The Most Important Weight Loss Tool

Losing pounds goes beyond healthy eating and exercise

Question: What is the single most important tool for successful weight loss?

If you answered a good diet, an effective exercise program, counting calories or even a support group, you would have named something very useful. However, you would not have come even vaguely close to the right answer. I hope that you will read the rest of this article and give serious consideration to what I share with you. It could transform your life and make all the difference in your long-term healthy weight loss.

Fact: Most dieters fail at long-term weight loss.

Why? Because they don't know about or ignore this essential tool. What is this illusive but crucial weight loss tool that almost nobody seems to know about?

The answer is you. I know this may sound a bit strange at first, but it is actually true. You are the most important ingredient. To be more specific, knowledge about yourself is the secret factor that is most often left out of diet programs.

Centuries ago, a very wise Chinese teacher named Lao-Tzu said it this way: "He who knows others is wise; he who knows himself is enlightened." You may know a lot about exercise and diet and calories and follow a detailed weight loss program, but if you don't know what makes you tick (your needs, inner hungers, addictions, fears, hopes and ultimately what makes you eat uncontrollably), you will eventually re-gain all that hard-lost weight.

Imagine for a moment that you want to go from New York to California, because a billion dollar inheritance is waiting for you there. The only way to travel is by car, and you do not know how to drive. Then someone gives you a new car. What would you do? I suppose you would immediately take some serious driving lessons and learn as much as you could about driving and basic car maintenance. Right?

Well weight loss, my friends, is far more complex than driving across the country, but most dieters know far less about themselves than they do about their own cars. No wonder so many people fail at weight loss.

You are a complex and wonderful being. You have needs and wants and fears and hopes and desires and expectations that all have a direct effect on what and how you eat. Did you know this? Did you know that a little self-exploration can make a giant difference in your ability to change your eating habits? I hope you agree with me so that you can put your weight loss energy in the right place and begin to make great progress.

A big weight loss tip: If you are stuck on the way to your weight goal then self-knowledge is probably what you need to have a breakthrough. How do you get this knowledge? Try answering the questions below. They will move you in the right direction.

Weight-Related Self-Knowledge Questions:

• What is my greatest inner hunger other than food?
• What major life risk have I been unwilling to take?
• What intense feelings most influence my overeating?
• What am I willing to do to learn about and productively manage those feelings?
• What childhood trauma is still affecting my emotions, eating habits and self-image?
• To what degree do I still fear growing up?
• How often do I blame others for my current life situation instead of taking responsibility for my choices?
• How does my weight help me hide from life?

I encourage you to explore these questions in depth. Do not settle for brief and easy answers. You will only sell yourself and your weight loss short. The more you know about you, the more weight you can lose.

Trust me on this one. If you want more tough-minded and effective tools for long-term weight loss and self-exploration then e-mail me. Have a happy new you!

Interested in weight-loss? Learn more about our Weight Control Series.

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