Can you be as creative as Darrell Nelson in creating your Safe Zones?

Darrell Nelson could win an award for the most creative strategy of the century. What did Darrell do? He created a new weight-loss strategy of offering to mow people’s lawns for free! That’s thinking outside the box and is a wonderful example of doing whatever works and being as extreme as you need to be. I know I’m impressed.

Darrell, weighing in at 258 pounds, knew he should lose weight. He tried dieting and joining a gym, but like for many, they did not work. Did Darrell give up? No he didn’t.

Darrell was aware of his strengths and weaknesses and tried to come up with a strategy that took advantage of his strengths and minimized his weaknesses. A classic weight loss move.

He was always good at keeping his work-related commitments. So he figured if he could turn his exercise into work he would have a lot better chance of sticking with it.

Brilliant! Some people might say Darrell should just be disciplined enough to go to the gym. But that doesn’t work for him and rather than worry about what he can’t do he figured out what he can do.

So Darrell hatched a plan of mowing lawns for free. You get a lot of exercise mowing lawns and because mowing lawns is a job, Darrell felt like he couldn’t go back on his commitment. Blowing a commitment to yourself to go to the gym is easy. Not showing up to mow a lawn after promising a family you would is hard, at least for Darrell.

Then Darrell took it even one step further. His old push-model mower couldn’t keep up with the work. Rather than spend money for a new mower, he sought out a sponsor. Toro agreed to provide him a new mower as long as Darrell lost 50 pounds! Now Darrell had double the incentive to keep up the work.

Isn’t Darrell just lying to himself? He’s mowing lawns for free so nobody could say anything if he didn’t show up. I don’t think he’s lying to himself at all. He’s being smart. Darrell is using his rational mind to provide himself the little bit of structure he needs to succeed. He knows himself well enough to know what works for him and he’s taking advantage of it.

What matters is what works for you. Don’t worry about what other people think or about useless questions like are you “lying” to yourself. Do whatever works.

How is Darrel’s strategy working for him? He lost 18 pounds in two weeks.

What works for Darrell may not work for you. What you can learn from Darrell is his creativity, his insight into his own nature, and his courage in acting on what he thought was right.