I have just caught up on the section this morning....I still need to do the actual work, but this was a very powerful point for me.
I have been working with a Hypnotherapist, and we have been working at reprogramming those sub-conscious thoughts and the conscious thoughts....My therapist has already gotten me of being hypersensitive to the words that I am using...we don't say "lose weight" because losing something connotates that it needs to be found. I melt/give away/get rid of/my excess weight.
I had terrible thoughts, thoughts that I would never even think about others, but I would think that of myself....Angel...thank you for your share about the hairbrush incident, I have had my own self loathing moments that included trying to hurt myself.....that is very difficult to admit.
I live here in LA and trying to get real with weight, in a society that is fixated on how small can you get, and trying to meet a guy being single in this town is impossible. I have beautiful thin friends who can't so I watch my own negativity in this area....if she with the great body,good job, excellent personality can't find the right guy then I have NO chance. So this was a great way to examine where else I have this victim/excuse mentality.
My loss has slowed down but I still feel good, because I am now focused on knowing that I ate the right things, and that is now where I am putting my focus. And, the truth is that I have lost 10 pounds since 8/29 anyhow...10 pounds in a month is still great.
Jo...I love your sentences...I may steal some for myself. I will be doing the exercises this weekend and reading for next week. I do feel that UWL is giving me more of a sense of being in control. The office is really busy right now with the US final tax extension due on Oct. 15th....I will be done and will be able to read more.
Rowan, I can certainly understand what you say about living in LA. We made our first trip there last year (wonderful place to visit, but we turned down a transfer because of the real estate prices and taxes). While I was walking Rodeo Drive and Beverly Hills, I felt so out of place. Here in Indiana where obesity rules, 'large' women abound.
I waited until the end of the week to comment on this section because I have been accustomed to "Right Thinking" for about 25 years now. I was a real estate broker, and when I first started out, a friend gave me a book, THINK AND GROW RICH by Napoleon Hill. It was first published in 1937, and the title is deceiving. It is not necessarily about making money, but about how to achieve goals through desire and 'right thinking.' (This is the author that coined, "whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve") The funny thing about it, is that I have applied the principles to all areas of my life but never thought about applying them to my health! When I read Dr. Phil's SELF MATTERS, I realized he was using the same principles, as was Bob Green in GET WITH THE PROGRAM and Bill Phillips in BODY FOR LIFE. The one thing I love about Dr. Phil is his down to earth way of explaining things. If there has been anyone who can make me 'think and grow,' it's Dr. Phil. But duh, I made the connection to right thinking and what I already knew for 25 years several months ago, and thus my signature line.
My heart just broke when I read that some of you have thoughts of hurting yourself. But the fact that you are brave enough to admit that in public is such an awesome step forward, IMO. Haven't we all been hurting ourselves, for whatever reason, with food? I think we are on such a fantastic journey into self-discovery!
I'm anxious to get on to the next chapter because yesterday, watching Dr. Phil, I had an OMG moment. I will probably be the first one out of the gate to post my discovery, but I am going to start today working on "Healing Feelings" that I have been harboring. I already feel a sense of freedom!
Hi everyone! I just bought the book this weekend, but wanted to comment on self dialogue. I suffer from and am on meds for constant low level depression. I have been working on improving my inner dialogue for YEARS, and it IS possible and it gets easier!! At first i would try to catch the negative thoughts and replace them with positive thoughts. It felt awkward, but I kept at it. Well, it feels natural now, and my FIRST thoughts are a lot more likely to be positive now too!! I still have bad days, and there are still days when I don't even catch myself, but THAT is okay too. I am a work of art.....IN PROGRESS!!! Believe me, emotionally and physically I have hurt myself a lot, and I see that I still have a long way to go, but I want to get there, and I am actually starting to enjoy the trip instead of just lusting after the end result. Studies done on masterpiece paintings have shown areas that were painted over. Even the GREATS make mistakes, the key is learning from those mistakes!!!
Page 51 quote:
What you tell yourself can make you feel stressed, anxious, worried, depressed - - and more apt to binge or overeat. Unless you eliminate self-defeating thoughts, they will actually gain momentum, becomeng more deeply lodged in the habitual patterns of your life and more unyielding to change. We must idenity and acknowledge them.
I am in the middle of trying to change the way I cope with stress and I think this "right thinking" needs to apply to other parts of my life and not just my weight loss.
I am finding the book very helpful so far. A lot of things I am reading about I never realised that I did to myself.
Hi everyone! I just bought the book on Friday and read the first couple of chapters last night. I agree with a lot of what's already been posted here and with what was said in the book. I think if I had to pick the categories of negative self-talking that I do the most, it would be the all-or-nothing and the pie dreaming. I can't even fathom how many different diets I've started and quit after I got frustrated because the weight wasn't coming off fast enough or because I missed a day of exercise or because I gave in and had a goodie that turned into a binge. Slimfast, WW, South Beach, Atkins, Cabbage Soup, Body for Life, Fat Flush, Hollywood Diet, metabolife, etc. I know what it takes to lose weight - healthy foods and exercise. No gimmick is going to make this weight go away magically tomorrow, and I don't need to be perfect in order to be "on plan." This is tough for me, but I hope it will get easier. I truly want this to be the last week that I am 280 pounds. And next week will be the last week that I ever see 278. And so on. So I'm thinking positively, and really trying to listen to that self-doubt.
Hello all. I see that Discussion 3 "Healing Feelings" has started. I've read the chapter but went back to Right Thinking. I'm still struggling with that whole concept. What I'm finding is that I'm pretty hard on myself (old news) and that the right thinking jsut sounds phony. Angel, I was wondering if you'd had a chance to work on that mantra you'd mentioned. You said something about saying it to yourself every day for a month? I'd be most interested in seeing this. Maybe something like that will help get "right thinking" through my thick head.
Also, I hope none of you mind that I continue on about this Right Thinking topic in our next chapter discussion - I'm afraid that if I keep posting to this thread until I "get it" I'll miss out on what else is going on, not to mention the opportunity for all you great folks to read my posts and perhaps offer suggestions should I get stuck again.
Debuska- maybe the "right thinking" sounds phony because it feels unnatural if you are not use to using it.
To me it feels weird saying these things to myself- like some silly self help clap trap ala Stuart Smalley from Saturday Night Live
(I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it-people like me!)
But I am willing to give it a shot - maybe you get used to it - I mean, we've been telling ourselves the wrong things for a long time so changing our mind sets is not going to happen overnight and it is bound to feel odd at first.
I agree with you, maybe a personal mantra may work better. I am willing to try that too. I really need to sort myself out mentally before I do anything else. I am also starting yoga - the exercise is great but again I get kind of weirded out by the chakras and meditation and ohms and all that. one of my tapes tries to get you to keep saying " I am a Goddess" and I just feel so silly doing it!
On that note....I have posted this by my desk as my daily inspiration....
"Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom.
Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.
If you realize you have enough, then you are truly rich."
From the Book of Tao Te Ching
hmmm.... maybe this should be one of my mantras?
Last edited by mauvaisroux; 10-07-2003 at 04:38 PM.
I have decided to leave each discussion board open to continued posts so that late comers can continue with them and also that along the way we can go back and take a look at it...
I am still working on the mantra.... I hope to have it done Saturday..... With all the studying I have been doing I have been getting behind the eight ball... I will definetly post it when I get done.....
This also is one of the hardest things for me.... I have a hard time thinking that i am worth it.... but I do.
Well, looks like I missed the boat on the Chapter One discussion. I didn't realize that the threads would be locked.
My quick thoughts on the first chapter. I was buoyed up with a feeling of empowerment when Dr. Phil was saying that if we grasp all 7 keys we will lose all our excess weight and keep it off. It is the second part of this statement that fills me with hope. We all know that we can lose weight, but is the keeping it off that seems almost impossible.
"So if you will do what I am about to set out for you, you will lose your unwanted weight and you will keep it off. If you don't, you won't. It's just that simple. Further, what you are about to do doesn't work some of the time, it works all of the time."
"It's about changing yourself from the inside out, so that being what is fit and healthy for you is as natural and as normal as breathing."
Jude, I didn't know that the first thread would be locked either. All of this stuff is "Greek" to me. But, if it makes you feel better, all of the comments about chapter one were lost in cyberspace when the website crashed. On the thread that was restarted, the discussion had nothing to do with chapter one.
Now it is time for chapter two. I'm almost done, and when I am, I will post my chapter two comments.
This chapter was so great, it will be hard for me not to quote every single word. I will try to limit my quotes to what really hit me where I live.
I wish every teenage girl with an eating disorder could hear these words: If you are judging your body against the media images of beautiful people who are touched up, airbrushed up, pushed up, and whatever elsed-up, you are not living in the real world.
I was just interrupted by my next-door neighbor (I call her my next-door nightmare) who came by to drop off brownies. She drives me nuts for a variety of reasons, and the last thing I need in my kitchen right now is my greatest weakness. Okay, back to Dr. Phil.
I have a terrible body image. This is what struck me about what Dr. Phil has to say: Once you start appreciating your body, trust me, you will begin to take much better care of yourself, and you will find that weight loss is so much easier because you are treating yourself with respect. One of the most powerful ways to attain a more positive body image is to have realistic expectations about what you can achieve and then to set realistic goals to achieve them.
My goals are: To lose 70 lbs. in the next 26 weeks and maintain that weight loss within 10 lbs. That breaks down to 2.5 lbs. a week. I understand that I will hit plateaus. These are points along the way at which your weight loss will slow down or appear to stop or taper off as your metabolism shifts to accommodate your new healthier size. This is only your body making physiological adjustments. It does not mean you have stopped losing weight. As long as you stay focused and action-oriented, you will bulldoze right over these plateaus.
I am making myself accountable to you...3fatchicks. All of you are so supportive, knowledgable, and more help than anyone else in my life.
Current weight, 1/16/04: 235 lbs.
Goal weight, 7/16/04: 165 lbs.
I didn't realize it'd be locked either, I tried to add a link to this new/continuation of the thread, but wasn't able to. My concern is, sometimes it's hard to find the new thread, so it helps if someone puts a link at the end of the OLD thread to the new one. Anyway, I found you, and now maybe I can get into the book again. I'm trying to re-read it, but as always, I never seem to have enough time. Will try to concentrate on Chapter 2 and catch up with you all....
Have a great weekend.
Oh, I'm on Atkins induction phase since 1/1/04 and i've lost 11 lbs. Very happy about that, but I had a drink last night and hoping that won't halt my efforts.
I am willing to try that too. I really need to sort myself out mentally before I do anything else. I am also starting yoga - the exercise is great but again I get kind of weirded out by the chakras and meditation and ohms and all that. one of my tapes tries to get you to keep saying " I am a Goddess" and I just feel so silly doing it! 
hmmm.... maybe this should be one of my mantras? 
Dr. Phil, Let's Start From The Beginning (again!) Chapter 2
Very happy about that, but I had a drink last night and hoping that won't halt my efforts.
