The REAL Secret to Peak Health and Body is SOOO simple.
Are we wasting our time fixated on the mechanics of “how to” achieve results when we have been missing the point the whole time? Clearly looking at the challenge of health, weight and body size we face in our current society, what we are doing IS NOT WORKING. Why is that? The answer is quite simple. “How to” has supplanted what really incites change. We cannot master transformation on the outer level of the body until we have understood and connected with the inner world of the mind from which all transformation springs.
Are Coaches, Experts, and Followers Focused on the Right Thing When it Comes to Health?
You may remember from your younger days or have seen dramatized on TV the diligent coach drawing out the plays for the team. Often there are lots of “x’s” and “o’s” drawn out on the board and the mechanics of the movement during the intended play discussed in great detail and with inordinate passion.
Players do their best to remember where they are supposed to go and when. But as often happens, in the heat of the moment, some forget, are distracted or caught up in thinking about what to do but not actually doing it. Others may just “go through the motions” trying only to remember the mechanics of the play, and still others may let instinct guide them to do something else as the play develops.
The coach may wonder: “Did I just waste all this time and energy trying to teach specifics rather than principles?” “Was it even worth my blood, sweat, and tears when nobody followed the play anyways?”
I ask the same exact question about the mainstream approach to transformation in the fitness, health, and personal development industries!?!
Do the “X’s” and “O’s” of Weight Loss Really Matter?
Do the specific “X’s” and “O’s” about what to eat, when to eat it and how much to eat really matter when it is too restrictive or demanding for 95% of people to follow?
Is all this advancement in nutritional principles and scientific understanding of obesity really that meaningful when it doesn’t actually equate to change in human behavior?
Does your “secret formula to losing weight fast” really matter if its effects are only fleeting, temporary and impermanent?
Is your “Lose 30lbs in 30 days” course really doing anything other than selling people and perpetuating the “quick fix” overnight, “outside in” lie that has only deepened the disorder up to now?
Why do we spend so much of our time, energy and resources drawing up the plays, the diets, exercise regimens and “do’s” and “don’ts” which really are never followed by the vast majority of people anyways? Have we missed the point?
Current Popular Weight Loss Approaches are Failing You
The study to end all studies about the long term results of dieting were astounding. In the New England Journal of Medicine article which reviewed much of the recent research on this, sought to “answer the impact of dietary composition on weight loss…once and for all.” (1)
They recruited almost a thousand overweight people and randomly assigned them to diets with varying levels of protein, fats, and carbohydrates. After two years, there were no differences in weight loss between the groups. All groups also had the same scores in terms of hunger and satisfaction. The researchers concluded that dietary composition has no impact on weight loss.
But here’s what stuck out to me: Only 15% of the dieters managed to lose a meaningful amount of weight. The same can be seen from Kevin Hall’s research into those participants in the well known “Biggest Loser” program. (2)
In a study conducted by Dr. Kevin Hall of the NIH he evaluated 14 contestants of the popular show The Biggest Loser in their weight loss journey and came up with some interesting findings. Even when there were prime conditions for weight loss—not having the stress of a 9-5 job, a tough but motivating trainer, telegenic doctors, strict meal plans and killer workouts–Hill found that the body in the long run will “fight like hell to get that fat back.”
Over time, 13 of the 14 contestants Hall studied gained, on average, 66% of the weight they’d lost on the show, and four were heavier than they were before the competition. How could that be?
They had all the food prepared for them, all the knowledge and motivation anyone could ever want at their finger tips. None of the stress of daily living, time constraints and other factors hindering them. But why did so few of them fail to retain even a small percentage of those results? Should we consider these case studies failures? Should we as viewers and a massively overweight culture blame our results on these so called experts?
OR could it be that we have been focusing on the wrong thing!??
Was the focus perhaps on optimizing external conditions and environment and not transforming the internal state of being?
‘How To’ Lose Weight & Be Healthy is Obsolete
We can no longer deftly throw out the latest and greatest “how to” approach to weight loss and body transformation and expect raving results.
With so much conflicting information we can often feel overwhelmed and feel that we are drowning in a sea of data. Do you and I really need to be told what to do or even how to do it?
Neither of these factors really matter or have relevance until we dig deeper and know why we should do it and actually have a system in place to actually do it.
Shouldn’t the majority of our efforts be at understanding the internal emotional and psychological state of mind and how to stimulate real change rather than fretting about the nuts and bolts of calories and lists of “do’s” and “don’ts” with diet, nutrition and exercise?
Well known author Brene Brown says it this way: “Why is ‘how to’ so alluring when, truthfully, we already know ‘how to’ yet we’re still standing in the same place longing for more joy, connection and meaning? Most everyone…knows how to eat healthy. We know how to take care of our emotional needs. We know all of this, yet…We are the most obese, medicated, addicted, and in-debt Americans EVER. Why? We have more access to information, more books, and more good science—why are we still struggling like never before?”
“Because we don’t talk about the things that get in the way of doing what we know is best for us, our children, our families, our organizations, and our communities.”
“We don’t talk about what keeps us eating until we’re sick, busy beyond human scale, desperate to numb and take the edge off, and full of so much anxiety and self-doubt that we can’t act on what we know is best for us. We don’t talk about the hustle for worthiness that’s become such a part of our lives that we don’t even realize that we’re dancing.” (3)
When it Comes to Being Healthy, Knowing is NOT the Same as Doing
Information is obsolete.
The cold hard truth is that facts and information don’t change people’s minds.
They don’t motivate real change.
Knowing the particular dance steps are useful but not until one can hear the actual music being played and appreciate the emotional aspects of the sound. When we can hear the tones and cadence and feel the sweetness, the depth, and the intensity of emotion from the musical piece then the dance steps will matter.
When we reach the point of feeling and connecting with the beauty of the music within us that arouses and incites a desire for real change, then the actual dance steps of nutrition, exercise, calories and energy expenditure will mean something. But until then they are only a band-aid, only a new “medication” to treat at the outer level of symptoms not a cure at the inner level of cause.
Actually Doing What You Know is What Makes You Healthy
How you do something is really becoming moot.
It is getting someone to actually do it and not just do it but internalize it so that it actually sticks.
When it becomes wired into the autonomic nervous system (the body’s unconscious brain that controls breathing, heart rate, digestion and myriads of other functions) and is automatic, involuntary and reflexive in nature it becomes our state of being.
We don’t have to ‘think’ about what to eat or not eat. We don’t have to fret, worry, and stew about “having to” exercise or “having to” eat healthy. We will naturally want to find foods, activities and behaviors that support our inner state of being.
If you want to find actual ways to do this, Click HERE for a FREE PDF about 5 Inner Core Foundational Body Changes that will help you actually get healthy and do the work!
For More Articles like this, See:
The Only Permanent Detox You Need
The BEST Diet for Permanent Weight Loss
8 Things Nobody Ever Tells You About Dieting
Works Cited:
(1) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2763382/
(2) https://time.com/magazine/us/4793878/june-5th-2017-vol-189-no-21-u-s/
(3) The Gifts of Imperfection; Brene Brown; p. 36-37
