Most people who have dealt with weight issues are very much defined by them. For myself and many of my clients being leaner, fitter, healthier feels a bit like fraud. Even when they are no longer at an unhealthy weight they still hold the same old the same old image of themselves.

If you have ever lost weight and not been able to really see or feel a change you understand this.

I know what it is like because I did it myself.

Even at my leanest and fittest I was always a large girl that was working really, really hard not to be. I was always a chubby girl masquerading as a thin one. I felt like a fraud! I could never relax because this was not who I was. I had to be ever vigilant to keep who I really was (a fat girl) from resurfacing. This realization really hit me one day while on vacation in Mexico years ago.

I was in Puerto Vallarta, my husband and I were strolling down the boardwalk and we stopped to watch a mime doing his act. He was pulling participants from the crowd to help him with the skit. He had about 5 or 6 young men and women participating in the scene. It was all very amusing until he mimed that he was looking for a large person to come up and join the group.
My heart slammed against my chest in panic and I immediately ducked down behind the crowd so he would not spot me. My husband looked at me strangely wondering what on earth I was doing . There crouched fearfully amidst the legs of the crowd I had an epiphany!
I thought he was going to pick me because I still saw myself as being a heavy girl. I had been at a healthy and fit weight for some time but I very suddenly realized that I didn’t believe it was true! I saw very clearly (amongst all those hairy short clad legs) that even though I had released my excess weight I was still very much a large person in my own mind.
Later, when I took the time to reflect upon this experience, I understood that until I released this limiting definition I would always “struggle” with my weight. How could I not end up putting the pounds back on when the very way I defined myself demanded that I do so.

As long as you think of yourself as fat, overweight, lazy etc you will always be exactly that. Your very self-definition is a powerful self-fulfilling prophecy. It might take months or years but you will end up back there it is unavoidable until you change the internal image and dialogue.

There are sometimes days when that old image tries to come back to haunt me, tries to pull me back in that direction. However, I now know how to deal with it. I know how to calm those voices and bring my mind back to the present reality and the person I am today. I know now without a shadow of a doubt in my mind or heat that I am not a heavy or big girl and I never will be again.

April Lifeshop

Self-talk and your Weight

The way you define yourself and the things you say in your head are undermining your weight loss success.

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