If you are tired of waiting in life for that specific thing to happen before you can get on and live your best life, then I write this article for you as well as myself. Today I am focused on losing the wait(ing), through my journey of losing the weight.

Even if weight is not your issue then I hope you’ll find the content pretty universal and relevant; whether you are waiting for more money, better health, a special person, a life’s purpose, a family, more confidence or like me you are keen to lose some physical weight, we are all connected by a common barrier which is preventing us from living the rich interior life that we deserve.

Today I ask the question, why are we waiting for our external world to change in order to change how we feel internally?

Earlier this evening I was out and catching up with a few friends when one of my girlfriends caught a glimpse of an acquaintance across the room that she hadn’t seen for awhile. She commented to the other girls who also knew her “Holy Crap! She looks amazing! What has she been doing? She looks like she’s lost about 30 kilos” to which another friend replied “She saw a Life Coach, they got into her head and she said it changed everything.”

My girlfriend then turned to me and said “You’re a Life Coach, you need to do that to me” to which I replied, “I need to do it myself” and then I lol’d.

(I didn’t actual lol. I just threw that in there to stir her up because she’s a passionate hater of the ‘lol’. And now I really am laughing out loud, I am soooo funny. lol)

My girlfriend and I discussed it and agreed that we would do it together, not as a client and consultant but as two mates helping each other out. I provide all the tips, techniques and tools that I have and she provides some accountability for me to start practising what I preach.

You see I know what I need to do, and I don’t do it. I even know what I need to do in order to get over not doing the things I need to do, and I don’t do them either.

I believe that all of us know what we need to do to make ourselves happy, healthy and loved and sometimes we don’t do those things. Sometimes we need help. Not to work out what to do but just to help us allocate some time and effort to an issue in our life. To help us with some inspiration, to help us with some accountability and to help us to acknowledge our unhelpful thought patterns.

I believe that we can successfully achieve any goal on our own, but I also believe, “where’s the fun in that?” Isn’t it an awesome thing to be able to collaborate with someone? Isn’t the juicy stuff of life all about sharing journeys, offering support and swapping wisdoms and ideas? These are the reasons that I am so passionate about what I do, I love helping people…but it’s time to start helping myself as well.

I preach the importance of, “putting the oxygen mask on yourself before you put it on others” all the time, but I’m not doing it. I also preach the importance of “taking it easy on yourself and focusing on the things that you are doing as a beginning point rather than on what you’re not”, so this is where I’m going to start.

Before I started Loving Business I sat with my own business consultant and we talked about the kinds of clients I wished to see and the types of issues that I wanted to focus upon and specialise in. The conversation turned one day to helping people with their weight issues, and I remember saying to him “how could I possibly help others when I’m not doing it for myself? I’d feel like such a hypocrite”.

And then he asked me what was a great question and just one of many great questions that I have thanked him for asking me, he asked “What would be the benefits to your clients be given that this is an issue that you’ve struggling with too? Remember that you’ve also overcome the struggle a few times before, you know the path and the traps for relapsing.”

I came up with a long list of the ways in which my journey and personal struggles could help people, but my fears of being hypocritical shied me away from the idea.

So I’m going to dip my toe in and help someone, not a client but a friend, and then I’ll go from there. But it’s high time for me to lose both the weight and the wait. My intentions are to write down in detail the journey that we undergo and put it into a format of a teaching program; and if it all goes well then I’ll share it with you any of you who are also on this path and interested in what we came up with.

Actually let’s go one step further than that. If any of you would like to be included on this journey as we go along then feel free to contact me via the Loving Business Facebook page and I’ll keep you up to date with what we are doing. I’ll set up a private Facebook group where we can share our stories of giving up the wait no matter what it is that you are waiting for, as well as offer support and inspiration.

A few months ago I wrote an article about How to Help Her Lose The Weight Without Losing Her, I had some great feedback from lots of people that told me they couldn’t read the article because it tapped into issues that they had experienced from others trying to control their appearance and weight. I promised that I would rewrite the article from the perspective of the self for those people.

So tonight this is what I’m doing. The following is also an outline of the conversation I had earlier with my girlfriend when I was explaining to her how we’d go about this all and how we’ll start. I promised her no talk about food or exercise to begin with, no jumping on the scales, and no tough love. We’ll get there, but we all know that stuff. The stuff that we really struggle with is letting go of the wait.

The waiting until we get our perfect bodies before we start to live the life that we really want to live, before we feel like we deserve to be loved and before we feel like we have anything to offer, the wait is the most insidious thing about a weight issue.

So if you are keen to get on with it and lose the wait, no matter what it is that you are waiting for then I hope you enjoy the outline I’ve written below. As discussed earlier it specifically pertains to my weight loss journey but the kernel of each point is transferable.

1. What You Need To Understand Before You Begin

No one can ‘get’ you to do anything, including lose weight. It’s a personal journey that isn’t anyone’s business, so be careful who you speak to about it in the early stages.

Many people struggle with this issue and people will be only too happy to offer you their fears and opinions regarding your journey, keep them at bay. You’ve got enough of your own fears and enough tough love swirling around in your head, you don’t need to invite another critical voice to the party. You know exactly who this person is within your life that I’m talking about, keep them out of this.

2. Why You Are Overweight

Regardless of what you’ve been telling yourself or other people, you are carrying this weight for a reason. Not only are they good reasons but they are awesome reasons. Whether your weight has been a comfort, a protection, a support, a shield, or all of the above, it has been of great value to you.

Whilst weight gain as a coping mechanism has many limits and some obvious health costs, it is not the enemy here. It has done everything that it has been asked to do. It has been your way of coping, and it has done its job. It has also provided you with a sign that something is out of balance in your life.

To effect change you don’t need to unravel the specific reasons as to why the weight has been necessary in your life, you know why. You only need to get to a point where you can acknowledge that those reasons are a part of who you are; therefore they are important, valid and worth loving.

3. Why Do You Want To Lose Weight?

Years ago I dated a man who thought that it would be helpful to pull at a fat roll on my stomach and tell me “You know something? You would be stunning if you lost some weight”.

Now let us ignore the insensitive nature of these comments and look at them for what they were. They were statements that I allowed because they mirrored my own thoughts about my body. They were also statements projected from a man who had those same insecurities and thoughts about his own body.

His motives limited his ability to offer a solution. He wasn’t able to offer me anything other than critical observations because that was all he knew how to bring to his own struggle.

If there was no way that his criticism and judgement was going to help inspire me then why do I think it appropriate to offer the same bullshit to myself?

Make sure your motives are loving ones. Get excited about moving towards the things in life that bring you joy rather than trying to push away from the things that are frustrating and disappointing you in your current life.

4. Your Weight Loss

Give up the temptation to compare your body and your weight loss journey with others. I mentioned before that your weight is no one else’s business, but the same goes for you.

I get that it gives you a thrill to see a celebrity on the cover of a magazine with their cellulite showing, or to run into frienemy who has packed on the pounds, but for your own sake stop it.

There are never times when we are thriving, feeling awesome and kicking goals in all aspects of our own life that we bother to stop and compare ourselves against the flaws and shortcomings of others. Never.

You’re not a horrible person for judging others, it’s human nature. But it’s not helpful to you on this journey. It is “pushing away” rather than “moving towards”. It is everything that you need to stop doing to yourself.

Judgement brings no joy and no solutions, it only offer’s more of the criticism that you’ve been hurt by yourself. Get rid of it out of you life. Because if you can stop measuring and judging the flaws in others then you’ll soon be able to stop doing it to yourself.

5. Specifically, What Are You Hoping To Achieve?

As an example let’s say that you’ve lamented how you used to be the life of the party and now you’ve put on weight you hold back. You’re less, less willing to go out, and you’ve noticed that you’re now lacking the confidence that you remember you used to have.

In this instance what you are hoping to achieve is to regain your confidence in a social context.

Activity:

I would encourage you to write out a list of the qualities you are hoping to see in yourself and experience once you’ve lost the weight, found the perfect person, have more money, have better health etc.

6. You Are A Mirror

You are the mirror from which you see yourself daily. If you were to start offering a new perspective on how you see yourself and your weight, then doesn’t it make sense that this would start to change how you felt about yourself deep down?

And the great thing is you don’t have to believe the new things that you are telling yourself, there was a time that you didn’t believe the horrible things that you say to yourself now. Your critical inner dialogue implanted itself into you slowly, little by little. So if you can develop hate for parts of yourself just by the things that you think repeatedly, then isn’t it logical that you can develop love for yourself using the same method?

I’ll pick up the example of confidence that I gave above. The first thing I’d like to ask you is; how has your lack of self confidence benefited you? Some possible examples below;

Activity:

Go through your entire list of what you are trying to achieve from the above activity and look at how you being overweight/ill/poor/lonely/ etc has benefited you in those areas. The benefits are there I promise, they are just hard to see when you are so heavily focused on the drawbacks.

The human experience is a dichotomy; near and far, hot and cold, light and dark, good and bad. It’s the whole yin and yang thing, for every drawback you’ve acknowledged about being overweight/ill/poor/lonely etc there are an equal amount of benefits, that’s right…equal. So start looking.

Then write out a list of appreciation for those benefits.

7. Your Positive Aspects

Going back to your list of things that you hope to achieve, I’d encourage you to start looking for where those facets of are currently showing up in your life.

If you are seeing your lack confidence at big parties; then where aren’t you lacking confidence socially? Where are you thriving socially? Who are the people you are with and what are the places where you are completely uninhibited?

Look for those moments; offer appreciation and positive attention to those moments. The day that you find more examples of yourself thriving then of yourself struggling is the day that you’ll tip the balance in your own perceptions.

8. Tell Yourself You Are Beautiful And Why

Once again, you don’t need to believe the words you are saying; because you certainly weren’t born thinking parts of yourself were ugly. You’ve picked that up over time through the practice of saying it repeatedly to yourself; unfortunately it most probably began with the help of some people you love.

So it’s time to get conscious about what you are saying to yourself, start by offering yourself some specific compliments that you can’t dismiss or shrug off. It doesn’t matter how small you start, just start. Pick something to focus on and repeat it until you believe it.

Be as enthusiastic and adoring of yourself and your body right now as you would be if you were living the dream that you’ve envisage for yourself. Once again, you don’t need to believe it, we’re faking it til we make it baby!

Why wait until you lose weight to offer yourself this level of positive attention, appreciation and affection? There is a lot about you that is fantastic right now. You’ve just got to start looking for what these things are. This is impossible to do when you are so heavily focused on the things that you don’t like, so shift your focus and get some balance back into your perspective.

9. You Don’t Need Fixing

You don’t need fixing because you aren’t broken.

You don’t need ‘to do things’ as much as you need ‘to stop doing things’. You need to stop believing that you are anything less than magnificent as you are right now. And this is easily achieved through practice.

Underneath it all you are exactly the same strong, brave, caring, compassionate, loving, smart, sexy, capable, funny and beautiful person who you’ve once known yourself to be. And don’t let me hear you say that you’ve never felt that way about yourself, you have. Because if you hadn’t then feeling the way you do right now wouldn’t be so bad because you’d have nothing to compare it to.

You know who you truly are, and that’s why it hurts so much everyday when you tell yourself that you are less than this.

You don’t need help to ‘get back’ to that person; you only need help to acknowledge that you still are that person. If fact if you were only focused more on ‘who you are’ and less on ‘who you’re not’ then you and I wouldn’t be having this conversation.

10. Losing the Wait

If you really want this, then stop waiting for your outside to change so you can have some peace and happiness on the inside. You can achieve that right now, immediately, and without waiting. Just keep your focus on just how amazing, beautiful and special you are right now and on thinking the thoughts that you perceive you’d have if all of your dreams were true right now.

Much Love & Appreciation, Leanne xx

PS: As mentioned above if you’re keen or you think that a friend would be interested to follow our journey with a focus on wait rather than weight, then hit me up through the Loving Business Facebook page. I’ll create a link for our private group where you’ll have a safe and supportive place to connect with which will hopefully inspire your own journey too.

Also for more Loving Business Articles please see the links below.