Weight-loss part 4 – What Not To Do

What Not To Do…when you want to lose weight

Part 1 –  we looked at why many people struggle to lose weight

Part 2 – we looked at making a decision and cutting off all other possibilities

Part 3 –  we looked at the 1st step – starting with the end in mind

Today we are looking at what NOT to do, check out if you are making these mistakes:

Okay, so let’s just imagine we have a goal, let’s say to lose 2 stone as an example but then we do these things:

 We look in the mirror and dislike how we look and often comment to ourselves 

Maybe we’ve eaten more than we wanted to and imagine ourselves getting on the scales and we haven’t lost any weight, we see an image in our minds of the scales reading the same weight as we were last week

 We’ve planned our healthier eating options in advance and yet those pesky little images of pizza, chips, cake etc keep popping up

 We imagine getting ready for a night out, trying on our clothes, see them looking tight and notice the feeling of them being tight as we put them on  

We go to reach for something healthy but have the thought of chocolate or cake instead and we give in 

We imagine losing weight as hard or a struggle and already envisage ourselves giving up Do any of these sound familiar? but it is a reality I hear you say! And yes it is true for you now. The issue is you are running the same program and will continue to run it unless you do something differently. In another post, I mentioned our brain is like a heat-seeking missile. What you give it, the brain accepts as a goal and will work to give you more of that to keep you in the program.

************************** WHAT TO DO INSTEAD: **************************

✅ When you look in the mirror and dislike how you look, stop yourself saying something critical, instead choose something different e.g. I am changing this, it’s okay as I am changing that program or just say more slim less weight thank you. in short, stop the loop of the program playing out.

✅ When images of those unhealthy foods pop up, immediately replace them with images of healthy food and see yourself eating them. Feeling pleased with yourself for making a healthy choice and doing good things for your body OR shrink the picture down and move it so far away from you it disappears. Do this fast 5-6 times until the image is gone or not bothering you

✅ Going on a night out? You look in the mirror and don’t like what you see? Say to yourself this is temporary and mean it. Bring up the picture in your mind of the you that has lost the weight. Keep putting this target in your mind to reprogram it.

✅ For the not so faint-hearted – When pictures of chocolate or cake or anything unhealthy pops up, combine that image with something you hate (this is called aversion therapy), see worms crawling all over the cake or whatever it is. Make that image big and close to you. You will not want to eat it guaranteed!

✅ Whenever images of yourself failing pop up, replace that picture quickly with a larger one of you at your ideal weight. Pull it up over the one where you are failing.

All the above tips will help you recode images in your brain, build new neural pathways, break old patterns and create new programs. It all starts with a decision, not only to lose weight but to do the mind work.

Our body is simply an instrument of our mind. Time to get your body to do something else? Start with the mind first.  

Repetition is key. We urge you not to give up on your first few attempts, keep going. In all honesty, it will feel challenging as you do the work consciously but when it goes into your unconscious mind, it won’t feel like any effort at all.