Consistency is the Key to Results

Years ago I used to do the original Firm workout videos. They had an abs video with about five ab segments. There was an adorable italian guy in the videos who at the end of one of the segments said "Consistency is the key to results."

That particular phrase has struck with me through the years as the truth of it is proved over and over again in my life. And following the No S Diet it has been proved true once again.

Consistently keeping my N days green, pretty much no matter what I eat or how much I eat on my S/NWS days has been the key to my results on the No S diet. Consistently eating only three one plate/bowl meals every N day and not eating snacks, sweets or seconds has paid huge dividends for me.

Sometimes I fret that I "ate too much" on an S/NWS day. But the truth really is "consistency is the key to results." As long as I have kept my N days green, the weight has slowly but steadily come off and now it is staying off.

Once again I am truly learning, it is consistency over the long term that is the key to permanent and lasting results.

... Nothing You Can't Comfortably Do Without

By cutting out [snacks, sweets, and seconds] during the week, you cut out plenty, but nothing you can't comfortably do without.

p.5 The No S Diet by Reinhard Engels

The "nothing you can't comfortably do without" is probably what is debatable for some of us, especially at the beginning. In a culture, where "well-known" fitness gurus are telling us to eat every five minutes to keep our metabolism up and so ... god forbid, we won't get hungry ... many of, especially in the beginning wonder ... can we, in fact, comfortably do without snacks?

The truth of the matter is that in the first few weeks, it might not be so "comfortable" to forego snacking. But it is truly amazing how quickly our body adapts when we are strict with our N days.

Others, of us, sugar babies that we are, fret. No chocolate? No soda? No snagging a handful of jelly beans when we cruise by the receptionist's desk? And HOW WILL we say "no" to the rest of the ubiquitous sweets that are offered, pushed, insisted upon? Perhaps in the beginning we are not so comfortable with "no sweets" either.

Our "no thank you's" are rusty and flimsy, perhaps even a bit wimpy from atrophy and little use. But, once again, it is truly amazing how quickly we can adapt when we are strict on our N Days.

And let's not neglect "no seconds". In a world where our eyes are much bigger than our stomachs, the concept of "no more" may seem daunting. But, once again, by keeping those N days green, in what is almost no more than a blink of the eye, you just might learn that "hunger" actually feels good and "less really is more."

So that, in not too long, perhaps in just the amount of time it takes to join the "21 day club" we have arrived at a point, where No Snacks, No Sweets, and No Seconds are something we can comfortably do without on our N Days and look forward to on our S days.

Photo: Yummy Lunch of Grilled Albacore, Sauted Spinach with Loads of Garlic and EVOO and Spiced Yams

Hexagram 61: Limitation

Through the years I have dabbled in studying different religions and philosophies. One of my favorite "soothing" books is the I Ching. I am very fond of the "taoist" strain in its teachings, not so much the "confucianist."

Since I have been on the NO S Diet, I have often thought of Hexagram 61: Limitation and how enlightening it was the first time I read it. In a culture where "more" is never enough and "too much" hardly seems like a respectable amount, the wisdom of "limitation" is like good medicine.

Let's look at some excerpts from the Wilhelm translation below:

The Judgement

Limitation. Success.
Galling limitation must not be persevered in.

The Image

A lake is something limited. Water is inexhaustible. A lake can only contain a definite amount of the infinite quantity of water; this is its peculiarity. In human life too the individual achieves signficance through the discrimination and setting of limits ... Unlimited possibilites are not suited to man; if they existed his life would only dissolve in the boundless. To become strong, a man's life needs the limitations ordained by duty and voluntarily accepted. The individual attains significance as a free spirit only by surrounding himself with these limitations and by determining for himself what his duty is.

To me traditional diets are a "galling limitation", i.e. limits that lead to the "misfortune" of failure if "persevered" in. The"diet backlash" or binge that follows every diet is a good example of such "misfortune". The No S Diet, on the other hand, gives us just enough limits to be appropriately discriminating in our daily eating lives.

The No S Diet is definitely NOT a "galling limitation." It is just the right amount of limits to help us acheive "success" and get on with the business of living our otherwise fascinating lives.

Anxiety

One of the many reasons I used to overeat and binge was to handle anxiety. I am not necessarily talking about huge or crippling anxiety, I am talking more about the "garden variety" kind of anxiety of living a "normal" life in the "modern world." The somewhat ongoing background tensions caused by interruptions, miscommunications, minor daily frustrations and obstructions.

This morning I accompanied a loved one to the hospital for an outpatient procedure. Hospitals, Parking Lots, Doctors, Consent Forms and basically the realm of the "unknown" loomed before me and my loved one. In the past, I might have been completely "unaware" of my anxiety, moving like shifting sands just below the surface of my consciousness, and used the experience to be "really hungry" all of a sudden.

But let's see, yesterday and today were N days. Hmmmmmmmm ... not a lot of room their for "food" subterfuge.

I began to realize last night that I was bit worried, just because anytime someone goes under anesthesia there is always THAT RISK. Small, but present. Curiously, I focused on how would I handle breakfast which was actually concrete and helpful. After much back and forth I decided the best bet would be to pack it and take it with me.

That is what I did this morning. Packed my healthy one bowl breakfast and threw it in my purse with a spoon. SO there I was in the waiting room ... tick tock tick tock ... the time was past when they were supposed to call me. Other patients "drivers" had already been called. I got to feel all my anxiety. Not mind bending. Not extremely high level. Just enough that prior to No S I might have ended up with some unwanted pastry from the coffee cart or some unsatisfying fare from the hospital cafe ... both reasons to indulge MORE when it was all over and I was free to leave the hospital, discharge my loved one, and then be free to ... well ... eat.

But that's just not how it went to day. I ate my one bowl. Satisfying as it always is. Lived through the anxiety. Tended to my loved one. Had a nice one plate lunch and got to work when it was all said and done. A "normal" day.

HALLELUJAH!

Who would have thought that I would have ever chosen anxiety over a donut?

Best Weekend Ever!

First of all, a housekeeping item.

After an emotionally tumultuous process I have decided to continue blogging about my No S Diet journey, however because of the time consuming nature of taking and preparing pictures I am going to start today, doing my week day posts without photos and save the pics for "weekend features". For right now this seems like a better balance than either continuing as I have been or totally stopping the blog. Okay. We shall see how it goes!

As far as being the "Best Weekend Ever!" this one was definitely it.

Why?

Simple reason.

I actually woke up grrrrrrrr .... HUNGRY this morning. "So what," you say. OH NO. This is the first Monday since I have been on the No S Diet that I actually woke up MONDAY MORNING - well, hungry.

What is the significance of that?

Well it means that I did not overeat this weekend. At all. AMAZING. I had my delicious caramel macchiatos, a dark chocolate/coffee bar from Starbucks, a lovely Italian meal and even ... GASP a peice of Von's birthday cake. What can I say, I was in the mood.

Anyway I also ate salmon, artichoke, healthy beans and lentils, an organic free range turkey burger, plain organic yogurt .... blah blah blah. BUT the thing is it is becoming more effortless and I am becoming more skillful at keeping to the right size portions for my body by "eyeballing" things and sensing how my body is "feeling."

Yes, I am somewhat delirious with this progress. I suppose you can tell!

Trick or Treat

Happy Halloween all of you NOSers!

Bwahahhahahhahahhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

This can definitely be a HAPPY Halloween for all of us. Myself, I am taking Halloween as an official NWS day. A couple of weeks ago I stacked up on my stash for the trick or treaters who will come by tonight, but because of my "time" on NO S they have been "safely" stashed in the closet untouched.

TRICK OR TREAT?

It is your choice.

Call it an NWS day and have a Treat or pass and go for the Trick.

It is your choice!

Me ... my treats today will be fresh donuts from our local donut shop, vegan nachos and a wickedly delicious Caramel Machiatto! Teeheeeheeee!

Photo: Halloween TREATS!

"Glass Ceilings"

"Glass Ceiling" is a concept Reinhard uses for "containing" alcohol consumption. I have been using it for the past two months to contain caffiene/coffee consumption and it has been working really well. I quit drinking coffee over four years ago because I could not stick with reasonable amounts. After nosing for six month I decided to experiment with using the "glass ceiling" concept for caffiene/coffee.

Works like a charm. Now I can enjoy my coffees twice a day, once after breakfast and another, usually after lunch. Then that's it I am done. I have only "broken" the "glass ceiling" once ... and that was an S day.

Reinhard has come up with so many useful ideas for managing our habits and disciplining our appetites. I am so glad I stumbled upon his book The No S Diet in Barnes and Noble this past March. It has changed my life and had an impact that the gazillion diet books that I bought before cannot even touch!

I love being "normal" and I love my "drinky" things. I am so glad that I get to MAXIMIZE my ENJOYment of them by using No S Diet concepts like "S days" and "glass ceilings"

Photos: Two Starbucks Coffees

I Love Veggies

I suppose I am fortunate because I love veggies. No broccoli haters here. ANY vegetable steamed or sauteed with a generous dollop of EVOO (extra virgin olive oil), salt and/or pepper is yummy to me.

I know! I know! We all talk about eating protien and making protien the central part of meals, but for me, my only "rule of thumb" is this:

I try to make sure that not a day goes by without a nice serving of GREEN!

The No S Diet is great for getting in your veggies because they are a GREAT way to fill up your plate. Without the higher natural sugars of fruit and loaded with even MORE MINERALS, veggies are the road to exuberant good health.

Like I said, I suppose I am fortunate, I have loved veggies since I was a kid. The simpler the better. Great tasting, fresh vegetables don't need to be drowned in heavy sauces, cheesy toppings, or fried and breaded. BLEYCH! is what I say to drowning all that natural goodness!

For today, try filling up your plate with nice, fresh veggies.

Photo: Mesquite Grilled Halibut, Steamed Green Beans and Carrots with EVOO and Celtic Sea Salt

Pre-disapproved

I love this little gem from the No S Diet book ...

"You're pre-disapproved, so forget it and move onto something else." p119

Being pre-disapproved definitely keeps things simple.

Someone stands in front of me with a sweety thing and/or a snacky thing and a big smile on their face.

"Here I brought this specially for you cause I KNOW it's your favorite."

Quick internal reconnoitering - is this an N day? Yes? Hmmm ... that means I am PRE-DISAPPROVED for ANYTHING sweety and anything snacky I can't or don't want to put on my one plate. Do I want to put THAT particular SNACKY THING on my one plate today? Heaven's no.

"Gee, that was so nice of you to think of me. I'll just take it and wrap it up for later."

Person's smile fades as I swipe it from their hands and quickly disappear.

On the way to lunch I make three points free-throwing it into the garabage. Better in the waste can than on my waist band.

Pre-disapproved.

Keeping life simple on the No S Diet.

Bad Ass

If you have been following my blog for any length of time, then you might remember that I took some of the $aving$ from following the No S Diet and hired a personal trainer at my gym in May.

Let's see that was four-and-a-half months ago.

IN the beginning the training manager gave me five complimentary sessions and trained me himself. VERY GOOD. And very nice. Then I was assigned another trainer. Pretty tuff on me, but that is what I asked for.

Yesterday I went in for my session and that trainer was no longer with the gym. Sigh. So they assigned me to another trainer. Young. Nordic. Uh huh.

I decided to take it in stride. We discussed my goals for the day and settled on some circuit training. He wanted to assess my fitness level.

So he had me start with 25 pushups, 25 deadlifts and 25 pull-ups. Now let me remind you that I used to not be able to do even one full body push-up. KNEES PLEASE!

Well, I dropped down and pumped out 25 perfect form full-body pushups and he was ... wide-eyed (probably not more so than myself) and said I was "bad ass". We continued through the circuit and he was apparently sufficiently impressed.

He took me to the other side of the gym and had be do another circuit of squat press things (not sure what they were exactly) and then these squat jumps and chin pull up things, in circuits of 21, 18, 15, 12 and 9.

He basically told me that most of the other people coming in for training weren't up to doing this ... COOL! When I was dying at the end, he said with a smile on his face, "That is what you get for being a bad ass."

As a forty-six year old female, who has in the past year-and-a-half been on a passionate journey to claim her inner IRON WOMAN - big smile - I felt like being able to pump out those 25 full body pushups and have this twenty-something jock call me a "bad ass" was pretty much a testament to not only the body reshaping that I have accomplished, but the development of FUNCTIONAL STRENGTH as well.

VERY COOL! I LOVE THIS STUFF! AND I LOVE BEING A "BAD ASS"!

Photo: One Bowl of Watermelon, definitely think this fits into the "maximize your real estate" category