We all know that you shouldn’t let your emotions rule your financial decisions. Does the same principle hold true for losing some weight? Yes, it does.

Impulse spending and impulse eating have one thing in common. They are done impulsively. Sometimes they are done to celebrate when you’re feeling positive. You don’t actually get out the party hats, but you do get out some treats. At other times impulse eating and impulse spending are done to lighten your mood when you’re feeling the very opposite of positive. You’ve had quite a day, and you’re feeling down, somewhat hopeless and helpless. You’ve been here before, and you know what it’s like. That makes it worse. In fact, you anticipate feeling as bad as you did last time. Antidote: go get something to eat. Not good diet food, of course. Some fattening food or lots of food.

Acting on impulse, whether it’s eating so much or spending so much, is something you must come to grips with—that is, if you want to have self-control to shed those extra pounds and keep those extra dollars.

Don’t wait until you start a diet or start the weight-loss process to work on your impulsive behavior. If you’re an impulse eater (and who isn’t at times), why not work on this very specific characteristic prior to even trying to lose some weight.

Here are some (weight-loss) strategies to get you started.

• Set up situations in which you can practice delaying rather than acting impulsively. Practice in non-food situations and in food situations.

• Before you have the impulse, try some substitutes that will keep you moving toward your weight-loss goal—like non-food treats.

• Practice riding out the feeling or the thought that makes you act on impulse, and help yourself do this by telling yourself that your feeling, thought, urge, desire, etc. has a beginning, middle, and end.

• Time your feelings and thoughts that lead to acting on impulse. Get to know how long they last. Use this information to make you confident you can get through it without acting rashly (and against your long-term weight-loss goal).

• Discover that not all feelings, thoughts, inner urges, etc. are the same. Some are more powerful than others. Use a subjective rating scale from 0 to 10: zero being the easiest to get through and 10 being the hardest to get through. Then when the thought, urge, feeling, whatever hits, you have a way of telling yourself how affecting it is, and you’ll be able to differentiate. Perceiving differences leads directly to behaving differently.

Keep in mind that controlling impulses is never perfect. Practice helps, but it does not make perfect. Cheating on a diet is a prime example of this kind of imperfection. You lose it, and you eat off your diet. It is an impulse, an imperfection, and it can be time-limited, maybe even situation-specific. Don’t compound the lapse by thinking all is lost. Go right back to your good diet plan. The sooner the better. Learn from your mistake.

Last thought: This has been a discussion of impulses that take you away from your long-term weight-loss goal. Bad impulses. But of course not all impulses are bad. Impulsive behavior is not always a no-no. Acting on impulse, a self-affirming impulse that is, can be one of the joys of life. So make sure that on the spur of the moment you do that special something for yourself— because a fulfilled woman doesn’t have to fill herself full.

by Maria's Last Diet