All, nothing, or somewhere in between? You be the judge.

I am on a Body For Life e-group. This morning there was a re-posting from a member who was a finalist in a BFL challenge. She was discussing how she worked the program to get the results she did. The moderator also linked to an article discussing the mindset behind the champions, and a joking (but true) description of how to guarantee you won’t be a champion (set no goals, skip workouts, eat cake at the office). But the whole thing got me thinking.

I am following BFL, but in a fairly lackadaisical fashion. I do not weigh my food or obsessively check the nutrient ratios, I could certainly eat cleaner than I do, I include faux beer and chocolate in my diet on a regular basis. These behaviors aren’t going to peel 2 pounds of fat of my body per week, at least not week over week. On the other hand, I don’t go into my free day, slavering at the bit because I’m going to die if I can’t get my pizza fix. I have “less than optimal” foods built into my diet, so that I enjoy them as I go along. This doesn’t feel like a diet to me, it’s just my lifestyle.

On the other hand, we all know how long I stayed stalled. Yes, the weight is (slowly) coming off now, but for how long? If you think of your program (whatever it is) as a sort of sliding scale, where are you? Where am I? The folks that win the BFL challenges are at an 11 on a scale of 0 to 10 – 0 being no effort and 10 being total effort. I don’t want to be at 0, and I can’t sustain a 10 or even a 9 without driving myself nuts and crashing and burning after only a few days. So where is the best place to be?

I’ve spent the last year somewhere around a 2 or 3 if I’m honest with myself. Right now I feel like I’m operating at a 6. I’d like to hover somewhere between 7 and 8 – IMO, that’s a pretty good effort, without making yourself obsessive or nuts.

I like BFL because it’s a program that doesn’t require excessive weighing or measuring. For most people, a certain amount of measuring is needed until you get your eyeballs adjusted and can make accurate estimates of portions. On the other hand, I can’t help but feeling like I would see better, more, faster results if I did a bit better on my food. Exercise-wise, I feel like I’m right on. For example, choosing more veggies in place of some of the whole grains. Having either a piece of dark chocolate OR a faux beer, just not both. I’m wondering if a few little tweaks wouldn’t pay off. But I don’t want to turn into one of those obsessive people who slice up a cuke to put their tuna salad (FF mayo only!) on so they can eliminate the 5 whole wheat Ritz crackers from their snack. I guess I’m wondering where I need to draw my line. What are good choices, and what is “over the line”? And how sad is it that I don’t know the answer to that question?

Maybe I’m just feeling bad that yesterday didn’t turn out as I had hoped. Yep, I got up and walked. But I was running late and feeling fatigued, so I skipped cooking breakfast and took the boy & me to Sonic. I had a diet limeade and a ham & egg sandwich (no cheese). A little over what I normally eat, a bit high on the fat, and there’s that white bread, but not too bad.

There was breakfast at the meeting which I knew ahead of time to avoid (no protein), but I did indulge in a fourth of a pecan sweet thingie. No biggie, right? I had my snack, so when we went to lunch I wouldn’t be famished. I limited myself to 3 nacho chips with some topping and one cracker with crab dip from the load of appetizers ordered. I had French onion soup for lunch (left about a third of the cheese) and a grilled chicken Caesar salad (no parm, dressing on the side). We didn’t get dessert, so when we got back I did have another third of that pecan thing because I wanted something sweet. Afternoon snack was skipped because we got out of the meeting late.

Because I got out of the meeting late and had to get the boy, I missed my chance to hit the gym. Hub was working late, so I figured we’d go out. We went out for Chinese with another family. Actually that was no problem – I ordered steam veggies with tofu & chicken, steamed rice and sauce on the side. I didn’t eat much of the rice at all, but I did use all of the general tso’s sauce on my meal and then ate a fortune cookie. Have you ever seen a fortune cookie with a nutrition label? I read this one after I’d eaten the cookie – 210 calories and 10 grams of fat! Good lord! How do they squeeze all that into that tiny, crisp cookie???

After we got home we took a walk, and I had a faux beer. All day long I made a series of “pretty good’ choices. But are they “good enough” to get me the results I want? I know it was just one day. But it’s our response to a series of decisions every single day that determines the outcomes we create for ourselves.

I’ve made a lot of positive changes lately – I’ve majorly curtailed my consumption of both beer & diet soda. I’ve cleaned up my evening snacking in a bit way. Am I just being impatient, or am I expecting more payoff than I’ve earned? I don’t know the answer to any of this, but I definitely want these thoughts at the front of my brain – as long as they don’t keep me up at night!