Do the ads for diet supplements that promise to help you “lose weight fast and look fabulous!” lure you in every time? They use pictures of shiny, happy people (models or athletes), having fun and loving life; they can really hook you in and make you want to believe oh so much that their product will work.
I still get this feeling sometimes, and then I have to remind myself that there is no quick and easy way to lose weight, if you want to maintain your health and keep off the weight that you lose.
In essence, it’s really not that hard to lose weight. It’s a completely different story though, if you want to lose weight in a healthy manner, and most importantly, keep that weight off for the rest of your life.
You see, there are reasons that you became overweight in the first place that diet and exercise alone just won’t fix. Some that you could be dealing with are:
- Overeating due to emotional issues.
- Using food as a crutch for life.
- Using food for love.
- Subconsciously desiring to remain overweight to protect yourself from life and living.
- Fear of success, attention, feeling good, and other fears.
- Lack of nutritional knowledge; it’s not how much you eat, but what you eat.
- Food addiction – you are eating foods that trigger you to overeat and keep you wanting more and more; you just can’t get enough.
- Core beliefs (often unconscious) that you do not deserve success, therefore you do not deserve to remain thin, fit, and trim.
- Stinkin’ thinkin’ – continual negative self-talk leading to the self-defeating behavior of overeating.
These are just a few of the reasons that cause overweight, and if you only diet and exercise without addressing the causes of your overweight, then you are only treating the symptom. Without treating the causes, you might attain outside thinness, but be bursting at the seams, ready to regain that weight and get back to your comfort zone.
When you lose weight quickly by treating the symptom, how quick is it when you end up right back where you started because you never changed your insides? I realize that when you look at taking the route of healing the causes of your overweight it can seem like “forever” until you will lose weight and be fit and trim, however if you are going to keep off the weight that you lose by changing your insides and adopting a healthy lifestyle, then you really are losing weight very quickly.
Why? Because you won’t be repeating the same old process of “trying to lose weight” for the rest of your life. You will have healed your relationship with food and yourself, and be living in peace with your body. Isn’t this really what you want after all? Do you really want to be on a perpetual diet, going back and forth with your weight for the rest of your life?
Great post! I think you raised some very good points that are often overlooked when it comes to dieting. Getting to a desired body weight and or fitness level isn’t something that is short term. It requires a complete life alteration over the long haul. Wanting to lose weight may be the first step, but overweight individuals should definitely analyze their current situation and what factors brought them there.
Hi Jamie,
Thanks for you comments, and your compliments! 🙂
I think that this is why the diet industry is so successful…there are millions of repeat dieters because the cause of the issue was never healed in the first place, only the symptom (overweight) was addressed.