The simple fact is: you can lose weight.
The difficult reality: losing weight seems to be impossible.
In fact, not only is it tough to shed the pounds, it seems like every time you try, you end up putting on even more weight.
But if there’s no physical reason that prevents you from losing weight (if you’re thinking you get a pass here because your metabolism doesn’t let you lose weight, forget it – we’ve told you before that metabolism is not an excuse), then why can’t you ever seem to lose any?
If it’s physically possible, but not happening, then something else must be getting in the way.
The mistake that most dieters and weight watchers make is to think that, because the extra weight they want to lose is a physical thing, the answer to getting rid of it is purely physical too.
If that was true, everyone would be walking around as slim as a rake.
Weight Loss is as Much a Mental Challenge as a Physical One
Just like there’s no reason why you can’t lose weight, there’s no reason why you can’t speak more softly, or decorate your home. But, unlike weight loss, you can easily do the last two because there’s nothing in your way. No mental blocks or challenges that you’re not prepared for. So you just get the job done.
Of course, while they are all physical tasks, losing weight is a complex process that few of us really understand.
The realization that you need to conquer mental challenges as well as physical ones can better your chances of enjoying weight loss success. Tackling the things that are truly stopping you from living at your ideal weight, and not wasting your time and energy on anything that doesn’t, gives you the highest chance of winning the game.
1. Emotional Eating
This is perhaps the largest and most difficult mental hurdle in your way. The reasons for overeating can be deep-seated, even rooted in emotional trauma. Food offers comfort.
But, instead of continuing to use emotional issues as an excuse, try to find ways to address them in other ways. Seek out therapy or try to substitute something other than food for relief. Do everything you can to not let emotions keep ruining your physical health.
There are other kinds of emotional eating too. It’s usually not a good idea to eat while you’re watching a tear-jerker on TV, or as a reward for an accomplishment, or in any other way that connects food to an emotional trigger.
The first step in conquering emotional eating is to be more conscious of when you’re eating and what you’re eating. The ‘when’ can show you the things that trigger your eating. The ‘what’ can help you substitute healthier foods when you eat to help improve your nutrition, eat less and lower you weight.
2. Stop Looking for An Easy Way Out
Just the idea that you can simply cut out carbs, slash your calorie intake, or workout like a pro athlete to lose weight can make it a bigger mental challenge than it needs to be. There is no easy way to lose weight and keep it off. The more you prepare yourself for the reality that weight management may be a lifelong journey, full of the ups and downs of anything else you do in life, the better your chances will be of surviving the inevitable setbacks.
3. Be a Better Boss to Yourself
What happens when you hop on the weigh scale and you notice, despite trying your absolute best to watch your calories, you’ve actually gone up a few pounds? What does your inner voice tell you? Probably something like “nothing ever works for me”, or “I’m a loser”, or “I’m just going to be fat for the rest of my life”.
What would you think if your boss or life partner said “you’re a loser” or “nothing’s ever going to work for you”, or “you’re going to be fat for the rest of your life.”
Now take a step back and think about what happened on the weigh scale. The numbers on a weigh scale just forced you to tell yourself things that you wouldn’t accept from anyone else. Even though you tried your best, you don’t recognize your effort, but focus on the numbers on the scale instead.
Again, the fact that we think about losing weight only in its physical sense is at the root of a lot of the self-berating that we do. The milestones of success are all physical. The diet says you should lose 30 pounds in 90 days, and when you don’t, you call yourself a ‘loser’.
Yes, you didn’t achieve the physical goal, but you did so much else. You probably still lost most of the weight. Maybe you got into an activity routine that improves your physical fitness and burns more calories. Or maybe your diet is way healthier than it was. You might not be at the weight you want to be, but that might be the only thing you didn’t achieve and, even so, you still lost some weight.
Try to listen more to what your inner voice tells yourself, especially as it relates to your weight loss. Speak to yourself in ways that you would appreciate hearing from others. Objective, supportive ways that
encourage your achievements and highlights areas for improvement
4. Set Mental Goals Too
If your weight reduction goals are all physical, then why not set some mental ones too.
But how do you set and track mental goals? After all, it’s not like you can hop on a scale that tells you just how much kinder you’re being to yourself. While that’s true, the fact that it’s not easy to measure progress towards your mental goals can work in your favour.
Let’s say you decide to be a better ‘boss’ to yourself. Even if you recognize just one thing you achieved in the face of not reaching a physical goal, instead of getting down on yourself, then you can say you reached your goal.
But the fact that the yardsticks for mental goals are somewhat hazy means that, once you take a step in the right direction, you need to reset your goals so you can keep improving. The key is, just like you would do with anyone else, is to make sure you recognize your progress, even if it doesn’t meet physical goals.
5. Set Reasonable Goals
Whether they are mental or physical, goals that are difficult to achieve might be one of biggest hurdles between you and success. If you tell yourself that, mentally, you’re going to love all of the new, healthy food you’re eating as much as you loved your favourite comfort foods, then you’re probably setting yourself up for a big letdown.
Physically, if your goal is to lose 30 pounds in 30 days, and keep them off for six months, then that is an equally massive goal to achieve.
Instead, set yourself more reasonable goals, like you’ll substitute one healthier food into your diet every week, or you’re just going to shoot for five pounds in two weeks, and you’ll accept any weight loss as a good consolation prize.
By setting more achievable goals, you’re not necessarily trying to make things easier, but you’re trying to stop the constant failure to meet loftier goals from making your mental challenge more difficult than it needs to be.
There’s one more thing we do to lose weight that makes it a tougher mental challenge. We try to do it on our own. But, if you find someone who wants to help you meet all your weight loss challenges, it can give you the support and boost you need to beat them. The nutrition specialists at your nearest Herbal One Centre are ready to help you.