Embarking on a weight loss journey is a significant undertaking, demanding dedication, perseverance, and a healthy dose of self-compassion. It's a process of lifestyle changes, setting attainable goals, and acknowledging your progress along the way. A crucial aspect of this journey is rewarding yourself appropriately, and that's where non-food rewards come into play.
The Importance of Rewards in Weight Loss
Rewarding yourself for your hard work and dedication to your diet is important and encourages accountability and provides motivation to keep going. Treats can keep you motivated and working toward your goal. Setting attainable goals and knowing ahead of time what you will do for yourself when you reach your goals is as important as getting to your goal.
Rewards serve as positive reinforcement; when you reward yourself for a behavior, you’re more likely to do it in the future. Science shows that rewards work best when they’re immediate, meaning you get them right after performing the new behavior, and intermittent, meaning you don’t get them every single time you do that behavior. Weight loss milestones, like losing 5 pounds, are a good time to reward yourself.
Why Non-Food Rewards?
It’s not uncommon for people to want to treat themselves with an unhealthy choice after they have started a new healthy lifestyle plan. This could be because they feel that they have worked hard and deserve a treat or view these treats as a way to deal with life’s stresses. For some people, their brains fight back in the attempt to return to what was normal before. For others, poor choices become appealing after a long period of healthy choices and gives the person a feeling of going rouge or being naughty. An occasional treat is fine, especially if you wish to celebrate a milestone on your health journey.
However, doing so with non-food rewards is essential in establishing and maintaining a healthy outlook on food. So, do not think about a big scoop of ice cream or slice of cake. Instead, consider some treats that do not contain any calories.
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Setting Effective Weight Loss Goals
If you're trying to lose weight and improve your health, you'll need to make some changes to your lifestyle. And to make lasting changes in your health habits, experts say, it's important to set effective weight loss goals. Those who are successful at managing their weight tend to set what are called SMART goals. That means they're:
- Specific: You decide exactly what steps you'll take.
- Measurable: There's a way to track your progress.
- Action-based: Your goals focus on actions you take rather than results.
- Realistic: Your goals are doable for you.
- Timely: You set a time frame for your changes.
Once you've determined your long-term goal, it's time to come up with a plan of action. Choose two or three very specific diet and exercise goals at a time that you're willing to take on. The more detailed these goals are, the better. For example, rather than setting a goal to "exercise more," commit to taking 8,000 daily steps as recorded by your smartwatch. Instead of "eat more vegetables," aim to include a green salad in each workday lunch.
Breaking your overall goal down into smaller pieces makes it feel more manageable. Completing these steps gives you a sense of achievement, which can help you stay motivated during your weight loss journey.
Non-Food Reward Ideas
Here are some ideas to get you started, arranged from least expensive or time-consuming to most:
- Get Moving with Music: Download a new song that will get you moving and grooving.
- Take a Nap: Give yourself permission to take a nap.
- Visit the Library or Bookstore: Visit the library or bookstore all by yourself.
- Home Spa Afternoon: Have a guilt-free home spa afternoon.
- Sleep In!
- Take a Selfie: Take a selfie to celebrate your progress.
- Digital Detox: Spend an hour away from your phone or computer.
- Eat Lunch Outside: Eat lunch outside or at least away from your desk.
- Declutter and Donate: Clean out your closet and donate all your too-big clothes to charity.
- Share Your Success: Post your progress on social media so your friends can celebrate with you.
- Take a Bubble Bath:
- Change Your Walking Route: Drive to a beautiful neighborhood or park to walk instead of taking your usual walking route.
- Use Stickers: Use smiley face or star stickers to note milestones on a wall calendar hung in a prominent place.
- Create a Trophy: Make your own ribbon or trophy.
- Motivational Magnet: Make or buy a refrigerator magnet with a motivational quote.
- Take a Vacation Day: Take a vacation day from work to do whatever you want!
- Movie Night: Unwind with a movie of your choice.
- Night Out with Friends: Plan a night out with your friends.
- Buy a Lottery Ticket:
- Subscribe to a Magazine: Subscribe to a fitness or healthy cooking magazine.
- Update Your Driver's License Photo: Get a new driver's license photo. (Don't lie about your weight.)
- Download a Fitness App: Download a new fitness app for your phone.
- Buy a Workout Song: Buy a new workout song.
- Fancy Shower Gel: Get yourself a bottle of fancy shower gel or lotion.
- Add a Plant to Your Garden: Pick up a new plant for your garden.
- Workout Socks: Invest in some moisture-wicking workout socks.
- Get Fitted for a Sports Bra:
- New Nail Polish: Try a new shade of nail polish.
- New Shades: Get some new shades for outdoor exercise.
- Bouquet of Flowers: Come home with a bouquet of flowers.
- Try a Fresh Hair Color:
- Personal Blender: Buy a small personal blender for smoothies and protein shakes.
- Wireless Headphones: Order a pair of high-end wireless headphones.
- Fitness Tracker: Invest is a fitness tracker to motivate you even more.
- Charity Walk/Run: Sign up for a charity walk or running event.
- Yoga Pants: Splurge on some nice yoga pants.
- Get a Manicure and/or Pedicure: A manicure and/or pedicure are nice treats for reaching your goal.
- Treat yourself to a Massage!
- Cooking Class: Take a cooking class to up your game.
- New Hairstyle: Get a new hairstyle.
- Workout Shoes: Get fitted for workout shoes at a running store.
- Piercing or Tattoo: Go for a flashy piercing or tattoo!
- Charm Bracelet: Start a charm bracelet.
- Resize Your Rings: Get your rings resized to fit your smaller fingers.
- Weekend Getaway: Plan a weekend getaway with your significant other.
- Adopt a Dog: Adopt a dog so you'll always have a walking buddy.
- Hire a House Cleaner: Hire someone to clean your house so you have more time to hit the gym.
- Try a Fun Exercise Class: Try a fun exercise class like Zumba or pole fitness.
- Personal Trainer: Book a session with a personal trainer.
- Professional Photo Shoot: Schedule a professional portrait shoot.
- Take a Trip: Who doesn’t love to travel to a favorite spot or somewhere new and undiscovered? Travel is an excellent treat to top off your weight loss goal.
- New Clothes for a New You: What person who loses weight doesn’t need new clothing to fit their smaller, trimmer body?
- Workout Gear and Equipment: Workout gear, or gear for your favorite activity or sport is a wonderful reward for a job well done.
- Learn Something New - It’s always fun to learn something new. Take a class on a topic that interests you or even a class to help you along with your weight loss journey such as home gardening, exercise classes, or healthy cooking classes.
Eudaimonic vs. Hedonic Rewards
There are two kinds of rewards: hedonia and eudaimonia. Hedonia (H-rewards) includes superficial pleasures such as weight loss, looking good, and acceptance by others. These rewards are more concrete and often short-lived. Eudaimonia (E-rewards), on the other hand, refers to a sense of meaning and purpose that contributes to overall well-being. To stay motivated, ask yourself how you will enhance your sense of meaning and purpose. They can be strong motivators for achieving your goals. The concept of E-rewards can be traced back to Aristotle, who believed that the highest level of human good was not about satisfying one’s appetites, but about striving to express the best that is within us.
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Lifestyle and Environmental Changes
Making lifestyle and environmental changes not only helps jumpstart weight loss, it helps sustain it. The following strategies have been utilized with success by individuals who have achieved long-term weight loss success. In a 2020 study published in the Wiley Online Library, researchers found that the easier it was for individuals to see and access nourishing fruits and vegetables, the more likely they were to eat them. Frequently we hear about placing a bowl of apples or grapes on your counter. But for many, leaving food out isn’t always a great option. (Hello fruit flies!) Instead, consider placing those items front and center in your refrigerator. And make them as easy to grab and go as possible. One great way to do so is to prep servings in their own reusable Tupperware containers. Heading to a meeting? Grab a container of carrots for the road. Is it time to pick the kids up from school? Grapes can be a great pick-me-up on your drive.
Research has found that simply recording what you eat can help you lose weight. In a study of nearly 1,700 participants, those who kept a daily journal lost twice as much weight as those who didn’t track their consumption. One of the easiest ways to maintain a food journal is with an app. The two most popular food journal apps are LoseIt! and Noom. In a two-year study conducted at Cornell University, researchers found that those who tracked their weight daily were more effective at losing weight and keeping it off.
Additional Tips for Long-Term Success
- Focus on Sustainable Changes: It’s not the diet that will keep the weight off. It’s finding a ‘sustainable healthy lifestyle change,’ as Monique Tello, MD, MPH explained in her 2018 article, ‘Which diet is best for long-term weight loss?’ published on Harvard Health Publishing.
- Avoid Deprivation: If you’re constantly thinking about cake while dieting and you deprive yourself of it until you reach a certain marker, you are more likely to eventually go overboard. If you make it a more regular occurrence, you’ll be able to enjoy smaller amounts while still being satisfied.
- Healthy Alternatives: There are so many specialty foods nowadays that there are infinite ways to make your favorite foods healthier. You can sneak veggies and fruit into any recipe and use alternative sweeteners to cut calories.
- Plan Your Treats: When your treats are scheduled ahead of time, it can help remove the guilt, in addition to fitting less-healthy food into the bigger picture of your weight loss journey. Think about your week of meals: if you’re eating well 95% of the time, one treat meal is only 5% of your week.
- Don't Get Discouraged: Eating healthy is hard! A meal or two that don’t quite fit into your plan won’t reverse the progress you’ve made. You might get a little bloated, but you probably won’t gain much weight. Don’t get discouraged because you feel like you’ve fallen off the wagon. If you were on track before, you can do it again! Don’t let an unplanned treat or two make you think that all your efforts are hopeless. The only thing that truly reverses diet progress is letting a mistake defeat you and resorting back to your old ways.
- Be Mindful of Triggers: It doesn’t make a huge difference what your treat is. But the behavior that results from that treat might have a larger impact. For example, does drinking lead you to eat more? While there’s nothing wrong with a little wine or a little white bread, if having wine leads you to eat more bread than you normally would, then you should be aware of that.
- Prioritize Rest: Proper rest is one of the most important (and most overlooked) elements when it comes to good health. If you’re tired or stressed, you’re more likely to overeat. Sleep-deprived brains are more likely to reach for “rewarding” foods (i.e. treat foods), making it even more dangerous.
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