearing a recording of someone else say the words, and then finally by reading in silence.

These results suggest that the reading aloud advantage comes from both the act of reading and the experience of hearing oneself. However, the gap between reading aloud and hearing a recording of oneself was quite small, with only 3 per cent difference in performance. The biggest gap (12 per cent) was between reading the words out loud and reading them in silence.

In discussing these results, the researchers used the term “the production effect”. This describes the memory advantage one obtains if you say things aloud instead of just hearing the information. The production effect is likely caused through the combined advantage of three factors. First, reading things aloud involves motor processing, making it a more active process. Second, when students read words, it requires an element of visual processing, which may lead to deeper learning rather than just listening. Third, reading aloud is self-referential (i.e. “I said it”), which can make the information more salient.

When the students read in silence (the least effective method) they didn’t experience any self-referential or auditory stimulation. These results also confirm previous findings suggesting it is advantageous to learn information using a combination of senses.

A recent review indicated that many students spend time rereading as a form of revision, rather than testing themselves, which would be more effective. If rereading is a strategy that students are going to use, then the current study’s findings are important as they indicate that doing so aloud will likely be more effective than doing so silently.

It would be interesting to see if the current results replicate when using materials that students have to study as part of their course, rather than simple word lists.

This study is a step forward in our understanding of how people can remember more information. Next time you come to read another brilliant BPS Research article, try doing so out loud (although your office or roommates may not thank you for this!).

—This time it’s personal: the memory benefit of hearing oneself

Post written by Bradley Busch (@Inner_Drive) for the BPS Research Digest. Bradley is a registered psychologist and director of InnerDrive. He has work with Premiership and International footballers and is the author of Release Your InnerDrive

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