I have been coaching clients on weight loss for over 20 years.
When I began my practice in 2001, I counseled my clients on what I learned in my masters program at NYU: Calories, protein, fat and carbs.
It didn’t take me long to figure out that this is NOT what people needed for lasting weight loss.
Most people know what they ‘should be doing’ but their own minds work against them.
It’s the wired in limiting beliefs, habits, behaviors and self-sabotaging thinking that needs to change more than the food.
Emotional eating and overeating unhealthy food is the symptom of your old story around your relationship with food and your relationship with yourself.
How does this all connect to Weight Watchers?
Weight Watchers system has you believing that you can eat certain foods in unlimited quantities because they have ‘zero points’.
This isn’t helpful to your long-term success because:
#1- All foods have calories.
#2- This doesn’t teach you how to change your self-sabotaging thinking, habits and behaviors.
#3- The ability to eat unlimited amounts keeps you perpetuating the compulsive behavior of overeating more food than your body needs and way beyond your satiety.
#3 is a big one. Think about it. While you are counting your points you may think it’s OK to eat a whole bag of baby carrots because it has zero points.
But the truth is, who needs to eat a whole bag of carrots? This is an impulsive/compulsive behavior. I can pretty much guarantee that after 6-8 baby carrots you will no longer feel hunger in your belly.
Here is what you risk by perpetuating eating unlimited amounts of food, even if its healthy food:
One day when you are no longer counting your points, those baby carrots will turn into a whole bag of chips or cookies because you haven’t learned how to break the behavior of giving into the compulsion/emotion when you are triggered.
Weight Watchers or any other diet that doesn’t address changing your relationship with food and your relationship with yourself will keep you on the dieter’s rollercoaster.
On the news today, it was announced that Weight Watchers is getting into the diet drug business.
That doesn’t sound like a company that is looking out for your best interest for the long-term. They are looking out for their best interest. The quick fix will work for them and their bottom line, it has never and will never work for you.
If you struggle with losing weight or emotional eating and yo-yo dieting, you have to get clear on what’s driving you to want to eat when eating has nothing to do with being physically hungry…even if you are eating baby carrots.
The real work towards true transformation starts on the inside…it’s a connection between your head, your heart and your stomach.
To get to the root of what’s driving your emotional or habitual hunger, find out more about What Are You REALLY Hungry For and how it can help you create LASTING change from the inside out.
