Going well...

Hello again Lovelies!
I just want to share a little something that's been helping me on my weight loss journey lately. A few weeks back, I was sick, under pressure at work, and generally eating just about whatever I liked! As a result, in the past month, I only lost 1kg, instead of the 2 or 3 that I had hoped for. I was fast slipping back into the scary eating patterns and resignation I had had before. But then something within me said NO. I don't want to undo all my hard work. I don't want to gain the weight I've lost. I believe God was causing some righteous indignation to bubble up in my spirit, and whispering to me "Don't give up... you CAN do it!"

So last Monday, after having bought takeaway TWICE during the day, I decided that I didn't want to continue this silliness any more! So I made a reward chart for good behaviour, just like I do for the girls and their chores. Every day, I reward myself $3 on the chart if I have not given in to temptation that day. When someone offers me something and I have a small serve, that's OK, I'm being polite and moderate at the same time. But if temptation is telling me to take a bigger slice, or another piece, that's when I have to decide what to do. My issue is not so much what I put into my mouth, but the amount of power I allow temptation/the flesh, to have in my life!
I also reward an additional $3 for exercise done with the proper amount of effort! Whenever I can, I will put away my weekly earnings to accrue for my new wardrobe that I will undoubtedly be needing in a few months!!! So last week, I earned a grand total of $24- enough for a cute new shirt perhaps! But not yet. So far, even though I'm just writing some money on a wall chart, I'm finding that I'm motivated to make sure I get to write up my $3 or $6 for the day! I am noticing some improvement in my body shape, and I don't want to lose it again. I might only have been losing a little bit at a time, but the fact is, I am losing it, so if I just continue in that, I will eventually reach my goal- if I don't give up!
Our Sunday message this week was about selecting scripture from the Bible to use as weapons when we feel the attack of the devil on our lives, just like David selected some stones to kill Goliath. Well, here's one of my weapons for this situation: Galatians 6:9- Let us not become weary in doing good, for in due time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up!
Have a great week, everybody, and don't give up!!!

Blessings,

Quit giving up!

Hi everyone, I know.. it's Thursday, not Wednesday, but I was so encouraged by Darlene's story on Live Well this week, that I just had to add the gorgeous pear logo... (is that pear getting slimmer, by the way??)
Darlene was telling the story of a couple who planted daffodils, just a few at a time, over many years, until eventually they had a vast hillside garden- one of the largest and most breathtaking daffodil gardens in the world.- It's amazing what can be achieved with consistent effort!
We were talking about this a bit at our home Bible study last night. It seems so many of us have become used to getting things NOW- not having to work and wait, and work and wait some more, until eventually we see the fruit of our efforts. Perhaps we blame society, the 'instant' generation, or whatever, but when it comes down to the nitty-gritty, all we can do is stop making excuses, and start changing ourselves.
It's time to accept that improving our health, our bodies, our mindsets is going to take WORK and PATIENCE, and a whole lot of it, too! We've all heard the cliche before- "It won't happen overnight, but it will happen!" Yeah... thanks. Well I've found that it hasn't happened. Why? The only reason that holds any water is: Because I keep giving up too early! Well it's time to get my fingernails dirty, to get a sore, bent ole back from planting so many dang flowers! Who knows, maybe if that little couple had given up every time they felt a twinge in their backs, they wouldn't even have filled a garden the size of a sandpit!

You know, sometimes I feel like just a bag of hot air (albeit an entertaining one!!), because I make all these commitments to myself, pontificate on what I should and shouldn't do, and I sound so convincing, too. But then in not more than 48 hours, I am at the bottom end of the see-saw, thinking "I can't do this", or "Who am I kidding- I'm never going to win over this thing!"

But my ever-wise and altogether gorgeous hubby reminds me that it's at these times that the Nike principle applies... don't get bogged down in your feelings and self-doubts.... Just Do It! Just put those runners on and get some exercise; just make the right food choice... again.

Don't give up. Haven't you spent too long already on the endless hamster wheel of trying and failing- I know I have.
So don't try anymore- Just do!

Don't give up, my friends. It may take a while, but in time you will reap a great reward. Remember this promise from God's word- "Do not be deceived, God is not mocked. A man reaps what he sows.... Therefore let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up!
- Gal. 6:7 & 9.
God bless, everyone, and keep moving forward!


Christian Glitter by www.christianglitter.com

Never, Ever...

This week I was handed an ancient manuscript... well OK, it wasn't an ancient manuscript at all, but I immediately recognised that the original had been typed on a TYPEWRITER!... Remember those archaic things? I mean, how long has it been since you used a typewriter?? We thought they were great at the time, but I can tell you now, man, I am not going back! Never.... ever! Just remember all that fiddling around with Tippex, and carbon paper, and margins and stuff. No thanks!

But speaking of never ever, the subject of this ancient document was awesome! It is called 'My Never Again List', and I share it with you now so you, too can be challenged by it.

My Never Again List:
A Bold Challenge to speak the Word of God

• Never again will I confess "I can't", for "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." (Philippians 4:13)
• Never again will I confess lack, for "My God shall supply all of my needs according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus." (Philippians 4:19)
• Never again will I confess fear, for "God has not given me the spirit of fear, but of power and of love, and of a sound mind!" (2 Timothy 1:7)
• Never again will I confess doubt and lack of faith, for "God has given to every man the measure of faith." (Romans 12:3)
• Never again will I confess weakness, for "The Lord is the strength of my life." (Psalm 27:1) and "The people that know their God shall be strong and do exploits." (Daniel 11:32)... I like that one!!
• Never again will I confess supremacy of Satan over my life, for "Greater is He that is within me than he that is in the world!" (1 John 4:4)
• Never again will I confess defeat, for "God always causes me to triumph in Christ Jesus." (2 Corinthians 2:14)

• Never again will I confess lack of wisdom, for "He sent Christ Jesus to save us, and make us wise, acceptable and holy." (1 Corinthians 1:30) (I admit, I translated this one from the old KJV to the Contempory English Version, as it was hard to get my head around it!)
• Never again will I confess sickness, for "By His stripes I am healed." (Isaiah 53:5) and Jesus "Himself took my infirmities and bore my sicknesses." (Matthew 8:17)
• Never again will I confess worries and frustrations, for I am "Casting all my cares upon Him who cares for me." (1 Peter 5:7) In Christ I am "care-free!"
• Never again will I confess bondage, for "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." (2 Corinthians 3:17), and my body is the temple of the Holy Spirit!
• Never again will I confess condemnation, for "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." (Romans 8:1) I am in Christ; therefore I am free from condemnation!

Yay, are any of you feeling EXCITED! and OUCH! at the same time?? I know I am! I am especially challenged by the ones that state I will never again confess "I can't", weakness, defeat and bondage. I think these are the areas I really struggle with!

But the Word of God is what will make us strong, everyone, so I am going to put these statements on cards, on my mirror and my car sun visor, and confess them until I live them!! Whenever we are tempted and down, there's nothing that can give us a faith boost and help us get back up on our feet and keep walking forward like God's Word can!

So if you're with me, I encourage you to snaffle up some promises from the Bible, put 'em up all over the place, and say 'em like you mean 'em! Remember what James said in the Bible about the tongue being powerful like a small rudder on a great big ship- it is able to change your direction and alter your entire course in life! So speak the good stuff, and do it continually, and you (and me!!!) will be steered toward freedom, power, victory, healing and faith!


Bring it on!!!

Sometimes things are just hard...

Swimming upstream, fighting the current, falling off the wagon, an uphill battle! I'm sure you can all relate... and for us female species, a day can go from fine to abominable in a matter of a few minutes! I'm going through this at the moment, but rather than drag you down with the details, I'm choosing to bolster myself again with the Word of God right here and now, so yáll can have the benefit of it too!
OK, hmm, what scriptures can I find to help me continue fighting the good fight?? Here we go:

Ephesians 6:10-11 Be strong in the Lord; draw your strength from Him. Put on God's whole armour, that you may be able successfully to stand up against all the strategies and deceits of the devil.

Galatians 5:1 In freedom Christ has made us free (and completely liberated us); stand fast then, and do not be hampered and held ensnared and submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Galatians 5:16 But I say, walk and live (habitually) in the Holy Spirit (responsive to and controlled and guided by the Spirit); then you will certainly not gratify the cravings and desires of the flesh.

And here's a great one...
Philippians 4:6-7 Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition (definite requests), with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants known before God. And God's peace which transcends all understanding shall guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

I just read Darlene's blog, at
and she talked about the same scripture and theme. Although sometimes we have physical things that come against us in a big way, a lot of the time our battle is in our minds! At those times, the Bible reminds us that GOD is our strong tower, our refuge, and our help in times of need. So, even as I preach to myself here, if you are also going through a battle of the mind, draw your strength from the Lord, stand fast in HIM, and remind yourself that He is the one who will help you to stay free from bondage. You can't do it in your own strength, or with your willpower alone. And lastly, when those thoughts start getting to you all over again, remember to pray and praise, and leave your cares and burdens in His hands.

So Father God, I thank you for your grace. I thank you that YOU are my help in times of need, my peace, my HOPE. And above all, you are my Father; you have declared that I am good enough for you to love and even delight in!, because Jesus paid the price for me to receive your love! Father, I have been struggling today with my confidence and sense of worth, but I'm reminding myself that you love me and see me as precious! I run to you. When my emotions are frail and I'm feeling weak, I am coming to you where I am safe. I ask that you will give me confidence and more strength to help me win over my struggles. You know what they are, you know what the roots of my problems are. Please reveal to me what things need to change, and what actions I need to take. And while I wait for further instructions, I'm going to rest. I'm not going to worry about my problems, and I'm not going to try to figure out what I should do (that never works!) I'm going to wait for you and trust in you! So thank-you Father for the peace that has settled in my spirit even now as I've written this prayer. Help me to remember to hand things over to you always. In Jesus' Name, Amen.

Thank you dear friends for sharing in this prayer time with me. I hope you have done your own form of giving things over to God today! If not, I've gotta say, I highly recommend it!
Have a blessed and worry-free week!
Much love in Christ,

The new game plan...

Hello again everyone! Well, it's time I spilled the beans about my new game plan to lose 25kg this year, and adopt a permanent healthy lifestyle in the process!
Last week, after a whole lot of reading and feeding my spirit, I came up with the following commitment to myself. I've pasted it here without further editing, so this will be a very long post, but here you have it... this is what sits on my study wall and also resides in my handbag, for me to consult whenever I feel weak or tempted!

To lose 25kg by the end of 2008, and maintain a permanent healthy lifestyle, I commit to:

Ø Continuing to drink 4-5 bottles of water per day.

Ø Consistently choosing healthy options for my meals and snacks.

Ø Restricting and keeping a careful watch over the amounts of unhealthy foods I consume each week.* (Right now, a set limit of 10 UF per week.)

Ø Being consistent with exercising a minimum of 4 times per week.

Ø Putting in due effort when I exercise, and increasing the intensity or duration as my body adjusts.

Ø Ensuring I have adequate sleep on most nights.

Ø Maintaining good nutrition.

Ø Having regular dental and medical checkups.

Ø Addressing stress and worry whenever I am being affected by them.

And when I am feeling weak, tempted, or unable to continue these positive behaviours, I commit to:

Ø Going to God as my Source.

Ø Seeking the support & counsel of godly friends and leaders.

Ø Reading Joyce’s books on this issue, reading other articles and listening to messages to bolster my faith and strengthen me to continue on!

Ø Diverting from temptation and abstaining from negative behaviours until I have gone to these supports.

Statement:

I will not comfort eat, I will seek comfort from God my source, and support from my Resources. (people, books, messages, etc.)

So there you go, that's my game plan for weight loss and a healthy lifestyle in 2008. I've kept most of my commitment this week, although I allowed a bit of slackness on the food choices at times, simply because it was my birthday week. Never mind; tally ho, people... onward we go into a new non-birthday week, and we're going to do our darndest to make sure that we live well! Thanks for your comments and support everyone... I'm believing for great change and personal improvement this year!
God bless!




P.S. I am an


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Standing up again...

Hello everyone! I'm happy to be back, not from holidays, but from the emotional rollercoaster ride that I've been on for the past few weeks. Nothing has gone horribly wrong during this time, but I guess I have been having a few challenges, and sometimes responding to them the wrong way.

The biggest difficulty by far has been with my thought life. In starting a new business, in trying to lose weight and adopt a permanently healthy lifestyle, and also in starting a "Search for Life" course at my church 3 weeks ago, I've found my dormant WRONG self-beliefs have been rising up like killer weeds, trying to defeat all my attempts at change, and strangle all my hopes and dreams. (If any of you have watched the animated movie "Joseph, King of Dreams", I'm thinking of the scrawny, ugly grains of wheat in Pharaoh's dream, that devour all the good grains!)

Well, today I've thoroughly neglected the house, and all of my "must do" duties, but I have fed my battered spirit, and I believe again that with God's help, I can be consistent, change my mindset, and win in all those challenging areas of my life!

But one thing I do need to do is have a plan. In "Develop a Game Plan", in Christian Women Online this month, Darlene Schacht challenged us to be specific in identifying our goals, figuring out what they will cost us, and committing to consistency in these behaviours. The really funny thing is that I went to a business building seminar last night, and I heard the exact same thing in very succinct terms- "Decide what you want, decide the price, and pay the price."

So that's the plan: I'm going to spend some time reading, praying and thinking, and develop a strategy to stick to so that I can achieve permanent change and victory in my life.
Dr Frank Smoot, of Weight Loss God's Way says "The good news is that you CAN be free! But there a few things you will need to do to get there. First, you will have to take a proactive role in the process. " Things just don't change by accident, at least not for the better. I need to be purposeful in what I do and the behaviours I choose to take on!
Reading from several godly sources today, one key theme has stood out: that I need to transform my mind by renewing it with the Word of God. My mind has definitely been the number one problem here, so I will definitely be incorporating that as a daily strategy for success. I was so encouraged in this by Darlene's blog entry from last week: Get Set to Soar, Feb 6th 2008. She wrote:
"“Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” – Philippians 4:8, NIV. These are the things that will help us rise above our strongholds. These are the thoughts that will bring us closer to the person God created us to be."
I encourage you to read the whole article at http://www.christianwomenonline.net/live_well_wednesdays.html .
I'm sure you'd love to know the plans and strategies that I come up with, but that's going to take a little while, so tune in maybe Thursday for an update. :o)
Perhaps you also need to do a reassessment of where you're going, and how you're planning to get there. If you've been as haphazard as me, then why not decide to use this same time frame to ask God, read, and re-focus too?
It's time to move forward in victory.

Until next week,
Keep on smiling!
:o) Juliet.

Live well Wednesday... OK Thursday!

Still trying to get the hang of this thing, I waited until today to check out how Live Well Wednesday works, as we are ahead of the U.S. in times by half a day or so. I have been reading some of the blogs written by other ladies who subscribe to Live Well Wednesdays, and been getting blessed by some of their stories, but gotta tell ya, this gig is hard... I left myself with a challenge last time to do something different so I can expect better results with my weight loss, and I'm ashamed to admit that apart from walking a little bit further, I haven't really come up with anything outstandingly different! Still it's early days yet, it's only been 3 days since that post, and I'm still giving thought to it, as well as continuing to resist too many goodies. :o)

I was blessed by Darlene's topic in Live Well today- moderation. Even though Christmas is past, we ended up with such a stash of chockies, that we still have about 5 boxes- 3 on the go, and 2 still unopened. Any Melbournites up for some free chocolate???? I am exercising restraint and averaging about 2 wrapped chocolates per day, while eating otherwise generally healthy foods. That, folks, is definitely moderation!! But I am a bit concerned that these chockies might be sitting in the pantry tempting me until the next lot begins to roll in at Easter!

Still, having looked at how I am eating now, I really shouldn't feel so bad about myself. I think if we have made a mistake or been excessive the week before, it can still influence our current behaviour. Until writing this now, I have been feeling low about my lack of self-control, and lack of change. But I realise that I'm actually thinking about last week's failings... I have improved this week but just not recognised it. I know I'm rambling a bit, but this is good! I'm realising right now that my behaviour has been good, and that means I have something positive I can continue. Do you know that until that realisation, I was in the "I'm not improving, so why bother?" mode. I was bothering- I was saying no to temptation, but my heart wasn't in it- I was thinking failing thoughts, and I would have given in soon.


No! I am doing well!
My weight has stuck around at the same level for about the past month. Although it's great that I haven't really gained anything over the Christmas period, I feel I really need to do more to begin to reduce it! So I'm looking at adding some more intense activity into my week somewhere: to give my plateau a kick in the pants! And I'm giving myself a week to figure out what I can add in. So if I get on here next week and don't report some new activity I've taken on, then I'm the one who gets a kick in the pants!! It's time to see some results on the scales again, people!

On a more serious side (again), I have been challenged by Tamra Nashman's "Overcoming Temptation-by-Chocolate" (how appropriate!), (see www.christianwomenonline.net/TamraNashman.html#TamraJanuary), and some preliminary reading of Dr Frank Smoot's Weight Loss God's Way program. Both of these are suggesting that there is a deeper root to our core weight loss issues, and that we will never be fully free from weight and body image issues until we are released spiritually from these deeper roots. I think they may definitely be on to something there, and will delve further into this.
So until next time,

and believe that as Joyce Meyer says, "I'm OK, and I'm on my way!"
Keep speaking kindly to yourself!
:o) Juliet.

Well hello there!

Hello and happy 2008 to all! So begins my first ever web log, with a salutation ("hello", for those who haven't seen Charlotte's Web), and a determination- to not be the same in 2008!
In May last year, I was challenged by this idea at Adore, our church's annual womens' conference. Pastor Jane Evans spoke these words at the final meeting: "But what a shame, what a complete tragedy it would be, if we were to come to Adore '08, the same as we were in Adore '07." This statement struck a chord within me, and I was determined to change, to win my battles rather than to continue accepting defeat.
This picture is a reminder to me, to all of us, to keep running toward the goal, keep fighting, persist, don't give time to the voices in your head that say that you can't, you won't win. Norman Vincent Peale's mother told him "You can if you think you can!" And as he grasped this belief, he turned from a defeated, droopy young man into a world changer! We can if we think we can!

So what, you ask, are these battles I am facing? Well, same as many, the first one is to lose weight and adopt a permanent healthy lifestyle, both physically and spiritually. I mentioned this first because of the obvious references to this on the rest of the page- my weight loss ticker, and the Live Well motivation box. Also, I want to overcome old fears which hinder me from achieving financial freedom. I promote a great product and an amazing company and payment plan, yet still my own thoughts and self doubts get in the way and make it hard for me to have confidence when I talk to people about them. Woa, being rather open here on the world-wide-web, but I'm sure there are 1000's out there who can relate to this too. :o)
So in 2008, I want to to win some battles, and strangely, I'm inviting you along for the ride! I'm looking forward to an amazing '08, and believing I will indeed be a different person by the end of it, and even by the Adore conference in May. To facilitate my (our?) transformation, at the end of each post, I will add an inspirational quote, a scripture, or a self-evaluation question to help us on our way. So for today:
"The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing you have always done, but expecting a different result." What behaviour will I change this week to help me achieve my desired result?
Keep on kickin' goals! :o) Juliet.