Join the 30 Day Eat Less Challenge Community NOW!

I wrote last week about losing weight and challenged you to join the 30 Day Eat Less Challenge by following The Rule. If you’ve not read this post please click HERE to get caught up.

One of the critical components to losing weight is to realize it is difficult to achieve success as a lone ranger. How many times have you tried to lose weight by yourself but ultimately failed? Losing weight happens best in the context of community. This is why groups such as Weight Watchers and Overeaters Anonymous have some success. There is power in community not found in isolation.

Yet, too often, we choose to go it alone. We want to be the lone ranger. Why? You know the reasons as well as I do.

1. It takes extra effort to journey with others. If you are part of a meeting you need to work it into your schedule. Even if you do an internet meeting there is a scheduled start time. And if you attend a face to face meeting you must get in the car and drive across town.
2. It means becoming vulnerable. Who wants to weigh in with a group of people? Who wants to face the group if you’ve gained instead of lost weight? Dieters avoid groups because it puts them into a vulnerable situation.
3. We feel as though we can do it alone. Being part of a group is a humbling admission you cannot succeed on your own. My brain rebels at the thought of needing others. I still fight this admirable but dangerous attitude.
4. When we make the decision to lose weight we are excited and fail to realize discouragement is just around the corner. We begin with optimism and assure ourselves this is going to be easy. But it will not be easy. We underestimate the need for community to achieve success.

The plan for the 30 Day Eat Less Challenge is for us to take the journey in community. Here are a few of the obvious benefits of joining a community to achieve our common goal.

1. Emotional support. There’s no way around it: this challenge will require emotional support. I remember when I first discovered and implemented The Rule. In less than 24 hours I became angry. I told myself I had embraced a fool’s errand. Why would I kick my good friend FOOD to the curb? Without the emotional support found in the context of community I ultimately gave up.
2. A pooling of knowledge. When it comes to weight loss I’m not the expert and neither are you. We need the combined wisdom of everyone who is taking the challenge if we are to succeed. If each of us can share just one idea we will have a large wealth of information to help us in our weight loss efforts.
3. Synergy. Think of this simple math equation: 1 + 1 = 3. Wait! How can this be? Synergy means the combined efforts of the group yields more than the combined efforts of the same number of people working independently. Give 5 men an ax and tell each of them to cut trees for 8 hours. The next day tell the same 5 men to go out as a group and cut trees for 8 hours. The group will cut more trees than the combined efforts of each man. To lose weight community provides synergy.

But there is one huge benefit found in community which will unlock success not found in isolation. It’s the idea of accountability.

If you try to lose weight in a solo effort there is no accountability outside of yourself. But when you embrace a community to lose weight there is accountability.

When you become part of the 30 day Eat Less Challenge there will be accountability. I’m in the process of setting up a special private Facebook page where we can share ideas, knowledge, encouragement, and the food we eat.

I proposing one of the most unique methods of accountability I’ve ever seen. To my knowledge no one has ever suggested what I’m about to say. Hang on. Here it comes.

I’m proposing during the 30 Day Challenge each of us take a picture of every meal and upload it to the private Facebook page.

“Say what? Are you serious? Are you crazy? Do you really plan on doing this?”

My answer is “yes” to all of these questions. With The Rule in place you only eat 3 meals a day. If you take a picture of your meal before you eat and upload it to the page everyone can see everything you eat for the 30 days. I know it’s crazy. But think of the accountability!

Here’s the plan. Take your cell phone, snap a picture before you eat and just upload it to the secret Facebook page. This is not so others can judge you. The purpose is for you to be visually accountable and increase your odds of success.

Is this mandatory? No. Some of you may not be so handy with technology. I don’t want to make it a requirement if you are not able to do it. But if you will do this extra step it will increase your odds of success exponentially.

After posting last week’s blog about the 30 Day Challenge several people wanted to start immediately. But, as you can see, before we start we need to build a community. We need to get the word out. And it takes some time to let people know what we are going to do. Feel free to share this post so others might consider joining.

Please be patient as I work through a few more blog posts to help set the stage for success.

Click HERE to go to a page where you can officially sign up to take part in the 30 Day Eat Less Challenge. You have the opportunity to be part of the first wave to enroll.

I invite you to be one of the first to enroll in The Challenge!

PS: The part of the sign up process is automated. There may be a few bugs to work out the first day or two!