I had no idea I’d lost 20 pounds.

My pants were easier to button, my dresses easier to zip. But since I usually only step on a scale when a medical professional forces me to do so, I had no idea I’d lost 20 pounds.

Then I went to a wellness screening mandated by my health insurance provider, stepped on the scale, looked down and saw a number 20 pounds less than the number I saw the last time I’d weighed myself.

“Your scale is broken,” I declared to the nice nurse practitioner filling out my paperwork. She just laughed and assured me it was not. I didn’t believe her. When I got home I weighed myself again and those 20 pounds were still nowhere to be found. “Maybe my scale is broken, too,” I thought.

Last week my fellow teachers and I returned to work after a two and a half month summer break and that’s when I realized those scales must have been right.

“Oh my gosh! Javacia, you look great!” one co-worker exclaimed. “Wow! You got so skinny!” said another. “Girl, what did you do?” a colleague asked.

Good question. What did I do? And how can I use the same principles I used to lose weight to help me with my writing and blogging goals?

I’ve realized that there are four things that helped me lose weight: mindset, movement, motivation, and momentum.

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