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Currently viewing the tag: "lifestyle change"
Eating and food habits challenge us when we are trying to lose weight. Diets encourage eating in a different manner but habits have a way of coming back, reappearing just when you’re making progress, or getting to a comfortable weight or size.
Why?
One of my brilliant clients coined a new phrase last week when she said many of her food habits had become more engrained than simple habits – they had deepened into behaviors – they were like
We hear a lot about “lifestyle change” today. In fact, most diets call themselves a “lifestyle change”, even the popular commercial ones that are nothing more than a prescribed food plan.
I guess it makes customers THINK they’re doing the big job, not the little (short-term) one.
My favorite “lifestyle change” quote came from a friend who dropped a lot of weight (temporarily) during the Phen-Fen pharmaceutical debacle.
I made a big discovery in the land of permanent weight loss yesterday. Even after maintaining my weight loss for five years (which signals “permanent weight loss” in the medical community), I still struggled at holidays. And, in my coaching practice, clients bring their struggles into their coaching sessions and holidays are often a very tough time for them when they are addressing their excess weight.
Now, however, 12 years into maintaining weight loss, this holiday season is remarkably different.
Instead of forecasting and planning, which I once felt helped me
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During an interview this week, I was asked a question that stopped me in my tracks.
“What derails you?”
It took me a couple minutes of thought before I could even get my head around this. It felt a little familiar – like maybe I once knew what it was like, but it was a dim memory.
I’ve been losing weight a long time. Like, if there’s an award for long-term change, I’m in line for it. But what happens when you keep going is that some things that seemed like BIG CONCEPTS and HUGE AH-HAs become…
well…
just life.
So I told the interviewer:
We often have a picture in our heads of what successful weight loss looks like.
It might go like this:
New Diet + Short Period of Time = Skinny Me
We convince ourselves this is how it works and, when it doesn’t work, we blame ourselves. Or the diet. But usually ourselves – as if any diet EVER worked!
With a 99% fail rate and a 108% regain rate, diets are so not the way to go.
Once we realize this, some really big opportunities open up! As one of my clients recently said, “There really are 50 ways to leave your lover!”
Have you heard this quote?
“The chief cause of failure is trading what we want most for what we want at the moment.”
The road to weight loss is littered with bad trades!
We vow to attend a barbecue and avoid drinking alcohol, since that often sets off compulsive eating. But, in the moment, perhaps under peer pressure from the host or hostess, we throw the vow away and plunge headfirst into a margarita.
Alcohol can lead to relaxed boundaries around food.
We promise to eat in a healthy manner but, when the first meeting of the work day shows up decorated in doughnuts, we’re on a sugar high before the boss can say “Good morning!” Continue reading »
It’s almost Valentine’s Day and look at what’s on my desk!
These are beautiful truffles from a party I gave right before Christmas. I used them as decorations at each place setting at the table.
So why are they sitting on my desk? Well, they are there because they were left over.
Now, there was a day when a leftover chocolate of any kind had NO SHELF LIFE within a 50-yard radius of Pat Barone!
With complete embarrassment, I admit I was that guest at the wedding
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I’m just back from a conference focused on scientific studies about change where I heard a repetitive chant: “People Don’t Change.”
I’ll acknowledge there are studies that show most patients who encounter life threatening conditions return to old behaviors that caused the problem in the first place. Hence, the red meat seduces the heart patient. Nicotine lures the smoker. Permanent weight loss is rare as weight comes back to the dieter.
I know some people don’t care to change, or it is too threatening to them to do so. Yes, living without food as a soother, friend or emotional barrier can be scarier than death.
I fit that picture once. Continue reading »
The first of the year always brings energy to weight loss. The gyms get busier. Stores stock diet products and push them in our face. Advertising proliferates.
Now comes the news that Jenny Craig has a new spokeswoman, Carrie Fisher.
This news really hit me hard. It made me very sad.
I wasn’t sad because we’ve got yet another famous face attempting to glamourize temporary weight loss. I wasn’t sad because we are once again NOT TALKING about sustainable change. I wasn’t even sad because we have to watch another public “slim down” and rebound.
The fact that our society spends untold amounts of energy circling the real reasons for our addictive behavior and instead plays bullshit games with destructive dieting is always sad to me.
I was really affected by this because I think Carrie Fisher is a remarkably talented woman.
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If you participated in our January 1st challenge, thank you! The challenge was to guess how many times I exercised in 2010. A package of Catalyst products for permanent weight loss valued at $350 is on its way to Deborah Phillipi!
Deborah guessed 355 exercise sessions for my activity output last year. My actual total was
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