My Heuristics for Weight Loss

I am also too sick to write today, in that I cannot bear to write about anything other than being too sick to write about anything other than being too sick to write.

I am in a lot of pain, but I thought that sometime late into the night I might feel a little bit better, and might have enough energy to write before passing out for the evening.

I used to tell people that I like to be gentle around weight loss because one of the easiest ways to gain a lot of weight is to get injured, and one of the eaiest ways to lose a lot of weight is to get sick.

But that it’s not the kind of sick you would wish on your worst enemy. And so “wishing yourself skinny in a very aggressive way” felt sad to me, given the kinds of sicknesses that can make that happen very rapidly.

I ate today: half a banana, 1 frozen beef and bean burrito. 2 Ibuprofens.

Likely a stomach bug.

And so I would always say that I want to lose weight, when I want to lose weight, from a place of loving my body, rather than hating it.

Heuristics I have had for this:

People generally look better when they have muscle. When you eat a lot of protein, you generally don’t want to eat too many other things. You can make having beautiful muscles a goal.

Generally, people have a lot more energy when they are able to run a few miles. If you can’t run a few miles, you should try to walk a few miles. How do you feel?

Walking a lot also makes you lose a lot of weight, and get better at walking.

I like, “having more muscle” and “be able to walk a lot” as nice goals because these two goals lead to weight loss for a lot of people. If you are walking 10,000 steps a day on top of whatever lifting and working you are doing, you are likely to lose weight.

I find it also nice because sometimes your body really wants to keep the weight, such as when you are a different kind of sick, and then “failing to lose weight” can be your body taking care of you. It would be sad to hate yourself for something like that.

I think it’s important to love a version your larger body when you’re losing weight, and love a version of the smaller body you’re moving towards when you’re losing weight.

This way, it is not coming from a place of self-loathing. Some people seem like they get motivated by self-loathing, but for most people it doesn’t work very well or keeps them motivated past the initial push.

Wanting to sculpt yourself like a Greek statue I find to be much more motivating, and it can be done at any age, and there can be refinements to do even when you are larger and older.

I also think about posture a lot. Stretching the upper back and shoulders in ways that make you taller, make the muscles less “knotted” and generally look very nice.

No matter your weight, and no matter how long it takes you to lose what you consider your extra pounds, you should never have a coat that looks bad on you. Coats are wonderful in that like a good suit, it really compliments you.

Pay attention to your shoulders, how the coat sits across your shoulders. When you gain or lose weight, your build of your shoulders isn’t really going to change too much, and so you can use that as your basis.