loosing weight for "good"

Today I am going to talk about an idea that I stole and then adapted from weight watchers.  I am not currently doing weight watchers although I have learned a lot from them and am using a lot of their ideas, It's just that I was paying for a service I wasn't really using that much.

Any way, I have always had trouble motivating myself to loose.  I mean I was in my sister's wedding this summer and lost only a fraction of the weight that I could have before I had to squeeze into that strapless gown (how gruesome).  So I have been thinking, what is something that will work, what can I do to give myself that extra push?  Well weight watchers does this thing where you get sponsors to give money for each pound lost (kind of like in an elementary school reading program) and then the money goes to a national food bank program or something.  That got me thinking of change jars and I came up with my own loosing weight for "good".  I am not asking people for money I have always hated that and am a terrible sales person (I had a hard time selling girl scout cookies as a brownie and those things practically sell them selves, not a hard time eating them though).  But why am I overweight?  Because I eat more calories then I work off.  Whether you are a low carb, low fat, vegetarian what ever... the basic science of weight is calorie intake vs. calorie burn.  If you burn off what you take in then your weight stays the same.  To put it even simpler I am overweight because at some point I ate more then my body needed to do what I do all day.  So I eat too much, and yet there are people in my community who don't have enough food who are just scrapping by and in this current economy my local food banks are going dry.  What if I put a jar on my dresser and each time I loose a pound I put a dollar in the jar and when I get a good amount, say every ten dollars, I donate it to my local food bank or shelter?

So this is what I've been doing.  It's an experiment to see if someone else's needs will motivate me since obviously the thought of me in a bikini is just way too far fetched at this point to do it.  It's working pretty good so far; for one thing my favorite and most dangerous time to eat is after the kids are in bed while I'm watching t.v. in our room.  It's the only time of day when it's quiet and I can have my food all to myself with out sharing and we eat dinner so early I'm hungry again by seven or eight.  Having a snack isn't bad unless it's ice cream and cookies which is what I always want.  I see that jar and I think "ok I'll have a graham cracker instead" and there is currently four dollars in there which is pretty cool to see, it's better then the tiny little increments on the scale and it sort of makes me want to "keep it up" certainly I don't want to take any money out.

This coupled with my new way of thinking about health and my body (mentioned in this blog a couple of days ago) I hope that I will start to see and feel a difference in me.  So lets call it the jar challenge, and I'm opening it up to any one who wants to help out and loose a few pounds.  This is NOT for those of you who are pregnant and being paranoid about your weight; your baby is more important then your thighs right now believe me (by all means feel free to give to your local food banks but don't make it about your weight) you know who you are... But for those of us who have already had a couple of kids and have a little more weight on us then that warrants lets' give it a try.  It doesn't have to be a dollar you could do a quarter or any denomination and if you don't want to take the money out every ten pounds then don't, you could do it every month, or leave it in there until you hit a different goal what ever.  But Maybe someone else's needs can get us going and help restore a little balance in our lives and in our communities, and if we all loose together and give together then we can make a real difference to a family right in our own back yard.