Shift Weekly: What Went Wrong? What Went Right? A Tale of Two Shifters

The Shift Summer Newsletter is currently being mailed to everyone we have a street address for.  There are articles, inspiration and discounted offers. If you know that I don’t have your address or if you have moved in the last few years please REPLY with your name and address and you will be mailed a copy--GOOD TIMES!

Dear Shifters,
This week I want to quickly share the tale of two Shifters –it’s a bit of a cautionary tale.

Once upon a time, about 2 years ago, there were two lovely ladies who were clients of mine.  They had both gone through the same Shift Weight Mastery Process, they had both had a great experience and really Shifted out of Fat Thinking and into Thin Thinking and had begun to release weight…about a pound and a half a week.

 Both of these ladies were ecstatic because for the first time in their lives they finally were releasing weight on their terms.  They felt empowered and aligned with themselves and each of their visions to release about 50 pounds each.  They were exercising, listening to their hypnosis, getting support from others and really figuring out what worked for them and what didn’t in terms of feeding themselves within their body’s caloric needs for weight release.  Things were going great and they had both released about 30 lbs when…

… the “Shift” hit the fan for both of them.  Each of these lovely ladies, around the same time, had a stressful life event that came up and in dealing with that event—got a bit off track—to where their weight release stopped for about 3 weeks and then in the next few weeks each of them gained a few pounds.  YIKES.  Fear and panic set in and that is when they both contacted me and wanted my help to get back on track (individually of course as these ladies did not know each other).

I gave these ladies the same coaching that I give here in the recent “Back on Track” teleseminar.  Link below—it is a great session if you are feeling stuck right now—fabulous hypnosis too. BACK ON TRACK TELESEMINAR

My main advice that I gave both these ladies was that in order to even begin to move FORWARD with weight release that they have to give up the idea of GOING BACK.  So often when we do well with weight release and then lose steam we try to “get ourselves to go back” to how we were in the beginning. 

This is impossible to do because we are not that person that we were—we are a bit older, wiser and more Shifted.  Even though we may not  be releasing weight—and even gaining a bit—we are still SHIFTING if we are allowing ourselves to learn from what is going on with our behaviors and are coaching ourselves to move forward with what we know works for ourselves in a positive and powerful way. 

So one Shifter took my advice to heart—she forgave herself for gaining some weight and really realigned herself not only with her Inner Coach but her vision of what she wanted to release--50 pound in total. She began practicing the behaviors she knew worked for her—tracking her food, listening to her hypnosis sessions, planning her food and exercise ahead of time.  This Shifter went on to release the rest of the weight and has maintained ever since.

The other Shifter?  Unfortunately, what happened was that she could not let go of the idea of “getting back” and could not forgive herself for gaining some weight.  “That is so stupid of me—I know what to do—why can’t I be good again!!  She kept trying to “beat herself” back into “being good” with that more harsh voice of her Inner Critic and then stressed herself even more.  Of course her Inner Rebel then took over and said, “hey this is too stressful…let’s eat today and start again and be perfect tomorrow.”  But that tomorrow became another tomorrow and another tomorrow and the weight began to crept up more and more and she really found herself BACK to where she started—30 lbs up the scale.

If you are plateaued or gaining a bit right now—don’t despair—check out this week’s Back on Track teleseminar…

BACK ON TRACK TELESEMINAR
And join us the Wednesday, August 1^st for the Hot Shift in-a-Box Weight Mastery Process.  This Wednesday we begin a powerful 5 day online training as your Shift Box (which contains a deep dive into making the Shift—with both coaching and hypnosis sessions that ignite your mind powerfully for weight release—in a 30 day process with online coaching—that you can do from anywhere or any time.)Click on the link to read the offer and get another 10% off when you enter the coupon code “Special Participant” on the order form

HOT SHIFT INFO CLICK HERE

Damian C. recent Shift in a Box participant--down 13 lbs by day 30

“Hi Rita. I've lost 13 pounds so far and loving it. The Mp3 has definitely been a God-send for me.

Its amazing how my mind has subtly shifted in a way that I didn't even really notice I was actually behaving differently in relation to food.”

Info for HOT SHIFT

Don’t delay though—I am closing up the process and the $200 discount tomorrow Tuesday at midnight because we need to get started Wednesday and there are only 4 slots left.  Click on the link to read the offer and get another 10% off when you enter the coupon code “Special Participant” on the order form.

Info for HOT SHIFT

Enjoy your week and as one wise Shifter said to me this week—“Forward” is the new “Back”!  Enjoy moving forward!!

oxoxRita Black

P.S. Look for the Hungry Games Part 2 next week when we explore how to deal with Emotional Eating.

Shift Weekly: The "Hungry" Games--Part 1

“Back on Track!”: F*ree Tele-seminar this Wednesday from 6pm-7pm PST July 25^th —please hit REPLY and say “I’m in!” if you would like to be on the list to receive the call in number for this hour long coaching session to get you re-motivated and moving forward with weight release with hypnosis co-hosts—Rita Black and Mickey Marraffino—invite your friends to this free- phone weight support event.

Save 25% Shop Shift Plus FREE SHIPPING!---Right now everything is the Shift Store Online is 25% off including 2 New CDs  (just a Bite or None at All and Show Up for Yourself) and pre-loaded MP3 with hypnosis and coaching sessions NEW! Hurry the discount is ending soon.  Just write “Summer” into the coupon box in check out to receive your discount.

Shop Shift and Save Link  

Hi Shifters!
Finally!  While I was away I got to see that movie The Hunger Games.  Interesting movie, a bit hard to watch at times because of the content, but correct me if I am wrong…was anyone ever hungry in that film?  No one ever appeared to be.  They all looked fairly coiffed and healthy for being out in the wild.  But the film got me thinking…about our relationship to hunger.

Every day I keep driving by this billboard that is posted in my neighborhood that “says 1 out of 6 Americans will go to bed hungry tonight”.  Now this does make me sad and it is a dismal reflection of where things are right now—but there is another part of me that thinks “...and the other 5 of those 6 Americans will go to bed feeling like they ate too much!”

 For over a decade I have helped people with their weight struggles every day and I see that there is a huge cultural fear about hunger and “being hungry” and “going hungry”. 

Most of us, even though we struggle from too much food intake and not too little, do carry that unconscious panic and fear around being hungry—or not getting enough.  Some of this fear comes from years of dieting and starving ourselves and truly experiencing self imposed hunger and sometimes it just comes from not true hunger but the perceived expectation of being hungry or not having enough. 

Often our hunger is not even the need for food but the need to take care of ourselves on a deeper level.   Over the years of struggling with our weight “self care” has come to equal “food” in our mind and so the fear of hunger often triggers a deeper panic –“if I take away giving myself that comfort food—I take away self care—which may jeopardize my survival”.

Over 2 weeks I want to explore HUNGER and our relationship to it with the idea of creating a more powerful inner dialog for your Inner Weight Coach to have with you—so that you can take back your power from HUNGER fears and feed yourself effectively in a way that allows for sustained weight release and maintenance.

First let’s just look at some facts—here are some various stages of hunger—

Shift Kids:  Want to contribute to Shift Kids—we now accepting tax deductable goods and services for our Shift Kids bingo event on August 19^th—email us back and let us know please. Help us fight childhood obesity.

HUNGER
-“Pre-hunger” – The first feelings of hunger you get when your stomach is empty or near empty. This may happen 20 to 30 minutes prior to regular meal times. This feeling may just tap you on the shoulder and then go away for a bit.

-“Hunger” – Usually starts about a half-hour after pre-hunger started. In this phase it is harder to get useful information about what specific foods your body needs. In fact, everything starts to sound good. This phase starts as your body’s nutritional needs transitions from specific nutrients to just needing calories—energy. Stomach sensations also transition from being a gentle calling for specific foods to a more intense pain accompanied with a slight weakening in larger muscle groups. You may start to feel a little weak or shaky.

-“Amorphous Hunger” – This phase is usually reached by eating the wrong foods. This is a signal that you get from your body that says “My stomach is no longer empty, but I didn’t get the nutrients I needed.” Have you ever been real really hungry and eaten a candy bar? Or do you remember when you were a kid and you ate candy for breakfast one holiday morning? And in either case your stomach no longer felt empty, but you didn’t feel nutritionally satisfied either. This type of hunger usually confuses the body and it has a hard time sending any useful signal like it can in the pre hunger phase.

-“Thirsty” – Can start at any time. This hunger feels a lot like pre-hunger, but without the specific cravings. This hunger usually goes away five to 10 minutes after drinking a glass of water. More advanced stages of thirst will usually include dry mouth and throat.

-“Post-hunger” – This phase is well under way when one or more meals have been completely skipped. This phase is also quite varied. Quite often hunger goes away altogether for an hour or two. At other times it brings a feeling of weakness, lightheadedness or headaches.

-“False or Emotional Hunger” – There are many other conditions that can feel like hunger. These include, but are not limited to ulcers, acid stomach, worry, loneliness, need to fill a void, boredom, need for a break etc. We will explore this emotional hunger next week.

Okay so now that we have established some hunger stages-- let’s look at some habits and beliefs around hunger that work against us when we try to release weight and some Shift Inner Weight Coach Strategies to fix them.

We ignore early hunger signals:  If I had 5 dollars for every client who typically allows themselves to get too hungry by just plowing through their feelings of hunger because they are doing something else and then too late find that they have little to no healthy food choices available to them and then wind up eating too much crappy fast food or quick fix gakky choice—I would be able to feed the other 1 out of 6 Americans that go to bed hungry!! 

STRATEGY: Think ahead—have quality food (almonds, apples, cheese sticks, packets of tuna etc) available for yourself at all times just to tide you over until you can feed yourself effectively. 

We hoard calories during the day for the night: This move is weight gain 101—deprive and starve yourself all day in order to have more calories at night—but then you are sooooooo hungry and your blood sugar levels are so depleted that once you do start eating you make bad choices and can’t stop eating.

STRATEGY: If you want to eat more at night that is fine but allow for small snacks of quality calories throughout the day to keep your blood sugar stabilized: hard boiled eggs, celery and peanut butter, TJ egg salad and carrots, Greek yogurt.  Choose some low calorie high protein and fiber snacks about three times through your day and then have your bigger splurge at night—but keep yourself fed!!!

We ignore getting full signals: Okay so the opposite of too hungry—too full.  But often it’s the chicken after the egg.  If you do not starve yourself or get too hungry (I call this hitting zero) and keep your blood sugar levels stabilized—chances are you will not go too over board.

When I run my Shift Weight Mastery Seminars we discuss a natural physiological breath that everybody reflexively takes when they are just full—this is where most thin people push the plate away—this is where weight strugglers keep right on eating!!!
STRATEGY: Never let yourself hit “0” or too hungry.  Next take a mindful Shift breath as you settle down to eat and get conscious of where your mind and body both are at and then begin eating mindfully.  Focus also on only havin as much as you need calorically on your plate so that you do not over eat.  If you are still hungry get seconds on vegetables.  And watch for that “I’m full” breath!”

We eat crappy food and always feel a bit “hungry”: I was guilty of this one a lot when I struggled with weight.  I ate a lot of what I thought were healthy “bars” and snacks that said they were “healthy” but were really fairly refined carbs.  I always felt hungry!  I thought what is wrong with me—I just ate and I still feel hungry.  What was going on is I was not truly nourishing myself with foods my body needed and with protein that would stabilize my blood sugar and allow me to feel satisfied.

STRATEGY: Eat 20 grams of protein at meals and keep refined carbohydrate portions to a minimum.  Over time your sugar sensitivity that causes “false hunger” will lessen and finally diminish with eating consistently in this way.

Okay I hope this Hungry game has served you--next week we will work on emotional hunger!  If you want additional help with this the hypnosis sessions “Mastering your Relationship with Sugar” and “Mastery Over Portions” as well as the NEW “Just one Bite or None at All” are on sale for 25% off in the Shift Shop. Just type “Summer” into coupon box at checkout to receive your discount.

Shop Shift and Save Link

Oxox Rita

PS Remember!!!
“Back on Track!”: Free tele-seminar this Wednesday from 6pm-7pm PST July 25^th —please hit REPLY and say “I’m in!” if you would like to be on the list to receive the call in number for this hour long coaching session with hypnosis co-hosts—Rita Black and Mickey Marrafino—invite your friends.

Shop Shift and save Plus FREE SHIPPING!--Right now everything is the Shift Store Online is 25% off including 2 New CDs  (just a Bite or None at All and Show Up for Yourself) and pre-loaded MP3 with hypnosis and coaching sessions NEW! Hurry the discount is ending soon. Just type “Summer” into coupon box at checkout to receive your discount.

Shop Shift and SaveLINK

Next week rita story about the chicken

Shift Weekly: Is the Scale Broken or am I?

Free Shift Event--…Wednesday July 25^th at 6pm—for the Shift “Back On Track” Free tele-seminar from 6-7 PST we will explore how to get releasing weight again.  Please RSVP if you plan to attend—this event is free.  Forward this and invite your friends this is a great intro to what the Shift is all about.

SAVE DATE—Shift Kids Bingo—Come play bingo and support raising money for the Shift Kids Website. Sunday night August 19^th at 7pm

Dear Shifters,

How are you?  I hope you are enjoying a fabulous summer...

A funny thing happened when I got on the scale a few days ago.  I had been away so had not weighed myself for a week.  I admit, when I get out of the routine of getting on the scale it’s always harder to get back on—that’s why I do it every day—to keep it a mindless habit I don’t even think about.  So my thoughts walking to the bathroom to get on the scale were,” just get on, yes you ate (and drank—we were in wine country) more calories than you usually did but overall I bet you are fine because you didn’t eat over enough to gain (BTW this is a huge benefit of tracking while you are away—knowing for certain where you stand when you get home) and you exercised so just get on the scale—get the number and then get off.”

I got on the scale and I weighed…nothing.  Nothing--blank screen--my weight and I didn't exist according to the scale!  Huh?   I got off and got on again.  Nothing!  Okay, now I know my weight has been stable for years (I miracle I never thought possible before I made my own Shift) but this is ridiculous.  I turned the scale over—no battery!  Huh—I looked around and could not find the battery anywhere.  It must have gotten carried away by the scale fairies when I was away.  Okay I got to weigh nothing for a day until I bought a new scale battery.

Now I know this is a silly story but I wanted to reach out to those of you who may be trying to release weight and the scale has somehow gotten stuck in one place.  When I struggled there were many times when I felt stuck I really did think my scale was broken because I was convinced I was doing everything right.  Often though I was not tracking my food or exercise accurately so my “doing good” was in my head and not in reality.  Other times I was convinced my body was broken and I just could not lose weight.  When I made my Shift I realized that what was broken was my relationship with myself when I was standing on the scale!

So I wanted to give your Inner Coach—that part of you who can lead you effectively to your ideal weight some good coaching material so that you can get the scale going again. (see below)

Hot Shift!!! New August Shift-in-a-Box process is beginning soon. Want to get back on track with your weight release this summer?  Never Shifted but can’t make it for the all day seminar in September in LA?  The Shift-in-a-Box 30 Day Weight Mastery Process is a home study version with support online and from Rita Black that offers lots of coaching and hypnosis and online training to get you inspired and motivated to release weight and to end the struggle with weight and yourself.  New group begins August 1^st—click here for more details on this exciting offer.

"Hot Shift" info

Three reasons why the scale hasn’t budged…and how to Shift yourself back into gear.

1)    You weight may be stuck but your original Shift vision is gone!  The scale isn’t stuck –your mind is! Remember how easy things were when you had that red-hot vision burning a clear path of what you wanted to look like and feel like at your ideal weight?  Remember how you absolutely believed you could achieve it?  Maybe you achieved an initial goal or released a chunk of weight but now the day to day of life is settling in and it’s hard to get motivated. 

Get that honeymoon feeling back with creating a brand new and powerful vision.  Think of a new vision that will get you excited to achieve.  Maybe it isn’t just a weight goal but a health goal too.  I imagine throwing those medications in the trash—that would be exciting!  Imagine what you could look like by the holidays if you released a pound a week…nice!  See it, believe it, you can achieve it.

2)    You are not burning enough calories.   Too often when we lose sight of our goals the ability to follow through on all the essential habits of weight release get sloppy.  We stop writing down our food.  We average calories instead of knowing exactly what we put in our mouths.  It is easy to burn calories during the week and then fill up the calorie deficit created with going overboard on the weekend.  Re-engage the loving scientist within, start really tracking and even weighing your food.  Get clear on the exact calories and think through challenging situations ahead of time.  Start really burning the calories and see the scale hop back into action in the downward direction!

3)    Has your Inner Coach been locked in the closet by your Inner Critic and Rebel?  You will know if this is happening because you will have slipped into Fat Thinking again—“Oh I blew it!” and “I’ll start again on Monday” on or off, all or nothing thinking that leads to weight gain and struggle.  Start listening to your hypnosis sessions and get your Shift head back on…

…AND mark your calendar for Wednesday July 25^th at 6pm—for the Shift “Back On Track” Free teleseminar.  From 6-7 PST we will explore how to get releasing weight again—this is going to be a great event. Please RSVP if you plan on being on the call. 

Also--consider enrolling in the August 1^st “Hot Shift” Shift-in-a-Box 30 day Weight Mastery Process—this is a Home study Shift Process with powerful coaching sessions, online training and hypnosis that gives your mind the SHIFT out of the weight struggle and into weight release success.  Check it out!  I will begin this new group on August 1^st so read more here:

"Hot Shift" info

Okay have a great week—even on the scale!  Get that Inner Coach out of the closet!

Oxox Rita

Shift Weekly: Mid-Summer Inspiration

Hi Shifters!

Here we are in the middle of the middle of the summer.  Sometimes it can be a bit daunting being in the middle of the middle of something—mainly because you lose your perspective.  When we are focused on weight mastery the middle of our journey can be more challenging--you are not at the beginning where everything is shiny, new and exciting and you are not at the end where you can see the light at the end of the tunnel and your goal is so real you can feel it, see it, even smell it.  The middle can be so neither here nor there—so hum drum, lifeless and unenthused. 

This Saturday July 14th Shift Support Group from 10-11:30am “Use Your Brain to Avoid Sugar Pitfalls this Summer”—contact Rita for more information

THIS IS THE TIME TO LOOK FOR INSPIRATION!
I was fortunate enough to interview Hungry Girl, Lisa Lillien who not only is the queen of inspired low calorie shopping and cooking.

Many of you who have done the Shift Weight Mastery Process have been inspired both by her daily blog at www.Hungry-Girl.com   and have received the Hungry Girl Shopping List. Also she is the star of the Hungry Girl Cooking Show on the Cooking Channel. info on HG Cooking Show times
Our interview happened last summer around this time and contains lots of Lisa’s great tips and tricks for creating low calorie, easy, tasty meals and summer drinks as well as Lisa’s own story of her weight release of 30 pounds and her tips on continued maintenance.  Please tune in and be inspired!!!

Rita Black interviews Lisa Lillien

ALSO Mark Your Shift Calendars!!!

The next Shift Weight Mastery Process begins Saturday September 22nd in Los Angeles.  Sign up now and receive the early bird discount and extra bonuses-- 323 988 4574—start your weight release journey now.


SHIFT SPECIAL EVENT

Shift’s non-profit SHIFT KIDS is having a fun fundraiser--

"LEGENDARY BINGO: SUNDAY EDITION" on Sunday, August 19th 7:00 pm show at Hamburger Mary’s in West Hollywood—a night of bingo, Shiftinis, auctions and prizes!

Please come and support our start-up organization Shift Kids dedicated to helping kids and their families “shift” out of childhood obesity.