How To Journal Effectively To Stay Motivated
Struggling with your motivation? If so, take comfort in knowing that this is a perfectly normal occurrence. Many people do struggle from time to time with their motivation levels but it's only those who are able to push past this who are going to see long-term results.
Rather than getting all held up over the fact you aren't motivated, what you want is a game plan in place that you can turn to that will help bring these motivational levels back up again.
That's where a journal comes into play. By taking the time to utilize a good journal each day, you can turn to this when you need a little bit of a motivational boost.
Let's look at a few of the facts that you need to know in order to journal properly to increase your motivation.
Take Pictures
The very first thing that you can do to make your journal far more effective is to make sure to include progress pictures. Very often it's hard to spot differences in our body's when we look at ourselves on a day-to-day basis.
But, when you look back over a period of time – say three or four weeks, then you can see clear differences in how you're progressing along.
Progress pictures will help you realize this and get the sense that all your hard work is in fact paying off.
List the Weight You Lifted in the Gym
Next, you should also take the time to write down precisely how much weight you've lifted at each workout as well. Listing this is going to allow you to look at your workout program and see how far you've come from that perspective.
Remember, any gains in strength do indicate progress as well, even if the (weight) scale isn't moving downwards as you'd like.
If you're lifting more weight during your workout, this likely means that you've actually built some new lean muscle mass which then explains why the scale hasn't moved downwards at the moment.
Take comfort in knowing that lean muscle mass will actually help you stay leaner in the long-run, thus you are progressing in the right direction.
List How You Feel About Your Day
Another very important thing that you'll want to do when you journal is list how you feel as you go about your day. Do you feel frustrated, upset, angry, or are you feeling somewhat confused over your program entirely?
Getting these thoughts and feelings down can help you notice trends in your behaviour and that can allow you to gain insight into how you should deal with these feelings so that you stay on track with your program.
For example, if you're often feeling sad and lonely and turning to food for comfort, this could indicate that you should either try and expand your social network or possibly even seek counselling.
If you never took the time to journal your feelings however, you would never have realized this and thus may have just continued on as you did before.
Nb: You do not need to write screeds of information, just concise lists that record important statistics, observations, feelings, foods and quantity consumed, exercise, etc. will give you good snapshots at regular intervals and then a long term picture to build up from these daily journals supported by photos along the way as well as tell-tale images, of the "before and after" variety where your weight loss is (hopefully) clearly evident in your 'after' photos. You then have 'actual' results to compare with 'desired' goals - and can correct your weight-loss efforts/actions if you are not making progress as planned. The accuracy, consistency and regularity of your journal entries (including the time at which you write) will be more important to your weight loss program than the quantity of information per se at each (haphazard) entry.
Summary
Any way you want to look at it, a journal is a very effective tool for helping to increase motivation and keep you committed to your program. Having a good journal in place, along with a proper workout program, a good diet, an effective appetite suppressant such as Phen 375, and proper goals so you know what direction you want to move in will ensure that you're always taking positive steps towards success.
