You Don't Have To Eat It All! 258.6 pounds. - 0.6 pounds today, - 0.8 pounds this week, - 0.4 pounds this month, - 21.4 pounds since May 1, - 74.4 pounds from my all-time high of 333 pounds.

I learned something new yesterday that helped me lose weight today. This wasn't rocket science, but to me it was. I've been trained my whole life to not waste food. My mother grew up on a farm and it is a cardinal sin for a farmer to waste food, so I learned to eat everything on my plate.

Well, last night my wife and I went to our favorite restaurant in Stillwater, Minnesota, Nacho Mama's. The food there is fantastic. I ordered the fajita lasagna, which was out of this world. The portion was generous to day the least. As I was enjoying my food and my wife was with her's, she said something amazing to me. She said that the portion was too big and that she was going to only eat half of it and take the rest home. Her words hit me like she was sharing some ancient wisdom with me that I had never heard before. It was as if I had been blind and now I could see.

It isn't as if I had never heard of someone taking food home with them, but for me I have always operated by the thought that as long as the food tasted good and I wasn't feeling sick from being too full that I would keep on stuffing the food in my mouth. I was fully prepared to do that last night, that is, until my wife dropped some truth on me. It took me a minute to register what she was doing and I thought, I wonder if I should do the same. I remembered that I had a date with the scale in the morning and maybe I should do what she suggested. Once I committed to do this I ate a few more bites and I savored the flavor of the food and I stopped. I boxed up half of my meal and I thought that it would be great to enjoy the rest of it at home.

I was rewarded on the scale this morning for following my beautiful wife's suggestion! (I know she wishes I would follow all of her suggestions--my life would go a lot better if I did!) I felt great stepping off the scale and realizing that I had made the right choice.

Today is going to be a great day. I have a full day of work and then my wife and I are going to Costco tonight to buy food for the weekend. We are having a family event on Sunday and it will be great to have family together. I need to make sure that I don't take samples when I'm at Costco tonight because before I know it I will be eating my way through the store. We'll see what happens today and we'll see what the scale says tomorrow morning!