Hi, and welcome to the Mindful Shape Podcast. My name is Paula Parker, and I'm a life and weight loss coach. So today I have a really special episode for you. It's gonna explain exactly the things that get in our way when it comes to weight loss, and I'm really gonna break it down in terms of. How this presents, how this showing up for you and then exactly what to do about it.

And it may not be what you might think. And so I think this is gonna be a real gem. We'll see. It might be one of the best podcast episodes ever, but we'll just see how it goes. So let's talk about everything that's getting in your way when it comes to. Not only releasing the weight that you want, whether that's the last 10 pounds, or if you have bigger goals, like 60 pounds or something.

Or even if you might be okay with your weight, maybe there's just five pounds or so, but you just really want to heal your relationship with food. Wherever you are. This, all of this is gonna apply. Okay? So number one thing that I see with people is that they think they have tried everyth. . If you are someone who's thinking, I've tried everything and nothing works when it comes to releasing my weight, then we know that you have a lack of belief in yourself.

That's the underlying problem. So you might be saying to yourself, nothing works, and then you give up or you think you can't do it. The underlying problem is you don't believe in yourself. Okay? So that's what we would wanna work on. The solution here is really watching your thoughts like a. , because sometimes we have this, we've built this self-concept with all of these thoughts about ourselves based on all our past evidence, right?

So if you've tried lots of things your brain has now learned based on your past experience, oh, she's not good at this , right? When it comes to food, when it comes to releasing weight, just not very good at this area, and will forecast the same in your future. So that's the issue, is you're always looking to your past rather than decid.

on your future deciding, you know what? I am gonna do whatever it takes to figure this out. Of course, it's a thought error to think you've tried everything because you've, you've tried everything then you would to release the weight for those of us, and I'd say that the majority, , it's physically possible for you to release excess fat off your body.

So if that's you and you're thinking you've tried everything, just know that it's coming from a lack of belief in yourself. And that can be. . Okay. So of course the key is gonna be processing your feelings to address the underlying issues for why you are overeating in the first place. That's gonna be huge.

The next thing, and these are in no particular order by the way, these are just kind of what I jotted down in my chart. The next thing you might be thinking is that you need to exercise. or this might be showing up as you're over exercising after you overeat, so you're trying to compensate this.

Sometimes what you can be doing is you plan to exercise, but then you don't do it and then you feel really guilty, and then it kind of continues on some overeating or making not the best choices around food. or you might be thinking you are not exercising just because you're lazy. . Right. Which I hear a lot.

It's like, why didn't you exercise? Cuz I'm lazy. No . I just say I removed the word lazy. I just stopped using it. Now it's just rest. It's like I'm not lazy, I'm just resting . Right. So little reframe there for you. Okay, I'm, you can probably still hear, I am still congested, . I think this is two months now and I feel bad you're listening to the podcast.

Still two months of me being congested, but I don't know, just doesn't seem to be going away. . Okay. So of course the underlying problem to this exercise thing is that you are still thinking of calories and calories out, and that does work, but it's very nuanced, right? So exercise alone is not going to help you release fat.

So if you are still of the mindset of like oak, well, I can overeat because I had a really good hard workout, or I can overeat a little bit because I'm planning on going for like a two hour long run or something like that. You know, it's that old adage, you can never. out work a bad diet and I would totally agree with that.

Also, my own personal experience, , I've definitely been someone who's been very active, exercised a a lot, but I wasn't managing my relationship with food and so I just wanna clear that up for anybody who's still under the illusion that they can just work. Off a diet that's not optimizing fat loss.

You really wanna optimize fat loss with the food that you're choosing. So one of the solutions that you can do in terms of, well, how do I incorporate movement into my. Weight loss journey is really doing movement that you find is really enjoyable and has a net positive. So if there's something that you're doing that you just find really, you're just miserable when you're doing it, it's likely not having a net positive effect on your life.

So what I would recommend is instead of looking at exercises, something that you are doing as like to compensate for calories or doing because you just want to build muscle or something. Choose something that you find enjoyable until you get all of the weight off. Once you release the weight, then there might be an area where you want to do a lot of thought work and put a lot of emphasis on in terms of your self coaching to get yourself to do the kind of weight lifting or the exercise that maybe doesn't come as enjoyable to you.

Okay. I did a whole episode on exercise so you can do a little search and find that. The next one is you. Want you might have the best intentions to do some sort of daily thought work. I call this the daily 15. Other people call it morning pages or just daily journaling, checking in. I know when I'm talking to clients and I ask, you know, what are the structures that are working for them?

Oftentimes this can be one of the things that either A, they're finding it's great, it's really helping them because they're doing it, or B, it's something that they're not doing, and they wish that they. and the underlying problem here is usually a lack, again, lack of belief that it's gonna do anything, or a lack of commitment.

So you haven't yet committed to the process of taking a look at how your thoughts and feelings are creating your results. That's the whole reason why we do thought work on paper or why you want to explore what's going on on the inside of your brain. You might be thinking, I'm too busy. It maybe doesn't have that much of an impact.

It's not for me or, or again, I'm too lazy or I'm just too tired. If that's coming up for you, a solution here is really simple. You wanna just get clear on your reasons for doing it. And if you're not so sure, then you might wanna just decide, okay, I'm gonna do it for a short period of time, and then just see what effect it has.

And if it's not serving you, then you find something else that is. But I suspect that if you really give it a honest effort, you will see the impact. On your weight loss for one, but also just on your mental health and you will wanna continue doing it. So decide on a minimum baseline and by that it just means something that you feel is achievable.

So for me, I like 15 minutes a day, but you might like, you know, 10 minutes. twice a week, whatever it is for you. Pick something that you feel like is achievable and then just do that. And you don't have to do a minute more and see what happens. And then another big thing is just knowing that you're not always gonna wanna feel like doing it.

Some days you're gonna sit down and you're gonna be like, I have nothing to write about. You just write about that . You just write down that, I really don't wanna do this. I'm feeling so much resistance. You just write that. It's just about developing the habit and developing that relationship with your.

Okay, next one is cravings, especially sugar cravings. So if you are having sugar cravings, you might just be thinking, I have a sweet tooth. Or you might be thinking, well, this comes from my family. Everyone in my family, we love sweets, that kind of thing. But I would suspect that the real issue is some level of insulin resistance, and that's why you're craving sugar.

You only crave sugar when you have sugar on a regular basis. So if you're craving. you wanna take a look at, just do an inventory. How often am I having sugar? And it might be even things of like dried fruit that can also be considered sugar, right? Because it's so intense. Or, or fruit juices, that kind of thing.

And so, of course the solution there is to create a protocol for yourself that will really help to manage your insulin. So that, , you are reducing the amount of sugar that's coming in and allowing your body to balance those hormones so that you stop craving sugar. Pretty straightforward there. If you wanna reduce sugar cravings, you must reduce the sugar.

No two ways about it. Another one is a problem that you might be facing is that you're trying new plans all the time, so you're never sticking to one thing. So your friend says this and you're like, oh, that's a good idea. I'll do this. Then you're, you read about Whole 30 and you're like, okay, I'm gonna do Whole 30, but then you never stick to anything.

So some of these will come along, these new plans and you'll try them on and they'll work for you and it's great. But if you're kind of like one of those people that you start something and then it's like shiny object syndrome, and then you're like, oh, I don't think this is gonna work. And you have lots of doubt.

And then you're looking at new diets or you're. Contemplating this or that, or constantly doing research. This is for my over researchers. Okay, . So you keep turning to action, hoping that you won't feel the discomfort of the plan that you're on because any plan that you're on, most likely, if you stick with it, it will work.

But what we try to do is we try to find just a new plan where we won't feel any deprivation, where we won't feel any confusion or any overwhelm, but of course we're creating that with our thoughts. And so the real issue here is that you are just trying to avoid discomfort, either physical from being hungry or going through sugar or flour, withdrawal, that kind of thing, and or.

So any kind of plan that you're on, usually it's just gonna mean not overeating. So many times we're overeating because we're not listening to true physical hunger, and instead we're eating for so many other emotional reasons. Most likely, any plan that you choose is not gonna allow for that, right? If it's gonna be a weight loss plan.

And so instead of dealing with that, what we often will do is just want think, oh, this plan doesn't work. I'm gonna try a new plan. Okay? So just be onto your brain if that's what's happening. So the solution here is really choose a protocol that's sustainable over the long term. Now I, in my program, I do allow for adjustments, right?

So if you've been doing something for a little while, you've been following it 90% and you're not getting the results that you want, then of course you wanna take a look and be very honest. And if you've been following it 90% of the time, then yeah, you might wanna make some adjustments that are temporary.

That's very d. Than saying, okay, I'm gonna try this new really restrictive diet until I lose the weight, and then, and then I'm gonna figure out another way to keep the weight off. What I'm talking about here is learning how to make decisions and making fine tuning your protocol. In ways that are sustainable over time.

So you might make a tweak where you just are making a tweak for a couple of weeks just to allow your body to release some fat. But the reasons that you're doing it and the emotions that are driving it are gonna be very different than kind of like out of confusion or overwhelm or like a desperation of really wanting to get the fat off and not knowing what you will do on the other side of it.

I hope that kind of explains that a little bit. and then any protocol that you choose. As I mentioned, there's gonna be some discomfort that comes up around urges around other people eating things that maybe are not on your protocol or eating at different times where other people are eating when you're actually not that hungry, that kind of thing.

And then it's about managing that discomfort. Okay. Another thing that will present in terms of things that are getting in your way is avoiding the. So I do encourage you to weigh yourself on a daily basis only because then we really get to see, one is your protocol working, and two, what's coming up for you in terms of mind drama.

So if you're weighing yourself once a week or something like that, then you're not gonna have a really clear indication of what's going on with your body because there are daily fluctuations that's gonna be based. How much how hydrated you are, how much sodium you've had, what's going on with your digestion.

If you've tried any new medications lately, if you've been traveling, a lot of times people, if they're on an airplane, that will affect this number on the scale. The next day has nothing to do with fat gain or fat loss. It's just the impact of being on a plane, how many carbohydrates you've been having in the days prior.

Your body will just really hold onto water if you've had a high car meal, that kind of thing. . And then lastly, I have a client who really, this, the number on the scale is really affected by her sleep. So if she doesn't have a good night's sleep, then she knows the next morning the number's gonna be up. It has nothing to do with fat gain, it's likely inflammation, but that's just a pattern that she can see because she's been weighing herself every day.

So when you weigh yourself every day, then you start to see these patterns and you know how your body works. It's really valuable information. and if you're having a really hard time getting on the scale, , then you will know that you're not having your own back. You know that there's some thought work to do.

There might be a lack of self-compassion. You're not managing your mind around the scale, or you're making it mean that you either, like, it's like a punishment. So you're making it mean something about the past, like you did wrong, or you haven't been sticking to what you said, or you're gonna make it mean something bad about.

Or you're gonna make it mean something bad about the future, so I'm never gonna get there. This always happens to me. All of that. You really want to look at it as data and watch again, watch your thoughts like a hawk when it comes to the scale. And I like to think you decide ahead of time that you won't make that number mean anything about you other.

that's interesting information. What does, what can it tell me? First, you wanna go through, okay, well, have I been traveling? What's my sleep, water? All of that to give you some information of, okay, why is this number, this number? And then secondly, maybe you do have to make a change to your protocol, but it's gonna be totally fine if you feel resourced.

If you don't feel resourced and you're stuck in that it's about me, I'm not good enough, or you're having lots of feelings of shame. Of course you're not gonna get on the scale, and then you're less likely to know what's going on with your body, right? You're less likely to be in touch, and you also miss an opportunity to really heal that relationship with yourself and have your own back.

So the solution here is just prep your mindset beforehand and afterward, watch your thoughts. So I like to think there is no number on that scale that. Create a feeling in me without my permission. I've just decided it was like one decision, and you can make that right now in this moment that no matter what the scale says, you are not gonna feel bad about it.

You just can decide that , it's kind of amazing. And then because you know, well, okay, this is giving me some information and I can make different. , okay. Doesn't mean anything about you or your future. So you wanna correct all those thought errors about what you're making it mean. Okay? Let's talk about mindless eating.

Mindless eating can happen anytime, but often this happens when people are cooking dinner and they're just kind of nibbling away at things. This is really caused by a lack of awareness. But you might be thinking, well, this is just how I am, or I always do this, like I'm in a habit and. Stop. Or maybe you're thinking, well, it doesn't really make that much of a difference.

I just nimble here and there and it doesn't make that much of a difference for my fat loss. But of course, that really could be making a difference, right? Because it adds up over time. So the solution here, one, is just, just decide. that there's no snacking, there's no snacking. While you're cooking dinner, there's no snacking in between meals.

Second is you do some sort of food journaling and now a lot of people can have resistance to food journaling, but I say do it if it serves you. You might wanna do it for a short term just to provide that awareness. So use it as an awareness tool, even if it's short term and not something you're gonna do for the rest of your life.

And then of course, protocol planning. So making decisions ahead of time in terms of how many meals you're gonna have and, and if you're going to allow for snacks and when you would allow them. An exception I have is if, say I get two 10 on the hunger scale, and I'm extremely ravenous when I get home and I still wanna make dinner, what I will do is have a planned snack.

So I'll just have something that's like a go-to grab some walnuts or something that's just gonna tide me over while I'm make dinner so that I'm not making, or sorry, I'm not eating what I'm making the entire time, so that when dinner is ready to be served, I'm actually already. , right? Nobody wants that.

You don't enjoy your dinner. So this is kind of a all encompassing one, but of course it's eating off your plan, eating off your protocol. There's lots of nuances here, but in general, you're gonna be probably thinking. , I have no willpower, or you're gonna fall into the diet starts tomorrow mentality.

What you're really thinking is, food will help in this situation. I'm too tired, I'm stressed, whatever I just need to eat. And this kind of falls into that screw up mentality. That's where this can show up. So of course, what's really happening is you're indulging in your emotions rather than processing them.

Really common ones that might show be showing up for you if you're overeating or self-pity. Entitlement. Like entitlement, like I should just be able to eat whatever I want. That kind of thing. Or she eats this, I should be able to eat it. Or rebellion. It's a huge one. Blame deprivation, or it might not be that intense emotionally, you might just not be paying attention to your hunger levels or how hungry you are.

Or you might notice that you're not that hungry, but then you're not honoring your body, you're just ignoring your body and you're just eating. over top of not being that hungry . Okay, so of course the solution here first is process your emotion instead of eating over it. And then second protocol planning.

So you wanna make decisions ahead of time. How hungry are you gonna allow your body to be before you eat? And then following through on that, which of course it's a bigger conversation. But for this episode, I just really wanted to give you almost like a bullet point, notes on, you know, what's the problem?

How does it show up and what's the solution? Okay. Another one is all in on your plan or all off. So I know this is a big one for many of us, and it's the idea that like, I'll just overeat now and I'll start fresh tomorrow. , this is very much diet mentality and what happens is you never actually start on solving for your over desire around food, which is created by constantly getting in that pattern of turning to food to solve emotional, emotional problem.

And you never get the opportunity to really practice processing emotion. So I want you to imagine it's like Sunday night and maybe you're a little bit tired and maybe you're a little bit stressed. The upcoming week and you haven't really eaten completely onto your plan, so you're kind of already going into that all or nothing, and then you're thinking, ah, screw it.

Right? I'm just going to, tomorrow's Monday. It's a fresh start, so I'm just going to overeat now and let it slide. It's not gonna be that big of a deal. What happens is that you are never, it's, you're missing such an opportunity on practicing processing that emotion in that moment. So, one, you're not changing the thought, which means you will likely have that same thought.

Over and over and over again cuz your brain is getting so used to thinking it. And then secondly, you again, as I mentioned, you miss an opportunity to really process whatever would come up for you if you said, okay, I know it's Sunday night and I know I'm really having this desire to overeat, but I'm not going to

What comes up for you? Then that's the emotion that you wanna. That's part of the solution, but really it's to correct your thought. Errors of thinking, it won't matter. I can start again tomorrow. And really starting to adopt the belief that every bite is a new, fresh start. Every bite is a new decision.

That can be really helpful in starting to reframe any kind of overeating, which is my next point. Overeating at. So this really is just eating past satiation. So I like to think of it in terms of satiation percentage. So if you imagine a hundred percent satiation is like maxed, like you're super, super oval full.

It's the fullest you've ever been. We're not going there usually anytime because we don't wanna feel that way in our body, but especially if we're trying to release weight. What you're really doing here when you're overeating at meals is just eating past that satiation percentage where you feel at your best, and then what you might be thinking is the reason you're doing it is because, one, the food just tastes too good.

it's like too good to pass up and you just want to keep continuing to eat. Other thing is that you sometimes will do this to prevent future hunger. I hear this so often we overeat at meals because we're thinking, well, I'm working or I'm gonna be doing something for four to five hours or six hours and I don't wanna get hungry.

Another thing you might be thinking is that once you start, like once you open that bag, you can't. and it's like once you start that train, you just can't get it off the track. The solution to all of that is one. Just deciding that you are going to as much as you can, really pay attention to your satiation level as you are eating right.

This takes dedication. It takes practice, especially in the beginning. If you're not used to it, then it will become second nature. But in the beginning, yeah, it's gonna require you to pay some attention at every meal to how the food is feeling in your body. And then that goes without saying you're gonna wanna plan what that's gonna be ahead of time.

So in terms. what your satiation percentage is. I really encourage you to plan that ahead of time. Think about it beforehand. The other thing I just wanted to mention, which I just learned and actually makes sense based on my own experience, is you could have some leptin resistance if you are somebody who is eating at a meal.

and you eat what you could consider is like a proper balanced meal and you just feel like you can't stop eating . You're like, you finish lunch and you're like, I could just do lunch over again. Like I could have two or three lunches if this is you. It could be some leptin resistance and a solution to that is reducing or removing fruit.

So I know that's kind of an interesting one, but fruit can really interrupt your leptins, so you might wanna. Just going without fruit for 21 days or so, just as a temporary reset to your leptin and see if that helps. So if you try that, please let me know cause I would really love to hear that. Okay.

Of course, if you're eating because you don't wanna get hungry later on, then what we really need to do is not overeat, but to solve for that fear of hunger. And that's again, another podcast episode. But really wanna take a look at why is feeling hunger So, , what are your thoughts about it right now that, that are creating all of that fear for you because, , we can think about hunger in a very different way.

It's a physical sensation. It's a communication tool from our body. It does not need to be answered with food. It could be answered with the excess fat that you have on your body. And then lastly, and I mentioned this before, but it's worth repeating. You can think even while you're eating. Every bite is a new decision.

I can stop at any time. Okay. There's a fresh start at. Okay. I only have one more, and that is so common. It's that it's not happening fast enough or, yes, I'm seeing progress, but that progress is too slow. , you know that this is coming up for you. One, if you're just saying that to yourself out loud or in your journal, or if you're really starting to consider some heavy restriction or crash diets or some kind of gimmicky weight loss stuff, right?

That could be happening. Or you are going the opposite way and you're just give up and you're just like, screw it. I'm done with this. I'm gonna give up this. The body I'm stuck with and I'm not gonna try anything else. Right. And it's like, feels very heavy and very negative. Or you could be following through on whatever protocol you have, but the whole time you're doing it with like , kind of like simmering under the surface.

You're doing it with some resentment. and or some self pity. So if that's the energy with which you're doing your action, you're gonna have a different result. That's just how our brain works. So the real problem here is of course, your thoughts that are creating impatience. So we want to, of course, figure out how to relate to our body, relate to ourselves, and relate to our weight loss journey in a way that won't create so much.

I. Another thing is just lack of belief in your result. So if you knew that, say one year from now, you would be at your goal weight. If you really a hundred percent believed that you knew it was possible, you knew you would do whatever it took to get there, and that it was possible for you, that you could resource yourself, that you could follow through, that you could learn how to follow through, then you wouldn't be so much in a.

because you would be knowing this is definitely happening for me. So if you're very impatient, it could be because you are not a hundred percent there in your belief, what will it require for you to get there? That's what you wanna be thinking about. That's what you wanna figure out and do some self-coaching on.

The other thing is you, you're gonna be thinking, if you're really impatient about getting there, it's, you might be under the illusion that it's gonna be so much better when you get there. That when you get there, you're gonna have zero desire for all the foods that you have now. You're never gonna wanna emotionally eat.

It's just gonna be like rainbows and daisies over there. So, of course you wanna get out of the pain of today so that you can be there in like the heaven of tomorrow. Of course, that's false. It's not gonna be heaven. It's gonna be. It's gonna be better in some ways. I've talked about this in my last episode, but it's not gonna be better in other ways.

So what is the solution here? I want you to write down what you think will be better. Let's say when you get to your goal weight, what will be better truly for you? What will be the same as it is now and what will be worse? Because there might be things that will be worse and you wanna write those down?

Well, people will be making comments. How is that gonna make you feel? What about when you. See somebody that you haven't seen for a really long time. Are you gonna feel really self-conscious? Are you gonna feel amazing? Is that gonna be better or gonna be worse? I want you to be thinking about this ahead of time so that you're just a little bit more realistic and less likely to be in the delusion that it's gonna be so, so much better when you get there, because of course you're still gonna be human.

You're still having the fall human emotional experience. Another thought that you can think on purpose is you just decide that it will take as long as. That you will just stick it out for yourself for as long as it takes. And then the other thing I encourage you to do is just look at the data as a scientist, whether the data is.

Your food journal or just the number on the scale you wanna be looking at, what are the results that you're getting? But look at it like a scientist, like as if you were looking at somebody else's progress. not your own, right? Because when it's your own, you're gonna have lots of stories. You're gonna have lots of stories about it.

But I want you to imagine you are looking at somebody else's as if I was looking at it. what I might be thinking, I might be thinking, oh, maybe we need to make an adjustment here. You'll be able to reflect with more honesty and tenderness when you're removing it from your own story. So maybe there is an adjustment that you wanna try.

For the next two weeks just to see if that makes a difference. And then of course, you want to be doing, and I talked about this just in a second ago, the future self work. So thinking that it's gonna be so much better over there. Just just do that work in terms of what will it be like when I'm there? How can I ensure that I'm taking care of my future self?

Now do all of that , if you are thinking progress is too slow. It's not happening fast. . If you're thinking that, just know one, you're being a little impatient and you can change that. Or you can just hold space for yourself Feeling impatient. . I also think that's an option. If you're like, that's a lot of thought work.

I'm not really there yet, then it's okay. It's okay to feel impatient sometimes when you really want something and you don't have it, then it's just an opportunity to hold space for yourself and be really kind and nurture yourself while you go through this process cuz of. When it comes to releasing weight, it's a physical process.

The number on the scale is the last thing to change. In the meantime, it's gonna be what's happening up in your mind, happens up in your mind first. Then you take those actions and then the biological process happens with your body, but it's a physical process. You actually breathe out. You're fat , right?

And so that's a process and it can take some time. And so we wanna allow for that. . Okay, so no recap today. I just give you kind of bullet point podcast episode there on problems, how it shows up for you and real solutions. So I hope you were able to maybe identify one or a few or maybe all of those problems that are getting in your way of releasing weight and maybe give you a little insight.

What the real solution could be for you so that you can implement it and you can reach whatever weight that you wanna reach because I am rooting for you and I will talk to you again soon. Okay. Bye.