The Secret to My Success

When people hear about my weight loss or how far I run they are often impressed.  Not that I put this out there in my introduction, “Hi, I’m Todd.  I lost 85 pounds and am training for a 10 miler in October.”  I do play it a little close to the vest, usually it comes up when coworkers notice that I am not eating the communal pizza and doughnuts.  The response to why I am not eating it usually goes something like, “Really, 85 pounds how do you keep it off? Running? How far do you run?”  The answer is, in actuality, a lot more complicated than that. 

I eat a lot of very healthy foods, whole grains, more apples than you can shake a stick at, I try for organic meats.  We have a guy we get the meat from at our farmer’s market.  It is expensive, organics just are, but, boy is it good.  The result of eating this way is that I feel bad when I eat the foods I used to.  Physically and mentally.  The guilt is really amazing and I am impressed that I can feel as logy as I do.  And I do eat that kind of thing from time to time; who doesn’t like cheese cake?  The other part of it is that I have to make the choice, do I have that doughnut now, or wait an have a half pound grass fed burger and a couple of beers on Saturday.  Generally, I choose Saturday.  Mostly because I know if I choose the doughnut now, I will still have the burger and the beer.

I have been reading a lot about how our brain makes decisions.  I read How We Decide, Jonah Lehrer, as well as many of the articles on his website.  Basically, the decision inside your brain works like this.  One part wants the doughnut now and the other knows how you will feel after.  It is a lot easier to quiet the side of the brain that wants the doughnut now if you have something to look forward to later.  Beers and burgers.  You can train your brain to accept that it will get the satisfaction it is look for in the doughnut later.  One other thing is it really helps is if you don’t see the food.  If it is right there in front of you, you are going to choke it down at some point or another.  If it is in the break room, go outside for your break.  It is just how we are wired.

I also look at all of the decisions individually, rather than as a whole.   If I thought about it as, “I am going to have to resist 67,319 doughnuts between now and the time I retire,” I would feel powerless.  But I know I can resist one, and from doing it for a while I know that each time builds on the last.  Eventually I give into temptation.  Then the next time around I remember how I felt.  Sometimes it helps sometimes it doesn’t.

Same goes for running.  If I looked at my mileage to get across the country, I would never start.  I know I can run from Ft. Kent to Madawaska, then to Van Buren and on.  I also know I cannot do these things in a day.  I had a tough interval session today.  Mile warm up 2x800 with a 400 recovery in between, 800 recovery, 2x800 with a 400 recovery in between, mile cool down.  The 800 recovery in the middle was an on the fly decision.  Interval training is not easy.  Also, I was thinking, “how am I ever going to get through the last one if I feel this way now.”  I took the extra 400 recovery and reverted back to an old trick.  I counted backward.  At the start of the interval I said eight; then every 100 meters I counted back again.  8,7,6,5  and on (this is easy to do on a track).  Eight sets of 100 two times.  It feels different, to me, to think of it in those terms.

Breaking the goal down to manageable pieces is the real secret to everything.  Set the goal, hit it, feel good, set another, hit it, feel good, set another, don’t stop…success.

The Madawaska post was going to go here tonight, but I heard from the town manager.  A little more research and I should have a nice writeup.