Those of you who have seen me recently know that I have dropped over 100 pounds. I hated just typing that sentence because I can’t believe I ever let myself get to the point where I had to drop over 100 pounds!! But I thank God that he finally got my attention! After shying away from cameras and feeling miserable with about half a dozen medical issues, I finally came to a point of decision. I had caught a glimpse of myself on a dvd of a skit I had performed on stage for Hearts at Home. I could NOT believe that what I saw on the screen was what people saw every time they looked at me!!! It was enough to shock me into reality and away from the fridge. Long story short— my dear friend Tammy and I now facilitate a weekly eating and exercising accountability group at our church called Weigh and Pray. If you’d like to start such a group in your church or community, here’s how:

Secure a time and location. You might want to meet at a church or perhaps in someone’s home. Maybe your local library has a meeting room for use. Also check banks and community centers.

Get the word out. Put notices in your church bulletin. List it in the local paper. Do an email blast. Whatever it takes! List the time, location, cost (if any). Our group has a one time joining fee of $5.00. This allowed us to purchase a good scale, purse-sized notebooks for each participant and to have a small “slush fund” to purchase fun door prizes, if desired. We keep our meetings to one hour in length.

Weigh In. Designate one tight-lipped, godly gal to be the “weigher”. Each week participants will weigh in privately in front of her and she will record their weight and the date in their handy-dandy little notebook. This is the key to this whole accountability process!! Do not skip this step. It is too easy to be too easy on yourself. Having to be accountable to another person shocks you into behaving!

Each week come with an opening question in mind. For your first meeting it can simply be “What brought you here and why do you need this group?” Other weeks ask them to name a high or low point of the week, tell how they are working in working out into their schedules or what new healthy discoveries have they come across that actually taste good.

Also have a topic at hand to discuss. It can be one person preparing a short lesson on a subject that has to do with eating right and exercising. Cover topics such as eating healthy while eating out, handling social situations, working whole grains into their diet or veggies or fruit or healthy meats. Maybe you will cover emotional eating or eating healthy while there are kids in the house. Other times have a brainstorming night. Maybe everyone brings their favorite low fat snack idea or main dish or dessert recipe. Keep it simple. Remember, you (nor I for that matter) are not medical experts and in no way want to be handing out advice. Encourage participants to get with their doctor before beginning any major lifestyle change in this area. This teaching time is more of an idea share.

Spend time gathering concerns in this area for which the participants would like prayer. Try to keep it simple. “Prayer request” times can get out of hand. We don’t want to be spending great amounts of time praying for you neighbors’ great aunt’s bunions, however bothersome they may be to her. Your purpose is to pray for each other in the areas of eating right and exercising. Try to keep it to that. Of course there will be times where there is an urgent request that goes outside of those boundaries. That is okay.

Spend time bringing your request to God. Do not force anyone to pray out loud. Have one person volunteer to go last. Then just begin to pray, whoever feels lead, covering the requests at hand. Once they are all covered, the last gal finishes up.

Watch your time. We break our one hour meetings down this way: Five minutes intro and welcoming new members having them share why they came and how they heard about the group. Fifteen minutes going around the room answering the opening question, twenty minutes on the topic of the week and twenty minutes for prayer. We weigh in starting 15 minutes before our hour begins. We encourage all to be prompt and weigh in before our start time of 6:00 p.m. That means you room must be open and your “weigher” there fifteen minutes prior to start.

Feel free to innovate. God will give your group other ideas. Perhaps you want to exchange addresses. That way you can encourage each other with a handwritten note now and then. Make an email list. Perhaps one gal would like to look up quotes or recipes and mail the occasionally to everyone. Anything goes!!

Keep me posted. I’d love to know if you start a group, what town you are from and any creative ideas you come up with. We can post them here for others to see! Contact me at Karen@karenehman.com.