Don’t make weight loss the goal. Let it be a side effect of emotional healing.
We work to heal the self-hatred and the self-loathing, and be able to respond to that critical voice … so that weight loss does happen, but it happens as a side effect of the deeper, more emotional work that’s happening … because that’s what is really holding us back.
People call me and say they’d like to work with me to lose weight.
From that very first phone call I frame up the way we might work together on this issue, and it’s not often what potential clients expect.
We briefly explore why they’d like to lose weight. They often tell me they’d like to be a certain size or a certain weight or have shapely legs or sculpted abs.
I then ask why they’d like to achieve those physical goals.
The answers I get are very frequently filled with self-hatred, self-loathing, and self-criticism. I hear that they hate their bodies. They say they’ve had a weight problem their whole lives. Their answers are marked by the underlying belief that they’ll be better, happier, more worthy of love when they’re thinner, smaller, more attractive.
They’ve been attempting to use this thinking to motivate them to lose weight for years. (But, it doesn’t work.)
I then ask:
What would you be able to do – that you can’t do now – with this body you envision?
How would you feel, emotionally, and in your body, day-to-day, if you lost weight?
How would your life be different if you were to achieve this smaller body?
The answers to these questions provides motivation that works … because we make it not about weight loss, not directly at least. We make it about the life they want to live, the relationships they want to build and be around for, the accomplishments they want to achieve, and the way they’d like to feel.
And, when we flesh these answers out with powerful language and resonating imagery they really stick.
We work to heal the self-hatred and the self-loathing, and be able to respond to that critical voice … so that weight loss does happen, but it happens as a side effect of the deeper, more emotional work that’s happening … because that’s what is really holding us back.
Weight loss as a side effect rather than the goal
Accept that where you are today … is where you are today.
We create suffering for ourselves by wishing things were different when they cannot be.
If you’d like to lose weight, you’re not going to lose it today. Those pounds are going nowhere today.
Accept where you are today by recognizing that the state of your body can change … but it is not going to significantly change today.
Remove the judgment and negativity of your assessment of where you are today.
Work to view your current weight, the current state of your body, objectively. By objectively I mean without judgment, without negativity, simply observing what is.
You may be at an unhealthy weight. You may have physical illnesses or pain as a result of that extra weight. If so, these are facts. Can you observe these facts and not beat yourself up for them?
You may be unhappy with the physical appearance of your body. Can you acknowledge that you have cellulite – or stretch marks or fat stored around your middle, or (insert what you’ve labeled as an undesirable body part) – and simply observe it without it having to be bad?
Accepting where you are today is not inconsistent with setting goals.
Acceptance is not resignation. Nor is it defeat, or giving up.
It is an objective assessment of the current state of things and a recognition that, today, those things are factually true.
Acceptance doesn’t mean you’re settling for the way it is right now. It doesn’t mean you can’t set goals for things to be different in the future.
But, to achieve those goals, you’re going to start from an objective, non-judgmental reality-based place, not a negativity-fueled, ‘less than’ place.
Set goals based upon what you’d like to be able to do and how you’d like to live, rather than the size or weight you’d like to be.
Ok, so, you’ve assessed your body objectively and you’ve accepted, without judgment, your reality-based starting place.
Now, you can dream. From here,
where would you like to go?
how would you like to live?
how would you like to feel?
what can you not do now that you’d like to be able to do in future?
what limits would you like to remove from your life?
Answer these questions with as much detail as possible. Set a timer for 20 minutes and allow your imagination to run wild to flesh out your vision.
Don’t limit yourself. Dream, baby, dream.
(And, notice how what you generate is not focused on what you’d like to look like, but rather in accessing much more meaningful sources of motivation.)
Bolster your goals with motivating language and power-packed visualization.
Now, pick out the top three most meaningful dreams from your list.
And, label each of them with a catch phrase, a mantra, or an affirmation.
And, then visualize, creating images that, when you close your eyes, you can see clearly in your mind’s eye; and then going beyond imagery, engaging your senses to provide details for what it would be like to really be there (i.e., what would you also smell, hear, taste, and touch?)
How does this work in action? Let me give you an example:
I had a client who wanted to lose 50 pounds. She was disgusted with her body. She hated getting dressed in the morning. She hated packing for trips. She edited photos of herself before posting them to social media. She compared herself negatively to what others shared of their fitness routines, their parenting, their vacations … their very lives. She spoke so harshly – hatefully – to herself and truly felt she deserved it.
She began trying to notice, disengage from, and challenge her inner critic. She learned to talk herself through seeing her body as it was – not good, not bad, just objectively, non-judgmentally as it was.
She remembered a time when she was physically fit. She remembered how it felt – in her body, in her soul – to be able to give a workout her all, without holding back. She wanted to be able to climb mountains. She wanted to be able to run and play with her daughter without getting tired.
Dream.
Language.
Imagery.
01.
Dream: Enjoying exercise again
Language: No holding back
Imagery: Evoking the memory of a killer workout class she used to love and how she felt afterward
02.
Dream: Hiking in the National Parks
Language: I climb mountains
Imagery: The moment of summitting a mountain and seeing the view stretched out before her
03.
Dream: Running and playing with her daughter
Language: I’m an active mom
Imagery: Seeing herself running alongside her daughter with energy and zest
She lost 50 pounds. She returned to loving exercise. She became a super active mom, and she and her family began travelling and hiking in the National Parks.
And, she did it by learning to stop being critical of herself, to remove the judgment, to accept that she was starting from where she was starting from (because she was!), and to anchor her motivation in her vision for her life, and not about what was wrong with her and what needed to be changed.
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This blog post is offered for educational purposes only and should not be confused as therapy or psychological care.