How to Change Your Mindset to Lose Weight

Have you heard of The Law of Attraction? Or the power of positive thinking? Basically, it’s the ability to attract the things we want by focusing the majority of our thoughts on them. This means you can manifest good things in your life by thinking about and believing it can happen. Did you know you can use Law of Attraction habits to change your weight loss mindset.

How to Change Your Mindset to Lose Weight

I’ve seen The Law of Attraction interpreted in different ways. Some people believe they can just sit in bed and think really hard about money and an envelope of cash will show up. This way of thinking is quite dangerous, in my opinion, because it takes control and responsibility out of your hands and put it into the hands of someone else.

Personally, I wouldn’t sit in bed, without food or water, waiting for money to appear or weight to come off. I don’t know about you, but I ain’t got time for that. Plus, it doesn’t work like that, unfortunately. To attract good things into your life goes far beyond just thinking about them.

Other people believe if you have a clear vision, believe in your vision, set goals, prioritize, develop strategies, practice gratitude, cope in healthy ways, reflect and become self aware, and reward yourself then you will manifest amazing things in life. ← this is what I believe and practice.

I’ve made a lot of changes in my life in the last 10 years. First, I got serious about living a healthier lifestyle, lost about 40lbs in the process, and became a happier healthier version of myself. I’m not the same person I was back then.

Second, I started Organize Yourself Skinny and turned that into a thriving business. Within 3 years after hitting publish on that first post I was able to quit my soul-crushing state job and work for myself. This was beyond a dream come true. There was nothing I wanted more than becoming an entrepreneur and I made it happen.

Both losing weight, and becoming my own boss, completely change my life. However, it’s not the end result that changed me, it was the process to get there that made me the confident, happy, and successful person I am today.

Of course there are specific steps and strategies that helped move me towards both my goals. I talk all about the importance of meal planning, meal prep, exercise, and other habits when starting a weight loss journey on Organize Yourself Skinny.

However, I believe the most important step in becoming successful in your weight loss journey (or any journey) is training your mind to accept and believe in the changes you want to make. Once your mind is on board anything is possible. The saying “what your mind believes your body achieves” is very true.

There are habits I practiced regularly to stay in the right frame of mind. These habits follow my own Law of Attraction interpretation and how I specifically use them to attract weight loss into my life.

Even though I’ll talk mostly about losing weight I do feel these habits can help you attract any success into your life. Of course, as I said earlier,  you can’t just sit around thinking about getting skinny and it will magically happen. You will have to take responsibility and put in the work. However, if you’re open to it, these habits can change your mindset and help you live a healthier happier life – and lose some weight in the process.

Weight Loss Mindset Tips

Envision a better life.

What would life be like if you put in place healthy habits? Would you feel comfortable in clothes? Would you feel sexy in a new dress? Would you have more energy? Would you sleep better? Laugh more? Be happier? Would you be a better better parent, friend, lover, partner, spouse? Try to get as specific and detailed as possible? How would life improve if you change your lifestyle.

When I started on my weight loss journey I envisioned myself as a healthier person, someone who took pride in her appearance and enjoyed having energy. I envisioned being able to run into old friends and not feel embarrassed about the way I looked. I envisioned not having to hide behind my kids in pictures. I envisioned picking out a cute bathing suit, trying it on, and loving the way I look.

Take time in the beginning, and throughout your weight loss, to envision a better life. Changing our habits can be difficult so why bother if it isn’t going to lead us to something new and improved. Envision a better life gives us something to look forward to and work towards.

Believe in your vision.

This is sooooo important. There’s no point in having a vision if you don’t believe it can become reality. You have to believe with everything that you can make this happen. That you can change your habits, lose weight, and a better life is waiting.

Also, I hate to even mention this, but not everyone is going to believe in you. Or their vision of a better life is not the same as yours. So in order to succeed you have to believe that you can do this without validation from anyone else. You must believe in your vision.

Another thing to keep in mind is that some people might become jealous as you crush goals. It takes a lot of work to change habits and not everyone is willing to put in that kind of effort. Even if they ultimately want the same thing their mindset might be very different. That’s okay. Don’t become derailed by other people’s insecurities.

Keep your vision at the forefront and believe it’s there waiting for you. That will keep you focused and moving forward.

Throughout my entire journey I always believed in my vision. When my vision became reality I never felt more accomplished in my life. It truly was amazing to see dreams come true.

Envisioning a better life keeps me positive – even when things go wrong I truly feel it’s because it wasn’t meant to be and something better is waiting. I’ve learned not to dwell on the negative and this has helped quite a bit with staying focused on living a healthier lifestyle.

Believe you are in control.

The most liberating part of my weight loss journey is when I realized I was the one in control. Actually, I remember the moment. It was about 3 weeks into tracking my meals on My Fitness Pal and I was getting on the scale for my weekly weigh in. I stepped on the scale and lost another 2 pounds – at that point I lost around 7 lbs total. I started noticing a difference in my clothes – nothing major but my pants weren’t as snug. Anyway, I thought to myself “I did this”.

Up until that point I used every excuse for not losing weight. That diet didn’t work, I have little kids, I work 40+ hours a week, I can’t afford healthy food, my body must be changing, and everything in-between. However, once the weight starting coming off, because I was being intentional with portions and calories, I knew losing weight was under my control. I had nobody else to blame but myself.

Related post:

4 Pieces of Advice I would Give My 40 lb Heavier Self

To succeed at losing weight, and other goals, you have to take responsible for your actions – you need to believe that you’re in control. If you put your destiny in the hands of others then you’ll never be able to move forward. Of course, there will always be some circumstances that are beyond our control but we choose how to react – that’s on us.

Even though taking control back over my life was liberating it was also scary because, if I didn’t accomplish my goals, I had nobody to blame but myself. However, knowing that I’m in control means I can make anything happen if I can envision it, believe in it, and work for it.

Learn to cope.

Many of our weight loss issues stem from our emotional responses to stress. How many times did you crave pasta or chocolate because you had a bad day. Or ordered a pizza because nothing was prepared for dinner and kids are screaming. Or give up on losing weight all together when work is busy, kids have a million activities, or some other stressful season of life.

Here’s the thing…when you decide to lose weight life doesn’t magically start going your way and stress disappears. Nope, unfortunately life is never going to be perfect and stress will always be there. Therefore, if you fall off track every time life doesn’t go your way then it’s time to learn new coping strategies. The goal is to succeed at creating a healthier lifestyle and losing weight despite the challenges life throws our way.

The good news is many of the weight loss strategies I teach also work to help manage stress. For example meal planning and meal prep help to have food ready to eat during the week when we are busy with work and activities. Exercise keeps me sane in more ways than I can count. Drinking smoothies and eating less processed foods gives me more energy than any amount of coffee.

If the way you cope with stress hinders you from putting in place, or sustaining, new habits then I highly recommend talking with a therapist or counselor. A therapist or counselor can help you work through the stress and develop healthier coping skills. This will help free up space in your brain for you to focus on that better life!

I truly believe having healthy positive coping skills is essential to succeeding in life – not just with losing weight. Like I said, life is unpredictable and won’t always go as planned. You can either get better or get bitter…that’s YOUR choice.

FREE Weekend Reset Guide & Clean-eating Meal Plan

Be Ready to Start Your Weight Loss Journey on Monday!

Enter your info below!

YES! Send Me The Reset Guide & Meal Plan!

We won’t send you spam. Unsubscribe at any time.

Built with ConvertKit

Remove clutter and chaos.

Okay what does clutter and chaos have to do with losing weight? In my opinion, everything. It’s very difficult to envision a better life when you’re surrounded by clutter and chaos. Clutter and chaos create hot zones, and it’s impossible to establish new routines and habits when trying to survive hot zones. Hot zones are moments when you feel stressed out, overwhelmed, and the decisions made are more about surviving the moment instead of focusing on long term goals.

I started my weight loss journey, like everyone else, wanting to eat less and move more so I could get into a smaller pair of jeans. Okay I had other reasons besides that but at first I wanted to be skinnier. Honestly, I had no idea that the clutter and chaos in my life was preventing me from losing weight. However, once I put routines in place to clean up the clutter, and control the chaos, it became easier to focus on goals.

Of course, I’m not saying my life is perfectly organized. Nope, I’m human too. The thing is I know I’m able to accomplish so much more when my life is in order therefore I make it a priority.

Related posts:

8 Habits to Do Before Bed To Organize a Healthier Lifestyle and Lose Weight

9 Habits to Do In the Morning to Organize a Healthier Lifestyle and Lose Weight

Focus on solutions, not excuses.

A mindful strategy that has been very helpful throughout my weight loss journey is focusing on solutions instead of excuses. I feel excuses serve three purposes. First, we use excuses because we’re afraid to fail. So instead of failing at an exercise routine we say something like “I can’t get to the gym at that time” or “I’m sick” or “Those exercise never worked for me”.

This gives us permission to give up or not try. But failure is part of the process. It’s okay to fail. So instead of giving yourself permission to give up, give yourself permission to fail. In order to succeed, not just at losing weight but in life in general, you have to be okay with failure. Remember fall 9 times get up 10!

Second, we use excuses because we are lazy. Warning, this is going to be on the tougher love side. I’m not saying I don’t get lazy, because I do so please don’t take this as self-righteous. But I’m challenging you to take a hard look at your excuses. Is it that you really can’t do “fill in the blank” or is it more you don’t feel like doing “fill in the blank”.

Do you struggle with self-discipline and pushing yourself? If you don’t feel like exercising, eating healthy, organizing, cleaning, or whatever the habit then just say it. Own it. Say something like “I know I should exercise this morning but I’m too lazy to do so” or “eating healthy is just not a priority right now”. 

I think it’s important to be real instead of trying to trick your brain to think otherwise. Nobody wants to admit their lazy – I know I don’t – but you can’t change what you don’t acknowledge. Holding myself accountable to my excuses definitely helped to turn my thoughts around.

Third, we aren’t ready for change. Sure we say we want to lose weight but our excuses say otherwise. We aren’t ready to change our eating habits, prioritize exercise, get control over the hot zones, and make the time to meal plan and prep. Even though we’d like to slip into a pair of skinny jeans, and have more energy, in reality we’re comfortable where we’re at. So instead of stepping outside our comfort zone we start making the excuses.

This is what I want you to take away from this – if it’s important then you make it a priority, if it’s not then you make an excuse. Focus on solutions instead of excuses and life will change in a positive way.

Related post:

7 Ways to Create Discipline In Your Life So You Can Lose Weight and Do Amazing Sh*t!

Plan it, be prepared, and take action.

Okay, you know I couldn’t write a blog post without talking about planning ahead of time. Hello, this is Organize Yourself Skinny. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years it’s this – change doesn’t just happen. Nobody wakes up and instantly changes habits without any work.

Often we look at someone who has accomplished weight loss goals (or any goals) and think it was easy for them. Most likely, they struggled just like everyone else. They had challenges and setbacks. The difference is they persevered – they kept going despite the challenges. We can’t compare someone’s Day 1 to another’s Day 300. There’s a lot of blood, sweat, and tears that can happen in 299 days.

In order to experience success you have to create a plan, prepare for change, and then take action. A new better life will not happen without those 3 things.

Here are some posts for putting together a successful weight loss plan.

• How to Create a Weight Loss Menu Plan
• 5 Habits You Should Be Focusing on Now to Lose Weight 
• A Beginner’s Guide to Once a Week Meal Prep
• 5 Things You Can Do In The Next 24 hours to Start a Weight Loss Journey

Be grateful.

Showing gratitude for all that life gives us is so incredibly important. Even the things that challenge or hurt us are lessons learned, I believe that. Being grateful keeps us humble and appreciative of the work it took to accomplish goals. It’s says thank you to the universe for recognizing efforts. In my experience, gratitude is a mind shift that will get you through the best and worst times of your life.

If you’re struggling to change habits or push through hard times try taking time every day and thinking out 1-3 things you are grateful for, like really grateful. Think about lessons learned and how you can become better because of it. Life is short, or long, and being grateful will help you appreciate all you have instead of focusing on the negative.

I’ll leave you with this quote “What consumes your mind, controls your life”.

I truly believe your weight loss mindset will start to change simply by starting to think more positive. I know I have experience success in life largely do to changing my mindset to think this way. I’ve envisioned a better life, believed I could do it, made a plan, and took action. I’m forever grateful for everything that I’ve experienced in life, it’s made into the person I am. I believe you can do the same thing!