What’s Wrong With This Picture?

Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash

You have to look with a critical eye.

Here are some subject line samples from emails that I have recently gotten:

• What to order at McDonalds.

• Crispy pizza rolls.

• Tasty solutions to stress eating.

How about these subject lines instead:

• How to identify self sabotage.

• How to work through food urges.

• Why journaling about your feelings will help you lose weight.

• Beware thoughts or actions that start with: need to, have to, or should.

It is so much easier to find low calorie substitutions for yummy foods than it is to ask ourselves why we overeat every weekend. It is much simpler to cut portions than to listen for our own harsh voices. Ordering a salad at McDonald’s is more straightforward than understanding why we have been supersizing our meals there for years.

How about an approach to weight loss that helps people change what they eat and gives them tools to examine how they are thinking too?  Here are a few things to start with:

• Understand why it's important to eat more vegetables AND also journal every single time you have an urge. Identify what triggered the urge, find adjectives to describe how you feel, note how long it lasted. Were you able to you sit through it? If yes, why? If not, why not?

• Control your portions AND examine why weekends are so hard. What are you escaping from or relieving? What does the weekend represent? What void is food filling for you? It is your definition of fun, relaxation, family time? What else could fill those needs?

• Plan your meals AND ask yourself how to make that plan as easy to execute as possible. Have you planned only “diet” food? Is your plan realistic? Does your plan include any foods you love? What obstacles could come up? How will you handle them?

We hear it all the time - it is not about the food. But it is SOOO much easier to make it about what we are eating or our lack of exercise than it is to examine how we are thinking. Although changing how and what we eat can be really difficult, it is far easier than examining the reasons that food has become our go to coping mechanism.

Maybe one of the prompts I listed above resonates with you. Write about it. Revisit often. Pay attention to what you learn.