Been wishing you could squeeze into that little black dress? If so, read on.
A couple of years ago I had slid up past 190 — not obese on a 5’10” frame, but definitely chunky, not petite. I put myself on a diet and dropped to 170. Lately the numbers on the scale have started to creep up again. Also, I have an extra incentive now, so I’m going back on the diet, aiming straight at 160 this time. I can tell you in two words how to lose weight. And unlike a fancy celebrity diet, this method is guaranteed to work.
Eat less.
The only way you’re ever going to lose a single pound is if you’re taking in fewer nutrients than your body needs. Your body has been storing up soft, jiggly layers of extra nutrition in case of an emergency. Now you need to get your metabolism to start using up some of the lard in the larder.
This is so simple and obvious that it’s shocking that anybody could ever make a nickel marketing diet plans. The reason diet plans sell, I’m pretty sure, is because people have an emotional relationship with their food. They don’t just want to lose weight — they want to lose weight while not disrupting their special relationship with what they’re eating. They want to keep on stuffing their feelings by gorging.
I have a close personal relationship with chocolate chip cookies, so I know what I’m talking about.
What happens, when you stop eating so much, is that all sorts of buried emotions come bubbling to the surface. You may feel anxious, irritable, weepy, angry, bored, impatient, whatever. Your normal strategy for dealing with those emotions is, you munch on something. After a snack or a rich, gooey dessert, the feeling subsides.
So here’s a second component in Jenna’s Fabulous Guaranteed Weight-Loss Diet: Learn to sit quietly with your emotions. If necessary (and it may well be necessary), learn some new strategies for dealing with whatever life challenges are triggering those emotions. That might mean developing better communications with a partner, for instance. I can’t tell you what it may mean in your case, but I’m pretty sure you’ll find out, if you sit quietly.
Next tip: Learn to embrace hunger as a good thing. I don’t mean being ravenous all the time. Please don’t starve yourself. What I mean is, if I’m feeling hungry in the morning, or late in the evening, I’ve learned to say to myself, “Oh, good! I’m hungry — that’s fantastic. Today I’m going to lose a pound.”
Don’t disrupt your meals, but eat smaller portions. And no desserts whatsoever, and no between-meal snacks either. If the pounds still aren’t sliding away, you might consider skipping one meal during the day, a couple of times a week — no more often than that.
My bathroom scale (a digital model) isn’t very accurate, so looking at my weight change or lack of it on a day-to-day basis can be discouraging. What I do is, I keep a spreadsheet on the desktop in my computer. I enter my weight every morning, and then at the end of a week I do a weekly average. It’s the weekly average that I care about. I want to see that drop by at least a pound every week.
Exercise is good too. This time I’m planning to boost my aerobics. But exercise by itself, without dieting, is worse than useless. If you burn calories by exercising, your body will quietly ask, “Can I have an extra helping, please?” And you’ll think, “Oh, hey, I got plenty of exercise today. An extra helping won’t hurt anything.” And then a month later you’ll be feeling discouraged because you got all that extra exercise and you gained three pounds! And we all know how to deal with deep feelings of discouragement: ice cream.
And here’s a final tip: Promise yourself a reward. Something that’s truly meaningful to you, and a little extravagant (but not something you can eat!). Maybe a trip to Hawaii, or a string of pearls to go with that LBD. When you reach your goal, give yourself the reward. You’ve earned it!
Eat less. Embrace hunger. Sit with the feelings. Track your weight. Give yourself an extra incentive. Nothing complicated about it, except actually doing it.
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