Day 3: Trade Your Judge’s Robe For A Lab Coat | 30-Day Weight Loss-athon
Welcome to Day 3 of the 30-Day Weight Loss-athon! Today we make a very important mindset shift – one that can support or sabotage you as you fight the fat.
I suggest you read through the steps first, then take 10 minutes to complete them.
We only have 10 minutes, so you need to move fast, act quickly and stop over-thinking. Just throw yourself in. Ready?
What You Need:
- Pen
- Paper
- An open mind.
Step 1
A number of the tasks in the 30-Day Weight Loss-athon ask you to change the way you think. This shouldn’t be too much of a surprise – the reasons most people fail at losing weight tend to be psychological.
In this task the mindset shift is an especially challenging one. I’m asking you to stop judging and start observing what you do.
| Instead of judging… | Observe… |
| I’m such a fat cow for eating all that dessert | Having that tiny lunch really backfired – I ate twice as much dessert |
| I’m so lazy for not going to the gym today | Trying to fit exercise in after work doesn’t work for me. I’m more successful when I exercise in the morning. |
| What a pig! | Huh. I really ate a lot of junk today. I wonder why. |
Now I’m not asking you to stop judging in order to discover self-love, re-parent your inner child or heal the emotional wounds of your past. I want you to stop judging because it’s difficult to observe what’s going on when you’re busy self-flagellating.
To notice and learn, you need to step away from the whip.
I want you to observe what’s going on because you are highly individual. The particular combination of diet, exercise and mindset that will work for you, getting you to a fabulous weight and keeping you there, is one that can’t be formulated in advance. No book, system or program will have it ready-made for you. We have to discover it.
Which means we have to try things, observe the effect, do more when something works, try something else when it doesn’t.
So the challenge here is to take off your judge’s robes and put on your scientist’s coat. Visualize that if it helps.
Switching from judge to observer will take practice, and you may need to re-visit today’s task occasionally to remind yourself to notice, observe, question.
Step 2
For the rest of today’s time, get a notebook and list a few of the weight-related things you say to yourself that are judgmental. Don’t dwell on this, just get it down.
For each judgement, write down an observation instead. Just extract the information and ignore everything else – that stuff is what starts binge cycles.
See the examples above to help you.
Step 3
Decide that you are going to be a scientist for the rest of this month.
If you want to put those judge’s robes back on after the 30 days are over, then go for it.
But seriously, the lab coat is so much more flattering.
Check in!
And you’re done! Turn off the Bunsen burner before you leave. 🙂
Be sure to leave your comment below to check in and stay accountable. If you’re reading this by email or in a reader then please click here to leave your comment.
See you tomorrow…
I am not going to judge! I have analyzed that yesterday was too busy, especially since I didn’t even see the challenge until bed time. And, head cold! Ick, can’t get the heart rate up without coughing my lungs out. So, I will eat well today and move FORWARD! Don’t look back!
I really like this idea. I see how we can use it to solve our own challenges. One of my biggest problems is buying a bag of chocolates, then eating the whole bag, then beating myself up verbally about it. I have written out a few observations that might help next time. Thanks!
Judge vs observer. That has a lot of applications in life. I can see how easily I judge myself and deflate. Thanks for the challenge. I need to keep this in mind as I will revisit the judge or observe battle.
I liked this task! It felt a lot better to just notice that I ate too many cookies than to berate myself for it!
Pity I got to read this so late in the evening…will have to take more notice of my inner judge! But thinking of it yep I was a little or should say big piggy with very sweet tooth today and have now realised why, I ran out of chromium tablets yesterday and haven’t bought new bottle. So moral to story, be more organised
This has been good for me. I am doing another 30 day challenge that is helping me see how much of my eating was due to boredom. I’m following Whole30 a Paleo diet. I would reach for carb/sugar laden food all the time then beat myself up after. Not anymore!
Made it to the gym yesterday, and did yard work too. Did the exercise. I’ve done this before via the Defeating Self-defeating Behaviors class from Margie Lawson, but some of the negatives still keep coming back, bringing new ones with them. Thank you for your help changing them around.
I don’t think I am much of a judge on myself. I have been writing my list as more a q and a to myself. lol. my main judge is critical of my shape but the smaller things I think I over analyse my moves most of the time.
I was working through this one the other day on 52wlm, lately, I have had trouble fitting in breakfast (I know, I know – the most important meal of the day), so instead of “You didn’t have breakfast today..again” it’s “Trying to have breakfast when I get to work isn’t working, I have to plan to to take 5 minutes to have it before I leave home..whether it’s 5am or 7am!”
Congratulations. Your on Day 3. You can do it. Exercising and following Michele’s advice you will make it a slimmer you; self-confidence; at peace with yourself; and bursting with new found energy. Remember, we are all beautiful. Good Luck and Happiness Always!
It is sort of seerendipitous that at least the first three missions so far are actions that I had listed in my intentions for this quarter of 2012 as priorities in my quest to achieve my ultimate levels of weight and fitness. The 30-Day Challenge is keeping me on the path that I had previously laid out. Thank you for such a great program.
You’re right…being a judge starts the binge cycle, the voices going around and around about how you might as well give up because you’re never going to conquer this! I hadn’t thought of that before. This will be hard work, but I have a journal I started for this program, so I will work at noticing and writing down the observations.
Wasn’t able to get on here and comment yesterday but I did get in a wonderful hour long walk with a good friend! Going to try and remind myself everyday to be less judgmental 🙂
I have realized that I am horrible about completely derailing my motivation. I miss one morning workout session and that leads to two…etc. I think of it as failing rather than adjusting to what’s going on at the time. I must say I love reading the comments prior to doing my “assignment”. So much motivation and inspiration out there. Thank you all!
This was a perfect one for today. Before going to bed at the earlier time I went online for a quick and necessary check, but rather than getting offline and going to bed I let myself get trapped into doing more and more. This is work I planned to do Weds. I need remember to follow my plan for the week in other areas to be able to be awake and ready to work out in the morning.
These missions always come in at the end of the day so I will have to try this one all day tomorrow. However, today I worked a full 10 hour day, I was able to control my eating really well all morning but the afternoon and evening just fell apart. It was really bad after my supper break. I wonder why.
Thank you for a great way to change the negative focus! So I know I have all this negative self talk, WHY? Thinking about it really puts it in perspective, I would never speak to others that way, why am I speaking (thinking) these things to myself?
I carried around a notepad all day today and came to the (kind of startling) discovery that I don’t do this to myself as it pertains to weight. I do do this to myself when it comes to thinking about my next job and my future prospects, but not about my physical appearance or my efforts to drop my extra pounds.
Hahaha this was definitely a good one for today! I’ve had A LOT of uni work to do, and have been eating chocolate all day… oops. This exercise really helped me to stop focusing on how terrible I feel, and to instead use it as an observation opportunity to think about WHY I ate so much chocolate. Procrastination and stress are the main reasons I came up with, so I guess I need to think of some other ways of dealing with stress, and some strategies for reducing my procrastination…
Still doing the best I can with this challenge while out of town with my DH in the hospital. This particular challenge was quite easy. I don’t think I have ugly thoughts like that about my weight very often, but I am going to try to be more aware the rest of the month to see if I’m thinking them without realizing it.