Paula Grasel is a 62-year old retired high-school teacher. What follows is what she recently wrote me about her success with LL and feelings before and since. Paula is a Boot Camp 14 graduate too and I think she did an AMAZING job of expressing so well so many of the tenets I try and convey in my teaching. I hope it provides you a sense of hope and expectation. There is every reason to believe you too can be a success like Paula.
Too often the complainers are the loudest and those within earshot can begin to believe that what’s being complained about is the norm.
Those who are successful and rockin it oftentimes go about their success quietly without much fanfare. In my world, the world of body transformation, this can work against me a bit in that there’s a mistaken belief that not enough people are successful long term (because we don’t hear from them). In my mind I roll through a rolodex of successes, most of whom never come out and shout to the world that they’ve been successful.
That’s why I’m always SO happy and grateful when one of the MANY long-term successes comes forward and does a bit of shouting to the world.
Thank you Paula!
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from: Paula Grasel
I Love Getting Naked
And when I get naked every day, my husband is NOT the first man that I think of. Nope, when I get naked each and every morning to weigh myself, I have to admit that I find myself singing the praises of a man up there in Dixon, Illinois, who I’ve never even met in person, but who I respectfully call my coach.
David Greenwalt (Coach) is the reason I ended Boot Camp 14 last June weighing a lifetime low of 115 (well, I’m sure I weighed that at some earlier point in life but surely not as an adult) and I certainly never expected that I would weigh that the year I got my first social security check. Nor did I expect that three and a half months after the end of Boot Camp, I would still weigh 115!
I recently retired after 40 years of high school teaching. I can’t even remember the names of all the “diets” I was on during those 4 decades. If it was a diet or diet pill that was popular for 5 minutes, I tried it. And here’s the kicker…they all worked. I was so successful at the dieting part, but it was the maintenance aspect of weight loss that eluded me. I finally snapped in my early fifties, when I complained to my doctor about my 25 extra menopausal pounds, and she basically told me that extra pounds were something that women of a certain age had to accept as an unavoidable reality.
I remember leaving her office that day totally enraged at her answer. Thank God for the internet because I started a frantic search and found Leanness Lifestyle. Something about it made sense….no pills, no starvation diet, no false promises. I signed up immediately and learned about food logging and attention to detail, about strength training and progression, and the importance of emotional and psychological balance in daily life. I discovered a family of like-minded individuals who provided the camaraderie and support that my years of solitary dieting sadly lacked. Four months after beginning with the lifestyle, I celebrated when I lost the last of those 25 pounds.
My doctor was wrong that day. There is nothing esoteric about weight control. What I learned from David Greenwalt was the physiological and emotional components of weight loss. I learned that external changes must begin within, that the obesity epidemic that is threatening the health of this nation stems from a myriad of causes ranging from the addictive qualities of modern processed food to the emotional patterns of eating formed during childhood. It has been a fascinating and exhilarating learning experience.
I found Leanness Lifestyle 8 years ago and this teacher finally became a proficient weight maintainer. And, I must add, a very grateful weight maintainer. That’s part of the Coach’s message, that gratitude must become a part of daily life and he has helped me to realize how much there has been, and continues to be, in my life that I am grateful for.
And number one on that list is the gratitude I feel each and every morning when I weigh my naked 62-year-old body.
Thanks, Coach.
Paula Grasel
Retired Teacher – Florida