American Muslima Writer -Daring to Work Towards Jannah

Here is the latest from my other blog http://sweatyhijab.wordpress.com/ but I felt that it deserves to be HERE too because it is about improvement in Islam too and any part of your life really. So I will post it becasue I'm a lazy blogger too and don't like to click links much either.

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Many people aim really high when they try to loose weight. They have it in their head that they need to change their whole life around to loose weight. Ohhh no i said the C word! CHANGE. It can be a scary word for people stuck in their ways. Entrenched in their habits. It’s hard for some people to take a chance and risk the posability that their life will change when they start to loose weight. It’s scary to them to think that by their life changing so will their personality and goals and whole “master plan”. Some people don’t feel comfortable stepping outside the box. They love the security of the four walls blocking the view, trapping them, ensuring their daily routine…. these same people when forced out of the box (for example because the doc says if you don’t loose weight you will die soon) tend to over aim when setting goals. They sign up for expensive gyms vowing to go to it everyday maybe twice a day, throwing all junk food away and buying only the latest healthy foods, weigh-in regularly and expect to see rapid weight loss…. then a week or month down the line the whole new lifestyle is hard to maintain so soon old habits return… chips and soda infiltrate the cabinets and fridge…that special meeting at the kid’s school interupted your workout routine…. you miss a morning weigh-in… or the scale doesn’t move fast enough… all of these leads to a meltdown of loosing weight AND depression that you will never be able to change so you curl up and slink your way back into your box and build your walls higher.

Many of you are nodding your heads that this has happened to you. Where’s the flaw what did I do wrong you may ask. You aimed too high.

To start something new you do need enthusiasm and motivation but you also need realistic goals to set for yourself! You can’t start this whole regimen thinking in one month you will loose 10 lbs! Especailly when your sluggish body is used to it’s style and habits too. Start yourself slow by slowly incorporating good habits and slowly weeding out the bad foods and drinks. Replace each bad thing with a good alternative so everytime you want that bad thing you have something healthy to stuff your mouth with. LIke I for example always want chocolate! Yet I got a large bag of carrots and told myself when I wander to the fridge for chocolate just pick up the carrot and munch away, as many carrots as you please. Eventaully I dropped most of my chocolate cravings. I say most because I believe in a treat now and then as long as you realize it is a treat and you’re not cheating yourself by treating yourself too often.

Exercise once in a morning and the next day maybe you don’t and that’s ok. Maybe the next day you’ll feel motivated by your previous workout to work out again the day after that. You don’t need to kick the ball out of the park you just have to get it moving slowly to start loosing weight. ANything you do towards your goal of loosing weight is a good thing and if you do nothing that is ok too and you just have to re-motivate yourself. Set small conquorable goals. I started out with a goal of loosing 10 kilos in 10 months. So if by the end of the month I lost one kilo I forced myself to be happy with that small advantage, hey a kilo is a kilo! I knew I could do better than that and I strive to do better than that but I don’t want to burn myself out and not complete looosing weight. After the first month when I lost 2 kilos I realized that would get me to my goal in half the time so I re made my goal to every month loose two kilos and that has worked really well for me. After many months I have been able to see a steady drop. Sure it looks slow on a graph or chart (which i do keep) but it does keep dropping without going up again. When I feel extra motivated I try for 3 kilos a month or GASP! 4 kilos! When i told my hubby maybe this month I will try for three kilos he scoffed at me! Whoa one more kilo wow don’t rush things he mocked. I gave him my “I’m smarter than you” look and said haven’t I lost so much weight so far and kept it off? If I aim low I can’t fail.

HEAR THAT? AIM LOW = NO FAIL

again: A I M L O W = N O F A I L !!!!

So by aiming low you set yourself up to achieve small but managable goals. This works in nearly every area of life not just weight loss when you want to step out of your box.

When I converted to Islam it was daunting the rules one has to follow and how much you have to change in your life. But I felt the pull and truth of Islam and that kept me motivated to continue. Sure the first time I aimed too high. I expected to be the perfect Muslim right away. Hijab, no alcohol, praying etc… but I failed why? I aimed REALLY too high… it takes a lot of small peronal obsticales to change so radically. I had to start with a small hedband scarf and work up to the full hijab. I had to learn small sections of the prayers before ebing able to do them once then up to 5 times a day. I had to realize the stupidity of drinking alcohol and it’s effect on me (which is bad effect..) [thanks friends for teaching me that one]…………

So again to step out of the box: AIM LOW = NO FAIL

Insha’Allah! and Good Luck to you all in your goals and weight loss!