Reality

REALITY

If I have spent decades gaining weight, wallowing in food addictions and persisting with bad habits, is it reasonable to believe that I can turn that all around in a couple of weeks?  Or that it will be easy?  And that I can do it and then go back to eating and living just like I always have?  If you watch all the promotional hype in ads and on TV selling shows, as they try to out shout each other, they would have you believe that their gimmick, potion, or surgery is a silver bullet.  Common sense suggests otherwise.

WHEN WORKING TO LOSE WEIGHT, WHAT YOU SHOULD EXPECT IF YOU ARE RATIONAL…AND SERIOUS:

1.       You are not defective or deficient if you have not succeeded before.  You can do just as well as me or anyone else who has succeeded.  You CAN do it, BUT:

2.       You must be willing to make REAL changes…and they must be sustainable.  If you go back to doing what you were doing, you will go back to getting what you were getting.

3.       Progress will be incremental.  You can make some changes in a few weeks, and subsequent change will take a few more.  If you persist, a year from now you will be doing much better than you are now---in two years much better still.

4.       During the first part of this process, you will have some setbacks, problems, discouragement, and dilemmas to figure out.

5.       These are real addictions and deeply ingrained bad habits we’re dealing with here.  Managing them at first will probably require some help in the form of training and accountability, motivation, and support…and some humility.

6.       You will have to give up some dearly defended and long held beliefs and traditions about food and eating.

7.       Your grandmother did not have access to the knowledge you have about anything.  In fact, her set of problems, which included how to keep a bunch of hard-working men and boys full on a very small budget while using mostly foods raised at home, was completely different from yours.  And so she wasn’t cooking for your family’s health.  She did miracles with the knowledge and resources she had.  The food you have access to is different.  Your family’s lifestyle is different.  Unless you want your family to be sick and obese, you must change fundamentally.