When I read the article on How to Handle New Riches in the San Antonio Express-News last Friday, I thought that the concepts applied to the newly skinny too. Studies have shown that people who come into money quickly, usually lose it almost as fast and end up in worse financial condition. Scam artists show up in droves, ready to bilk them of their windfall. The newly rich often do not know how to handle a drastic life change.
Isn’t that the way it is with dieting too? Except in reverse, of course. People who lose a lot of weight and who are not emotionally prepared to be slender – that is, the emotional reasons underlying the weight gain are never addressed – will gain all the weight back and usually a few pounds more. Each and every one of my clients had one thing in common: they had lost a great deal of weight and had gained it back, not once but several times before they hired me. And, as it is with the lifestyle change for the newly rich, if the newly skinny are not confident with their new body, they, too, can easily fall prey to the attention of undesirable people. For several of my clients, that was the reason they had put the weight back on: to keep "predators" away.
So how does someone deal with being newly skinny? First and foremost, fall in love with your new body. Every chance you get, look at yourself, really look at yourself, in a full-length mirror, preferably in clothing that makes you feel attractive. If you feel guilty or shameful in any way, realize that guilt and shame are always gifts from someone else. We are not born with either of those feelings, and we cannot develop them on our own. The freedom from guilt and shame is through forgiveness: forgiveness of the person who gave us shame or guilt and forgiveness of ourselves for whatever event precipitated the feeling. The more confident we feel about our new body, the less likely we are to succumb to insincere flattery from potentially dangerous people. As the confidence within builds, the protective armor becomes unnecessary.
The very best way to lose large amounts of weight is s-l-o-w-l-y: no more than one to two pounds per week. In reality, it’s not the weight we need to lose; it’s the emotional pain and/or the childhood programming underlying the need to overeat that we need to shed. Once we release the emotional pain and/or rewrite our childhood programming, the weight comes off easily. Excess weight is a symptom, not a problem. Correct the problem and the symptom disappears almost like magic.
Which reminds me of a joke…a man goes to the doctor and says, “Doctor, every time I hit my elbow like this, it hurts.” The man has a small hammer and hits his elbow with it to show the doctor, and then he asks, “What can I do to make it stop hurting?” The doctor looks at him with a very serious and somber face, and says, “There is only one cure, Mr. Smith.” He pauses for full effect, and once he feels that he has Mr. Smith’s full attention, he says, “Don’t hit your elbow like that anymore.”
If every time you drink alcohol before eating, you overeat, don’t have the drink before eating. If every time your sister calls, you have an argument with her, and you devour a bag of M&Ms, don’t argue with her. If every time you push yourself to exhaustion, you eat a bag of cookies or an entire cake, don’t push yourself to exhaustion. The key is to find out what the triggers are, develop a healthy strategy for dealing with each of the issues, and use food as a friend, not as a punishment. I say “punishment,” because if what we do leads to misery, such as obesity and its associated diseases, I would call that punishment. Wouldn’t you? A friend would not have allowed you to gain all that weight. Let food be your best friend!
Somebody Stole Thanksgiving!
Where did November go? And what happened to Thanksgiving? It used to be celebrated between Halloween and Christmas, but now it seems that people are wearing Santa outfits to Halloween parties, goblins have been replaced by elves, candy handed out to trick-or-treaters is now wrapped in Christmas wrapping paper, and the only thing we’re thankful for is a day off from work. Keen marketers have stolen our holiday! There is no money to be made in being thankful, is there?
Not that long ago, Thanksgiving was a time to reflect on all that we are thankful for: a roof over our heads, food on the table, and love from our family. But the advertising on TV and the flyers in our newspapers, which are packed with sales for the latest and greatest, have left us with the feeling that we don’t have enough.
Like others, I got caught up in the frenzy for more stuff this year. I drooled over the Black Friday sales, and before I went to bed on Thanksgiving Day, I circled all the items I wanted to buy and set the alarm for 3:30 AM. The alarm did not ring, and I woke up late, feeling like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz when the hot air balloon left without her. Instead of rushing to get dressed and hope that some of the things I wanted were left, I poured a cup of coffee and sat in my living room looking out the window. That’s when it dawned on me: I had so much to be thankful for. At that moment, I realized that many of us have grown to believe if we had this TV or that handbag, we’d be happier. But we never are, not for long anyway.
Our eating habits have also lost Thanksgiving; we don’t take the time to reflect on what we eat and to give thanks for having food. We’ve super-sized our appetites, just like our shopping habits, but instead of being healthy and happy, we have become overweight and miserable. We are deep in debt for buying what we don’t need, and we are packed in unhealthy fat for eating more food than our bodies could use.
Perhaps it’s time to slow down and reflect on all that we have before we make another purchase, reflect on how many calories we’ve eaten before we take another bite, and reflect on the stress created by our burgeoning debt and bulging waistlines, neither of which adds to the quality of life.
Not that long ago, Thanksgiving was a time to reflect on all that we are thankful for: a roof over our heads, food on the table, and love from our family. But the advertising on TV and the flyers in our newspapers, which are packed with sales for the latest and greatest, have left us with the feeling that we don’t have enough.
Like others, I got caught up in the frenzy for more stuff this year. I drooled over the Black Friday sales, and before I went to bed on Thanksgiving Day, I circled all the items I wanted to buy and set the alarm for 3:30 AM. The alarm did not ring, and I woke up late, feeling like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz when the hot air balloon left without her. Instead of rushing to get dressed and hope that some of the things I wanted were left, I poured a cup of coffee and sat in my living room looking out the window. That’s when it dawned on me: I had so much to be thankful for. At that moment, I realized that many of us have grown to believe if we had this TV or that handbag, we’d be happier. But we never are, not for long anyway.
Our eating habits have also lost Thanksgiving; we don’t take the time to reflect on what we eat and to give thanks for having food. We’ve super-sized our appetites, just like our shopping habits, but instead of being healthy and happy, we have become overweight and miserable. We are deep in debt for buying what we don’t need, and we are packed in unhealthy fat for eating more food than our bodies could use.
Perhaps it’s time to slow down and reflect on all that we have before we make another purchase, reflect on how many calories we’ve eaten before we take another bite, and reflect on the stress created by our burgeoning debt and bulging waistlines, neither of which adds to the quality of life.
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