It’s January, the month of broken resolutions.
Why do we do it? Why, every January 1st do we decide that this year is the year that we will finally achieve our weight loss goals and become the person we long to be?
How many January the firsts have we spent pouring over the latest diet-to-end-all-diets, the one that will finally mould our out-of-control bodies into that of the svelte like model in the picture, with the crisp clean tape measure loosely held around her bony hips?
How many times have we found ourselves one week, two weeks a month later, staring down at the fickle bathroom scales, incredulous that after all that deprivation, will power and superhuman effort we are back to exactly where we were when we started?
Why do we set ourselves up for failure? Every year!
Dieting does not work, it never has and never will, and it is absolutely not your fault that you cannot permanently change your body weight by following a diet, whatever the claims made by those who came up with it.
Yes, you may weigh, measure, exercise and deprive yourself into ‘shape’. The will power that is needed to get to your goal weight is super human; many give up the struggle long before the scales reach that magic number.
Few are able to sustain the weight loss.
It is like stopping smoking; you either stop and become an ex-smoker, or stop and become a smoker who denies themselves cigarettes. The latter may not smoke but spends every day resisting the urge to have another cigarette. This person is not truly free, they are not really an ‘ex-smoker’, they are a smoker who isn’t smoking, battling with their urges every day. This is a life of constant conflict and stress, exhausting and unfulfilling.
Long term weight loss is the same. When you embark upon a diet you use your will power to keep you following the rules, eating what you are told is best for you and sticking to prescribed exercise regimes. If you are able to stick to it all, you will lose weight, at first. However at some point you will stop dieting. At this point you will face the same challenges as the person who has stopped smoking.
When you end your diet, either because you have achieved your target weight or because it all just got too difficult you usually either go back to overeating, whilst waiting for the next diet to offer you a final solution, or you manage to maintain your weight by closely watching what you eat and balancing it with enough exercise. Whichever category you fall into you are still a dieter who is not at the moment on a diet.
As with the ex-smoker who needs to change her relationship with cigarettes, to become a true ex-dieter you need to change your relationship with diets. Diets have to become something that you eliminate from your life, as are cigarettes for the ex-smoker.
Sustainable change around your relationship with food is only achieved by rewriting the internal dialogue you have around it, freeing you to think only about eating when you are hungry, without guilt, without restriction and without fear. Embarking upon yet another diet, whatever it promises, will not change the way your subconscious mind thinks.
All those times you started a diet and failed to stick to it, all the times you told yourself your stomach wasn’t flat enough, or your thighs were too heavy, your hips to wide, your subconscious mind recorded the words and feelings you experienced onto a loop which plays constantly in the background of your mind. This subconscious tape is extremely powerful, far more powerful than anything your conscious mind has to say. It is the thoughts that originate from our subconscious mind that determine our behaviour. It is here that our lasting perceptions and beliefs are held.
So, when you make promises to stick to a healthy eating plan, to walk once a day, to go swimming regularly, you are making them with your conscious mind. All the time your subconscious tape is playing telling you the exact opposite; ‘you know you can’t stick to it, you’ll fail, you’ll always be fat’. Every time you allow your concentration to slip, that default tape will come to the forefront of your mind, triggering those self destructive thoughts. No wonder New Years resolutions are so difficult to stick to!
As you can see, your subconscious mind is the boss, it runs the show. However it is also from within this powerful, subconscious mind that lasting change originates, if we know how to tap into it and re-record the message it is constantly transmitting to us. It is only by changing the words on that tape recording that you have playing in your mind that you can permanently lose weight, and find freedom from the enslavement of diets.
Diets and slimming clubs which encourage you to effect change by providing you with advice on what to eat and when, motivating you at weekly meetings and rallying you to take action are engaging the conscious mind. All of this can help you to lose weight, for a while, and you will, all the time you can stick to the programme, but because they do not address the workings of the subconscious mind change can be very short lived.
We, at Imeson Jackson, help you to retrain your brain, freeing you from the thought processes which keep you enslaved. These changes occur gently, easily, lovingly. You will discover balance, harmony and joy. By the time you leave us you will have all the tools you need to embark upon a life without diets, a life where you are the master of your own thoughts, and free to shape the future into one that you truly desire.
Our transformational holidays enable you to truly become an ex-dieter. Our programme is designed to tap into those self destructive subconscious recordings and rewrite them. Together, deep in the heart of the Andalucian countryside, we will finally uncover what is holding you back from having the life you desire. Experientially, whilst enjoying our finest home cooked cuisine, you will discover that finding out what lies behind why and how you eat is the key to a life without diets.
So, this January, why not do something that really works. Ditch the diet and the slimming clubs and do something that will change your life. Join us here in beautiful sunny Spain and re-discover your magnificence!