What's Your Pleasure?

It seems that every Tuesday we are celebrating another milestone in the lives of our amazing clients! This Tuesday was no exception. We had TWO of our clients hit their 100 pound weight loss mark today!  Congratulations to Bev B. and Tim E. for staying the course, persevering and being such an encouragement to the rest of us! We're so proud of you! Tim celebrated by sharing 100 bottles of water with his fellow Olympians...thanks Tim!

We celebrated a first this Tuesday as team "Skinny Up" won the weigh in for the third week in a row! Congratulations to Tony and Jessica who made a decision and have had great success because of it! They had a combined weight loss % of 2.45 for the week. They shared their prize again with our second place team at the 6pm gathering. Thanks you two...but I'd be a little nervous about next week, I think we've got some teams that want to take those T Shirts from you! :-)

At noon the newlyweds won with a 2.63% of weight loss! Arty and Tammy are showing us that two are better than one! Tammy hit her 50 pound mark today as well. Congratulations to team "100 meter Egg Beaters"...you guys rock! 

My message this week was serious and intense...but good! I spent some time on the pain VS. pleasure theory.  Everything we do, we do out of our need to seek pleasure or avoid pain. Of all the things we CAN change about our brains...this is one that we won't change. We will always seek pleasure...that's how we are made. The problem isn't that we seek pleasure, the problem is what we link pleasure to.

As a nation we are becoming increasingly indulgent. Whether in our consumption of food, alcohol or drugs. At present 1 in 3 adults are obese and 1 in 10 has a substance use disorder with alcohol or drugs.

So what's up with that? Why are we becoming junkies?

Three factors are converging on us:
1. Our brains naturally drive us to seek our pleasurable experiences
2. Our stress levels are higher than ever, which weakens our self-control
3. Our environment is presenting an increasing variety of availability of pleasurable options

The unfortunate consequence is that over indulging in extreme pleasure is changing our brains. Our desires are becoming increasingly insatiable and our lives increasingly unhappy.

I shared some strategies to protect us from being hijack by the wrong pleasures.

Ask yourself... What is my pleasure? Decide what you'll link pleasure to.

Improve your ability to deal with stress in healthy ways.

Control your availability to non-healthy foods/drink. Keep your enviornment safe.

Find your calm. This might take some time if you've been using food to sooth you in the past.

Link pleasure to things that really matter in your life!

Most important, I encouraged our teams that there is no time like now to decide to change forever. The longer your vice holds you captive, the tighter it's grip.

I invited our Teams to go on a field trip with me to Clark Counties Drug Court. August 30th we will be visiting the superior courts and hopefully learning as we observe Clark County residence working their programs to be free from drug use.

Your Challenge For The Week:
Listen to week # 3 "What's in Your Back Pack ~ Controlling What you Can" and do the homework provided.

It's week 4 of this Summer Team Challenge! Great things are yet to come and I'm so excited for all of you who are participating fully in the program. Keep up the great work!

Always encouraging you.
Letha