Losing weight: The easy way and the impossible way.

First things first.

Image: Cherries, Lawrence Alma-Tadema. Public domain.

Hi all. I really hope you are well.

Last week I said we would get back to the subjects of weight and eating. I'll start by reminding us (yep, me included) that good people can care about the world and their health at the same time. And that now is always a good time to take ourselves seriously.

As you know, I write way more about changing our habits than I write about changing our bodies. 

That's for a few reasons, but the main one is that when we separate these two related concerns—overeating and losing weight—it makes each of them 1,000x easier to take on. And the order in which we address these two issues matters. A lot.

If you start with the goal of losing weight, you'll probably do what almost everyone does, and attempt some form of dieting, or restriction. According to science, dieting doesn't do what it's supposed to do. Turns out, dieting is an excellent way to gain weight. This is true for 98+% of people who go on diets. 

That's not all. Besides causing weight gain, dieting reinforces a big snarl of habitual thinking about food. In other words, obsession. 

Obsessing about food you can't have is not known to lead to weight loss, or a nice life. It leads to preoccupation and constriction and conflict and resistance and we all know what happens next: unbearable tension builds, something (the news, towels on the floor) causes us to snap, we're damned if we're gonna starve one more minute, and ... The End. Giant binge. 

But wait! It's not the end, because what comes next is the cycle starts up again: Shame, self-hate and a vow to do better. This is the last time we fall down like some kind of baby or something. We're a badass! We're recommitting to a new and better diet, dammit!!! <— and THERE IT IS. 

RIGHT THERE, don't we feel FANTASTIC? Full of energy and promise? Oh, we do.

And the great feeling lasts...well, it's variable, but we can say: NOT LONG. The cycle keeps grinding on. 

We think we can end the cycle with a diet, with staying on a diet, with the guaranteed (don't read the fine print) weight loss the diet will bring, and for all but less than 2% of us, this is just wrong.

The cycle doesn't end with weight loss and skinny ever after. The cycle only ends after a binge. But THIS IS THE PRECISE POINT where we can take control back (and also get our self-respect back at the same time). 

It can be hard, after an eating frenzy (large or small) not to wallow in some shame and self-hate. But you know what's easy? Saying "I'm not going to indulge in another #%*$ing diet" <— right there is the EASIEST, FASTEST, MOST POWERFUL place to jump off the merry-go-round.

If you decide to address weight issues first, which a lot of people do because the overculture applies a TON of pressure on us to prioritize our size, you'll probably stay on that merry-go-round. You'll do all the things that reinforce the diet-binge cycle. 

It's really almost impossible to get free of disordered eating if weight is your top priority.

But if you decide to address eating concerns first, you can take that snarl of obsessive thinking and undo it with the incredibly simple and pleasurable act of eating meals (of your own choosing on a flexible schedule that you design).

Then you can recycle all those weight-obsessed nerves into some creative machinery that will help you eat differently (maybe tomorrow, maybe later: up to you), address your weight, and fix any other damn problem in your life.

And it doesn't take long. I've seen women get control of their eating in a day. It's not unusual!

Do they eat like Gwyneth on Day One? THEY DO NOT because no need! "Clean" eating isn't required to dissolve a habit of bingey eating. Perfection (which isn't our goal; isn't even a thing) is very relevant to diet culture. It's totally irrelevant to habit change. Perfection is Enemy Number One of habit change. 

And we don't need to eat perfectly to lose weight, either.

So that makes this another reason, if you are struggling with food, weight and eating, to stop dieting today. Stop thinking of diets as the solution to weight loss. They never were. 

If you need help with your eating, here's a smart easy lightweight tool you can use to get yourself sorted. The current price is stupid low. It won't stay that way forever.‡ 

If your eating is basically under control, and you've got the energy and clarity to tackle your weight (should that be a concern), hit Reply and let me know what your chief issues are. We're going to dive in together.

Okay, that is the week. THANK YOU for reading 💛

‡ My method gives you a way to get your food and eating together quickly. You can stop dieting, start eating normally and do both almost instantly because you do not have to do any of the 1,000 things that other people will tell you are essential, like: go through therapy, learn to process emotions, learn what hunger and fullness feel like, catalogue and avoid your triggers, forgive anyone including yourself, take up meditation, quit taking medication, break up with anyone, take up with anyone, stop drinking or using drugs, go public with your problems or solutions, or anything else.

Obviously some of these things might be appealing to you. DO ANYTHING you (and your qualified advisors) feel is right. But none of these things needs to be complete and checked off your list before you can transform your eating.

This is pretty great! Because it means you can get an astounding upgrade in headspace and self-respect on Day One. You don't have to wait for the scale to move to feel 1000x better about yourself.

Details here.