Achieve Your New Year’s Weight Resolutions
Millions of Americans make New Year’s resolutions to lose weight, but most will give up a few days, weeks or months later. Despite good intentions, few will have lost weight and, of those who did, few will keep the weight off.
Nevertheless, 15 percent to 35 percent of Americans are battling their weight at any given time during the year.
This battle is waged through low-calorie and low-fat foods, artificial sweeteners, skipping desserts and commercial weight-loss centers, which require that you buy their prepared meals.
Other will exercise, visit "fat farms," take diet pills, or turn to surgery, such as liposuction, to shed the pounds.
In the 1960s, amphetamines and thyroxine were popular diet fads, and more recently Olestra, fenfluramine and phentermine (fen-phen) have become well known.
All of the fads tout the same goal -- to be slim, fit, and forever young.
Many people get caught in an endless cycle of losing weight and regaining it shortly thereafter. The amount of money spent each year to facilitate this cycle is estimated at $30 to $50 billion.
Further, failed attempts to lose weight often bring with them guilt and self-hatred. Prejudices toward overweight people run rampant and are often shared by the overweight themselves, who may view themselves as lazy, undisciplined or self-indulgent.
Efforts to lose weight are a common phenomenon in the general population;
however, among adolescent girls and young women they are almost universal. Many girls in middle school, high school and college, who are far from overweight, believe they are obese and often adopt bizarre diets, starve themselves, take laxatives, or binge and purge.
Among this population, anorexia and bulimia are epidemics, dangerous ones at that, as mortality rates are as high as 20 percent. Many girls are well aware of the hazards of these practices but would rather risk death than not reach their ideal of extreme thinness.
Why is it that people have such a hard time losing weight, despite the societal pressures, the urging of their doctors, and the investment of staggering amounts of time, energy and money?
The old view that body weight is a result of intake of calories verses expenditure of energy, has given way to a much more complex formulation involving a fairly stable set point for a person's weight that is resistant over short periods to either gain or loss, but that may move with age.
According to this concept, we all have a set point of weight. Changes in feedback mechanisms under the control of the central nervous system alter both appetite and metabolism to defend the set point and prevent large fluctuations in weight. The set point can be overridden, for example large losses can be induced by severe calorie restriction in conjunction with vigorous, sustained exercise, but when these extreme measures are discontinued, body weight generally returns to its preexisting level.
Hereditary factors play an important part in a person's weight, as shown by studies with twins, and likely influence the slow change in the set point of weight that occurs over a life span.
New England Journal Medicine January 1, 1998;338:52-54
Dr. Mercola's Comment
It's hard not to get the resolution urge on New Year's Eve. There's that sense of renewal, of rebirth, and the guilty awareness that you ate your own weight in chocolate during the holidays.
Sure, last year's resolutions didn't make it past the fifth of January, but hey, this year's going to be different, right? Most of us don't have a clue how to make a reasonable resolution, which is why most of us fail to keep the ones we make.
We set high goals for ourselves, and then wonder why we never attain them. So we either stop setting goals (never a good choice), or make resolutions that are ridiculously easy to keep.
A few months ago the new figures from the CDC were released, and we learned that two out of three Americans are overweight. There are many factors that contribute to this, and as I have addressed these in past editions of this newsletter, the information is available on Mercola.com by using our powerful "search" feature.
But in short, the future health of our country undoubtedly depends upon healthier eating. Most people who are obese are not happy about it and would like to return to a healthy weight. They know about the potential health implications but often receive incorrect information from medical "experts."
The good news is that overweight and obesity are nearly universally preventable by following my nutrition plan, exercising, and addressing emotional stresses. Quite simply, you need to replace grain carbohydrates with vegetable greens.
Adjusting your diet for your Metabolic Type is also an essential element to successful long-term weight loss.
However there is a basic physiological truth of life that you can use to your advantage to help you achieve your New Year’s resolution for weight loss or for ANY other goal that you have.
The principle is that whatever you focus your attention on you tend to manifest in your life.
So simply writing down your New Year’s resolution is a significant step in the right direction.
However, stating the resolution twice a day while looking deeply into your eyes in the mirror will radically improve your likelihood of achieving your goal.
But if you really want to make sure you achieve your goal, I would strongly advise you to use psychological acupressure techniques like EFT. The "magic" about EFT is that when you tap for your goals, most of us will come up with a reason why we can’t achieve it.
This self-limiting belief is sabotaging our efforts to achieve it. The beauty of EFT is that you can tap on this negative self-limiting belief and help transform it so it is not serving as a roadblock to your success.
I know many of you have not read the free EFT manual yet. But, if the holiday season has allowed you some spare time, I encourage you to give it a try. For some, the technique may sound a bit odd at first, but it is also relatively simple; the results, meanwhile, have left many of the loudest naysayers quite convinced!
I updated the manual recently so it is much easier to use. If you already understand the tapping points you can go directly to the EFT Affirmation Page.
To conclude, you will definitely have a great advantage on your New Year's resolutions this year if you approach them with a conscious strategy like EFT.
mercola.com
Nevertheless, 15 percent to 35 percent of Americans are battling their weight at any given time during the year.
This battle is waged through low-calorie and low-fat foods, artificial sweeteners, skipping desserts and commercial weight-loss centers, which require that you buy their prepared meals.
Other will exercise, visit "fat farms," take diet pills, or turn to surgery, such as liposuction, to shed the pounds.
In the 1960s, amphetamines and thyroxine were popular diet fads, and more recently Olestra, fenfluramine and phentermine (fen-phen) have become well known.
All of the fads tout the same goal -- to be slim, fit, and forever young.
Many people get caught in an endless cycle of losing weight and regaining it shortly thereafter. The amount of money spent each year to facilitate this cycle is estimated at $30 to $50 billion.
Further, failed attempts to lose weight often bring with them guilt and self-hatred. Prejudices toward overweight people run rampant and are often shared by the overweight themselves, who may view themselves as lazy, undisciplined or self-indulgent.
Efforts to lose weight are a common phenomenon in the general population;
however, among adolescent girls and young women they are almost universal. Many girls in middle school, high school and college, who are far from overweight, believe they are obese and often adopt bizarre diets, starve themselves, take laxatives, or binge and purge.
Among this population, anorexia and bulimia are epidemics, dangerous ones at that, as mortality rates are as high as 20 percent. Many girls are well aware of the hazards of these practices but would rather risk death than not reach their ideal of extreme thinness.
Why is it that people have such a hard time losing weight, despite the societal pressures, the urging of their doctors, and the investment of staggering amounts of time, energy and money?
The old view that body weight is a result of intake of calories verses expenditure of energy, has given way to a much more complex formulation involving a fairly stable set point for a person's weight that is resistant over short periods to either gain or loss, but that may move with age.
According to this concept, we all have a set point of weight. Changes in feedback mechanisms under the control of the central nervous system alter both appetite and metabolism to defend the set point and prevent large fluctuations in weight. The set point can be overridden, for example large losses can be induced by severe calorie restriction in conjunction with vigorous, sustained exercise, but when these extreme measures are discontinued, body weight generally returns to its preexisting level.
Hereditary factors play an important part in a person's weight, as shown by studies with twins, and likely influence the slow change in the set point of weight that occurs over a life span.
New England Journal Medicine January 1, 1998;338:52-54
Dr. Mercola's Comment
It's hard not to get the resolution urge on New Year's Eve. There's that sense of renewal, of rebirth, and the guilty awareness that you ate your own weight in chocolate during the holidays.
Sure, last year's resolutions didn't make it past the fifth of January, but hey, this year's going to be different, right? Most of us don't have a clue how to make a reasonable resolution, which is why most of us fail to keep the ones we make.
We set high goals for ourselves, and then wonder why we never attain them. So we either stop setting goals (never a good choice), or make resolutions that are ridiculously easy to keep.
A few months ago the new figures from the CDC were released, and we learned that two out of three Americans are overweight. There are many factors that contribute to this, and as I have addressed these in past editions of this newsletter, the information is available on Mercola.com by using our powerful "search" feature.
But in short, the future health of our country undoubtedly depends upon healthier eating. Most people who are obese are not happy about it and would like to return to a healthy weight. They know about the potential health implications but often receive incorrect information from medical "experts."
The good news is that overweight and obesity are nearly universally preventable by following my nutrition plan, exercising, and addressing emotional stresses. Quite simply, you need to replace grain carbohydrates with vegetable greens.
Adjusting your diet for your Metabolic Type is also an essential element to successful long-term weight loss.
However there is a basic physiological truth of life that you can use to your advantage to help you achieve your New Year’s resolution for weight loss or for ANY other goal that you have.
The principle is that whatever you focus your attention on you tend to manifest in your life.
So simply writing down your New Year’s resolution is a significant step in the right direction.
However, stating the resolution twice a day while looking deeply into your eyes in the mirror will radically improve your likelihood of achieving your goal.
But if you really want to make sure you achieve your goal, I would strongly advise you to use psychological acupressure techniques like EFT. The "magic" about EFT is that when you tap for your goals, most of us will come up with a reason why we can’t achieve it.
This self-limiting belief is sabotaging our efforts to achieve it. The beauty of EFT is that you can tap on this negative self-limiting belief and help transform it so it is not serving as a roadblock to your success.
I know many of you have not read the free EFT manual yet. But, if the holiday season has allowed you some spare time, I encourage you to give it a try. For some, the technique may sound a bit odd at first, but it is also relatively simple; the results, meanwhile, have left many of the loudest naysayers quite convinced!
I updated the manual recently so it is much easier to use. If you already understand the tapping points you can go directly to the EFT Affirmation Page.
To conclude, you will definitely have a great advantage on your New Year's resolutions this year if you approach them with a conscious strategy like EFT.
mercola.com
