Developing Mental Muscles for Successful Weight Loss

When we want to develop our body muscles, we exercise, and gradually - the muscles develop.

Talents and skills can also be developed. Leadership skills, self-control, restraint, forgiveness, tranquility, perseverance... they can all be improved and developed!

Knowing this fact doesn't always push us towards our goals, because knowing is not enough, we need to act. Just like our physical muscles - watching videos and others train won't develop our own muscles. Only practice and persistence can do that.

How many of us know what to eat and what to avoid, yet still don't lose weight? So much knowledge is available to us! The catch? It's in the application.

Remember learning to ride a bike when we were kids? Did anyone know how to pedal right away? Of course not. We fell and got bruised many times. Only those who kept trying and insisted on learning until they succeeded learned to do it and eventually started enjoying it!

To continue and persevere, it's important to link success to pleasure. It's crucial to see what will happen when this ability is developed. Simultaneously, it's essential to know the hidden cost of not doing so.

Going back to the example of riding a bike -

My pain: All my friends are riding joyfully, and only I can't - it hurts my self-esteem, my chances for enjoyable activity, and my body muscles are weak...(of course, one can choose another activity, this is just for illustration purposes).

My pleasure: When I learn to ride, I will feel enjoyment, a sense of belonging, I'll be able to do sports, breathe fresh air, participate in competitions, my health will improve...

The cost of quitting is painful and expensive.

Reflect on the pain you might experience if you don't lose weight.

What is your pain when you give up on a healthy body weight: poor health, low self-esteem, shame, guilt, disappointment, sadness.

What is your gain when you succeed: lightness, energy, health, high self-image, buying clothes you love, enjoying looking in the mirror, happiness.

Add more costs and gains. This is important to motivate yourself to keep training even when it's hard, to continue even if you fall.

Now start practicing developing the skills you believe will help you achieve your goal. For example: persistence, restraint, control, creativity...

When you start practicing restraint, it'll be difficult at first because it feels automatic to you. You see tempting food - and eat, because you perceive yourself as lacking the necessary ability to stop, and thus at first, you will fall, like those who try to pedal and fall.

If you give up at this stage, this mental ability will not develop. But if you persist - this ability will develop, and this mental muscle will grow more and more. Your self-identity will change, you'll start believing in yourself and your abilities.

Breaking the automatic habit and training helps create a new neural connection in the brain and weakens the automatic neural connection that leads you to eat without control (but more on that in another article).

Find time daily to imagine - visualize yourself in control and how it impacts your weight.

Imagine yourself and your life when you're in control, managing your food intake, and being slim, healthy, and energetic.

The process of losing weight is a process that requires developing talents and skills, just like developing physical muscles.

Sometimes you may falter, and that's okay, it's part of the process!

It doesn't mean you can't, and it's certainly not the time to give up and quit.

We have two choices - one is to give up, and the other is to try again, stronger.

What do you choose?

Want to know more about my method, and learn how to truly lose weight? Sign up for the "Smart Diet" workshop on the Jewish Campus.

Dr. Rina Mordo, Ph.D, is a coach specializing in nutrition combined with the subconscious and NLP.