If we haven’t met, my name is Denise Jelinek. I’m your Catholic health and weight loss coach and creator of Weight Loss with the Holy Spirit. Now, I just got done with a client and she said, Denise, I know that when I make a plan of what I’m going to eat during the day, I’m not supposed to plan “should” foods or foods that lead to weight loss.

She’s   how am I going to lose weight if I don’t plan foods that lead to weight loss? And it goes like this, so if you don’t know this, I have two food rules. And my two food rules are that you plan food that you like, and that you feel good about when you eat. So if you like Oreos, and you feel good about yourself eating three or four Oreos, then plan Oreos.

But if you don’t feel good about eating eight or  the entire package, you wouldn’t plan the entire package.  The rationale behind eating food that you love, that you feel good about, is that when we plan “should” foods, or diet foods, or weight loss foods, at the end of the day, if you don’t follow that plan, you’re going to have a million reasons why you didn’t follow that plan.

You’ll easily be able to justify, well I didn’t really like that, it wasn’t that good. I just felt so deprived. You’re still believing that the problem is that you made the wrong plan. Now the alternative is if you make a plan that includes the foods that you enjoy in an amount that you feel good about and that you want, there’s no shoulds, there’s no, this will lead to weight loss. If you plan anything like that and you have any of those thoughts, you need to re-evaluate

but if you plan food that you love, that you enjoy, that you feel good about, and at the end of the day, you don’t stick to that plan. That is like Eureka! That is like the Lord shining a flashlight , look at this situation. Look at this situation. Hey, we need a problem solved for this. That’s how you identify the real problems that you need to solve.

Let me give you an example. The client that I was just talking to, she said I realize that when I sit in the car, when my girls are in ballet, I want to go to Starbucks, Burger King, .  Little Caesars.  That’s what’s throwing her off the plan.  Let’s problem solve for that.

And she decided,  I just live around the corner. I’ll just go home.  Another problem that she identified was that her daughter made her a cobbler for her birthday. Isn’t that lovely? And she said,  on my birthday, I had a reasonable amount of the cobbler that I felt good about.

And since then, I’ve just left the cobbler on the counter with a spoon in it. And I just keep taking little bites and little bites. So is the problem the cobbler or is the problem that the count that the cobbler is on the counter with a spoon in it? So you guys, that’s how you get to start identifying what the real problem is.

So we can go live over diet land, and traditional weight loss, where we just make a plan. And it’s going to lead to weight loss. And at the end of the day, if I don’t follow the plan, well of course it’s the plan’s problem.  Instead, I encourage you to make a plan of foods you enjoy that you can stick to. And if you don’t stick to it, it’s not a problem. I love to call it an easy to stick to meal plan. In fact, when you’re planning your food, you’re going to ask yourself, Is this easy to stick to?

And if not, what needs to be changed?  Maybe I want to plan three cookies instead of two. Maybe I want two helpings, not just one. Maybe I want a full sandwich and not just a half. Is it easy to stick to? And if not, what needs to be changed? When we can live in that honesty and go through the day,  if you don’t follow that plan, it’s not a problem either, but being willing to look at what tripped you up is how you’re going to solve that problem. Isn’t that amazing? Now, there will be a point where you want more weight loss, but you’ve already developed the skills of knowing how to make a plan that you can stick to.

That’s a skill. Once you do that, then you can make adjustments and you’ll be ready to maybe cut some things out so that you can have greater weight loss. But I am telling you, until you learn the skill to make a plan that’s easy to stick to with the foods that you love, be willing to address what the real issue is and problem solve for that, you’re just gonna feel stuck in diet land.

If weight loss has felt hard for you, it’s not because you’re doing it wrong. It’s just you haven’t known where to start. And I have a free five day amazing weight loss challenge for you that only requires a pad.

You don’t even have to do anything in your kitchen for it. It will show you exactly where to start so that weight loss is lasting. 

Take our free five day weight loss challenge for Catholic women  visit weightlosswiththeholyspirit. com.