10 Concepts For Success That Fit People Live By

I was provided this book to review. No other compensation was given. All opinions expressed are 100% my own.

I love a great self-help book. I think I may be a little addicted to them, in fact (part of my perfectionist habits). The latest one I am reading is from Dr. Oz’s personal trainer, Joel Harper.  His new book, MIND YOUR BODY: 4 Weeks to a Leaner, Healthier Life is absolutely fantastic! As I have been reading it, I have been able to learn a lot about myself, and I keep thinking of all my personal training clients who I want to share it with. 

The best part about the book is how personal it is. You work through the book and learn about yourself first.  Then, you can apply his great tips for connecting your meals, moves, and mindset. Meals to keep nourished, moves that can be done in the comfort of home, and the mindset to keep motivated, inspired and thriving. And in the process, he provides a three-step weight loss program that claims to help quadruple weight loss, maximize workouts by 85 percent, and boost happiness and energy levels by more than 40 percent—in just fifteen minutes a day. You will also love the easy, great tasting recipes and a complete healthy meal plan as part of the program.

The book also lays out the 10 core concepts of optimal success that fit people live by:

1. Shut out of the noise – filter your thoughts to discern and disable disruptive mental static.

2. Maximize inner motivation – determining your personal and emotion-driven reasons for wanting to change is what will sustain your motivation long term.

3. Cultivate grit – honing a sense of “try and try again” perseverance can up your success rate by more than 30%, according to University of Pennsylvania researchers.

4. Set specific intentions – clearly knowing what path you are on helps eliminate distractions and self-defeating habits from your life. Establishing extremely detailed daily goals and a plan of action that resonates with the unique vision you have for yourself can result in twice as much weight loss, according to researchers from the University of Sussex and Warsaw University.

5. Visualize success – mentally seeing your future develops a visual layout in your brain, which works like a road map showing you how to get where you want to go. Repetitive practice of visualization lays down actual physical frameworks via neural connections in your brain, which engages your muscles even when you are sitting still, and increases muscle mass. The more specific your mental image, the more specific your results will be.

6. Eliminate excessive choices – variety may be the spice of life, but making many decisions can be overwhelming, which depletes willpower. Having at least one planned meal per day can help make healthy eating automatic; too many choices will more likely lead to a less healthy snap decision.

7. Extinguish escape routes – anything that delays your goal or lowers your standards can take you so far off course, you’ll never get back on track. Don’t keep enablers like “fat jeans” in your closet that make it all too easy to get comfortable with anything less than the goal you’ve been working toward.

8. Yield to traffic – have grace under pressure, go with the flow and make on-the-spot adjustments as needed by accepting that there are times in life when things won’t work out exactly as planned. For example, if your husband surprises you by taking you out to dinner, embrace it and order something healthy off the menu, rather than freak out that you’re going off plan a special treat.

9. Believe it & become it – you can set yourself up with a belief system that produces dramatic differences in your health. An Israeli study published in 2007 shows that confidence in your ability to succeed at weight loss can triple the amount you’ll lose compared to those who doubt themselves.

10. Jump for joy – celebrating your success boosts your motivation. University of Connecticut researchers put women on a 12-week diet and offered half of them a weekly chance to receive small rewards if they lost a pound. Those who received rewards lost twice as much weight.

What do you think? What would you add to the list?