Get Everything Done

Hmmm, the more I get into AF the more interesting it becomes...

A thought just struck me - if I kept a list of meals I want to eat, and used AF to decide what I want to buy , what I wanted to cook etc., my rational / intuitive sides to my brain should "kick in" and help me lose weight without any stress right?

Any thoughts?

Derek

Freaky Derek. I thought of this about a month ago. I didn't implement it, but let me know if it works for you and I might give it a shot!

I do it. I also put in stuff that seems "contrary" to my goals that I think I would like to do. This comes from a little advice Mark had when I posted about cutting back on Red Bull consumption. It worked.

Write it all down and let AF sort it out.

Drinking Red Bulls just starting becoming dismissed tasks. Great advice. Thanks a lot.

I've decided I need to use the AF stop smoking method first!

Just loving this AF thing, thanks again Mark.

Regards,

Derek.

Good luck with stopping smoking. I used tobacco for most of my life and toward the end I was a moderate user, only smoking 2-3 packs a day.

If you would like some tips, let me know.

I don't need to lose weight, but I have been intrigued by the idea of someone trying to diet by writing "Eat 100 calories" into his or her Autofocus list twenty times at the start of each day.

Derek, just my $.02 from when I quit back in '97 - there's no reason why you can't do both at the same time. I don't care what the "experts" say - at least try to maintain. I actually lost weight the first month after I quit. Then I let up the reins on my way of eating because I talked myself into thinking I deserved to have junk food and put on about 25 pounds in 6 months. Even though I was running every day for an hour, I still packed on the pounds.

Quitting smoking wreaks havoc with your blood sugar and insulin levels. If I were to do it again, I'd start a lower carb diet a couple of weeks before my quit day and get into an exercise routine too. Doing both of these help with cravings.

Have you ever quit before?

Dan, would you give yourself bonus points if you *didn't* complete all of the items? Or save them up for a big binge? :-)

Some other tasks you could add that would support the goal include:
Drink a glass of water
Record what I ate
Purge some unhealthy food from the fridge/pantry
Find a new low-fat or low-cal recipe online
Review reasons for losing weight (alternatively, you could just include these throughout your list to read and then check-off, possibly re-adding)

Derek--
Just realized that I use my AF list this way, but not for dieting. I often buy food I intend to cook and then forget. I put it on my AF list. Sometimes it still gets dismissed, but it does help!

Jacqueline -

Sure, why not save them up? 100 calories today is pretty much the same as 100 calories tomorrow, right?

As an added bonus, you will have to make it all the way through your AF list at least three times a day if you want to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

-dp

I do put reminders to track my weight watchers data in my AF list (but not often enough if the scale is any indication).

*puts it back on the list*

Thanks for all the tips folks, I'm using an AF as "little steps" approach to healthy lifestyle:

put on nicotine patch, dont smoke
drink 6 pints water
Run every day
2000 net cals per day
cut sugar
cut salt
etc etc.

Thanks Mel for some more ideas!

They are listed one above the other in AF and I'll keep everything beow the top live item dismissed until I am convinced I've cracked the first step.

For me it has to be one step at a time, but the all or nothing approach may work for others - this AF thing is great as it can be tailored to suit everyone, love it.

regards

Derek.

Mark,

Are you still following the 'No S' diet?

If you've dropped or changed it, any reasons why?

cheers,
Pete.

LOL @ the "No S" diet. Reinhard is great. He is my kinda guy, a lot of thinking and figuring to find an elegant, obvious, and long used solution. I have always enjoyed his work. The Shovelglove is a hoot. A strange but utterly simple and effective idea for keeping fit.

Thanks for the reminder.

Just visited his site for the first time in years. Here is this gem:

Modern euphemism for "sloth": "multitasking."

So much for attention and focus. "Multitasking" is the euphemism for "idleness".

Thanks Mark,

The 'No-S' diet is what I call a 'heuristic' diet, it seems they're better for improving healthy eating habits rather than losing weight alone. Eating 5 portions of fruit or veg a day is a well known one.

Something I've been following for a while is to eat 1 portion of white flour based food a day, eg bread, batter, pastry, pasta, pizza etc. Since white flour isn't very filling it should help with calorie intake too.