I am sure by now you are wondering what a vision board has to do with anything. When I talk on this subject, one statement is written on people’s faces: “We want to lose weight!!!! Get to the part where I know what to eat, what not to eat and what exercises to do.” And I remind them that they came to me to find out how

I did it and not the other way around. It took me ten months to lose weight; I spent five months losing and gaining weight, going round in circles because I overlooked the most important thing – my mind. Every journey you take in life will be fruitless if the mind does not go through an orientation program. I just didn’t get it, “how can I lose weight and be gaining it back, this is not easy, it is painful.” Losing weight is not a stroll in the park and gaining it back is demoralising. I just knew I was done feeling sorry for myself.

I keep a vision board. It has developed into a vision room now. I put up pictures of things I want to accomplish, places I want to go and things I want to acquire. It has worked. Every now and then I update it, I take down my accomplishments and I put up new goals. So I asked myself why I didn’t have anything on weight loss up. I went on to put up 70kg. I laughed. I was even worried that someone might pass by and see my vision board and laugh at how a fat girl wants to be 70kg but despite that, I went through some magazines, got pictures of slim women I wanted to look like and also put them up. It was important for me to put the photo of the women running and the healthy meals so I could remind myself that if I wanted to reach my goal, it required exercise and healthy eating. The goal seemed almost impossible, so I put up a calendar with mini goals so the end goal wouldn’t look so daunting. I also put up photos of Jennifer Hudson before and after. I used it as my screen saver, my wall paper on my phones and my computer. Every day I looked at my walls and asked myself, “what can I do now to bring me closer to my goal?” My vision board helped me put things into perspective, it was also a daily reminder. You can’t imagine how I felt, when I got to 70kg and the tears that ran down my cheeks when I looked at my wall. “Wow, I did it.”

HOME WORK

Get a photo of your dream body, get the specific number you want to weigh and get photos of people working out and put it up everywhere. You can put it up on your fridge to remind you to stop before you decide to eat indiscriminately. Avoid negatives on your board like “don’t, can’t, fear… etc. Use words like can, do, will. Play with pictures and develop a visual representation of your final destination.