Not sure if I can post a link but here goes. I read an interesting article in the most recent Oprah magazine about a different weight loss approach and would be curious to hear what you experts think : )
From a place of stillness, openness, forgiveness, and acceptance, you can renew your commitment to any eating plan you like. Go ahead, stay on the Key lime enema program—though I doubt you'll want to. Such diets are unnatural, like throwing that porpoise through a hoop. A relaxed porpoise often jumps for pure joy. A relaxed human eats healthy foods in healthy portions, and stays active because it's more fun than lethargy. The result? Healthy weight, with little effort. It's that simple.
I'm curious to hear what other people think, but I do think she has a point... for all of my 27 years, I've had a horrible fingernail-picking habit, I would pick them down constantly so there was no white left, and they just looked awful. My whole life I've wanted to stop doing it, and had a few weeks here and there when I didn't, but I always started doing it again... and then I started seeing a therapist a few months ago to talk about my lousy family problems and social anxiety. Three weeks in, I literally woke up one day and thought, "I'm not going to do this anymore", and just stopped picking them. There's just no desire to do it anymore. I wonder if I'll eventually find the same is true for whatever it is that makes me want to overeat.
"just relax" sounds easy but if it were that simple, we'd all be where we want to be already, right? I like the idea of reducing anxiety as part of overall well-being though and Jajabee - I love your example of the overnight habit change as anxiety went away.
I think it's not "the answer," (because "the answer" is a myth), but I think there's quite a bit of truth in what she's saying.
I am losing at a much slower pace than I ever have, but I'm not torturing myself either. I spent three decades plus looking at diets as ways to torture myself for the unforgiveable sin of being fat, and therefore beyond bad - disgusting, horrific, worthless.
I think it's so ingrained in our culture, that the natural tendency is to put ourselves in diet jail for the crime of being fat. As a probation officer and having a master's degree in psych, I can tell you that when people are in jail, even when they believe they deserve it, the natural response is to desire and seek escape (mentally, if not physically). If the cell doors were opened and the jailors walked away - there wouldn't be many staying behind.
Since we try to be both jailor and prisoner - the dynamic doesn't work very well. We seek both confinement and escape, the need for control and freedom.
When I refused to play the punisher/punishee roles, I was able to have a lot more success (providing I didn't define success as dramatic overnight behavior change and wowing weight loss).
Change is tough - whether you're trying to learn to play the piano or lose 25 lbs. But, it becomes easier if you don't put your ego - your very value as a human being - on the line.
I like the article. I think it contains a lot of wisdom. It may not feel 'easy' to relax, but that's probably why this is such a process for so many people. Sometimes it takes a while to change our habits and feel comfortable with them. Studies after studies demonstrate that people respond more favourably to a kind approach - even when the news is unwanted. Losing weight can be a long, if not sometimes challenging/trying, journey in itself - being hard on ourselves just makes it that much harder. There's no sense in that, and it feels awful - not to mention, we just don't deserve being treated like crap, even if it's self-induced. IMHO, whatever our body size, we deserve kindness and respect, most certainly from ourselves
I think the article suffers from what a lot of "exciting solutions" suffer from - it paints a scenario that ends well, and that's end of it, as if that scenario somehow constitutes proof. Somehow. But just because the appeal for the brownies evaporated for her, hardly means that is the end of it for everyone else. There isn't the faintest hint of what to do then.
I take anything in Oprah magazine with a huge grain of (marketing) salt. But if it works for YOU, who am I to say? For me, there was a whole lot more to do than to just "relax and be one with the porpoise"...I have too much stuff to do and no staff to do it for me, unlike Ms. O...
Kira
There's absolutely no way a magazine article can provide more than a few tips or tricks, or a few key points on ANY subject. Expecting more is like asking a person to summarize everything they know in five minutes. You can ask, and you might even get five minutes of something - but it isn't going to encompass everything the person knows.
Weight loss is a subject that can't be adequately summarized in one book (and probably not in a library full of books), let alone a magazine article. Part of the reason that articles are written from a "this is the secret to weight loss," format is because the consumer expects it - but there is no one key, and trying to condense it into one "soundbite" is always going to be meaningless in the big picture.
I think, at best, a person can gain a new perspective or learn a new approach to try, but expecting it to be "the key," or "the secret," is basically asking for magic.
Yeah, it would be nice if more parts of the 4-part article focused on the actual tips and tricks for "relaxing" about food, instead of all the buildup to the big "secret". I do think she's on to something with this, and it'd be nice to read more real-world advice on how to actually do it!
I think the article provides some good insights. It's not the be all, end all but has some excellent points.
I think the biggest problem is perfectionism. I know, you don't think you're a perfectionist because if you were, you'd be able to stick to a plan and exercise regimen perfectly. Wrong! A perfectionist might avoid starting or quit altogether unless they can do things 'perfectly'. If they're working on it and they 'fall off the wagon', party over!
Perfectionism is also what drives us to create time constraints that we tell ourselves are goals. A weight loss goal really shouldn't be tied to a calendar, in my opinion.
I've got a lot of weight still to lose but I have now lost more weight than I've ever lost before. I'm not a significant yo-yo'er because I get derailed by perfectionism long before I can lose a bunch of weight.
The author of the article doesn't talk about perfectionism or much about artificial time constraints but I think it does play into the mentality that causes failure. I only count calories 1 day or less per week. I try to eat healthy but still intuitively. I lose weight slower but it doesn't FEEL like work to lose it. I feel like I'm just living my life rather than 'dieting'. That is similar to the approach the article recommends.
Dr. Abraham Low said "Lower your expectations and your performance will rise". I used to think that was dumb because if you lowered your standard, of course you THOUGHT you were doing better. I've learned that it's much more than that. We are motivated to do things when we feel good about ourselves and our abilities. If we set the expectation lower, we get to constantly feel good about ourselves as we meet the goal. Usually, we'll exceed it just because we can and then we feel even better. Case in point- my minimum time for exercise is 35 minutes. That's it. I almost always work out for 45-60 and those last minutes I get to feel great for going so far beyond my basic goal. If I'd expected myself to work out for 60 minutes, I'd be disappointed every time I could only do 45 and then feel like I fell short of the mark.
The mental part of weight loss is certainly under planned by most of us. I can absolutely agree with the article on that.
Yeah, it would be nice if more parts of the 4-part article focused on the actual tips and tricks for "relaxing" about food, instead of all the buildup to the big "secret". I do think she's on to something with this, and it'd be nice to read more real-world advice on how to actually do it!
Well then, you'll just have to buy her book, now won't you?
I didn't like the article. I am not an emotional eater, and I did not get fat by emotional eating, so the telling me to just relax would have done me not one whit of good. I got fat by eating whatever was around me and plenty of it -- pizza, burgers, french fries, ice cream. My saving grace was changing the food that was around me through organization and planning. Now when everyone else has pizza, I have a sandwich that I made from home. When everyone else has ice cream, I have a yogurt and an apple. Problem solved, no crazy brain techniques involved (other than sitting down and making a food list every Sunday).
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I didn't like the article. I am not an emotional eater, and I did not get fat by emotional eating, so the telling me to just relax would have done me not one whit of good. I got fat by eating whatever was around me and plenty of it -- pizza, burgers, french fries, ice cream....
I feel the same way. I wish I could blame my super morbid obesity on hormones, thyroid, or some mind boggling psychological illness, but *for me* I was fat because I was lazy...a little tooo relaxed. There was no excuse why I needed 5000 calories + a day to shovel in my face. None. I put myself in prison...and I deserved to be there because I was "bad" to the body that I was blessed with. I was lazy, I didn't care, and I blamed the world. Then one day I decided I wanted out. I decided I wanted out early, so I worked hard. I got time off for good behavior.
LoriBell; NOOOOOO, lol. I wouldn't wish a thyroid condition upon ANYONE. It is much more than weight. It is chronic fatigue, mental instability, brain fog, fibromyalgia, extreme hair loss, feeling like you are in Alaska when in fact, you are in the Deep South. To me, your problem is a less complicated fix, although it probably doesn't feel that way to you
But I do know what you mean. I am pretty much having to go through the same changes you had to make, but with an added nuisance of hormonal problems. Making those changes is not the easiest thing, but you did it and now you get to go on with life. I have to make sure I take my medicine everyday (3 X's a day), work food schedules and anything else with iron or calcium around when I take it. Not the end of the world, but not my ideal situation either. I have moved past the pity though. I think I am more pi**ed off now, more than anything, LOL. It is a good anger though. It's like I have wagered this competition against my body. And I'm gonna win this time
I used to cry to my husband frequently when I DID try to lose the weight. I tried SOOOOO hard last summer for 12 weeks straight and I think I ended up losing maybe 4 lbs altogether. I also stupidly got rid of my stationary bike (had to buy a new one again) and decided to give up. If the meds are off even the slightest bit, the weight goes nowhere. I would just keep saying how unfair it was, how I could understand if I gobbled down 3,000 calories a day or something; WHY do I have to be fat. So I guess the grass sometimes can look greener on the other side, haha.
Interesting article in Oprah magazine
