Re-training your mind is the key to losing weight and keeping it off for good
That all so common and fateful phrase ‘New Year New You’. You had great intentions on the 1st January, but now it is March and you are already giving in to your usual sugary cravings and feeling like an outright failure. Sound familiar? Well, it really does not have to be that way.
The only way to change your ‘body’ is to re-train the way your mind ‘thinks’ about yourself and food. Everything else falls neatly into place thereafter.
Instead of restricting certain foods, (or in some cases entire food groups!) or embarking on rigorous and unrealistic fitness regimes, you need to take a step back.
Hypnotherapy and cognitive therapies are highly complex and vary depending on the individual, but here are three implementable tips that anyone can try today to kick-start the path to a fabulous bod. The best bit? It can be done from the comfort of your sofa nursing a hot cup of tea!
1. Stop ‘trying to lose weight’
Focus on a goal that is positive rather than negative. Why would we want to lose something? Let’s gain something! When you start to nourish and look after your body and stop overeating you can unlock your very best figure as if like magic!
HOW: There is another cake in the office pantry! What do you do?! That cake is going to take you further from your fab-bod. So why would you want that? Go for a walk outside, grab a green tea and imagine your awesome aspirational self on that beach. The cake is pretty dry and unsatisfying anyway and you won’t have anything to show for it tomorrow other than guilt!
2. Give yourself positive affirmations every day
This is a seriously powerful tool. Tell yourself out loud what you are grateful for, what you love about yourself, who you love in your life and what they bring to your life.
HOW: Write down your questions on the fridge door or on your bathroom mirror. Whenever you are brushing your teeth or making a brew before work, answer those questions out loud! It will give you a spring in your step for the rest of the day. Happy people love and appreciate their bodies and eat healthier things!
3. Eat more consciously
We have all heard about the value in eating more consciously and slowly. It is no co-incidence that naturally slim people eat slower and stop eating when they are full!
HOW: When you feel hungry, have a glass of water or cup of green tea. If you are still hungry after 20 minutes, have something to eat. When you eat, put your knife and fork down between each mouthful and properly taste and chew it. And most importantly, when your stomach feels physically full… stop eating!
Need a bit more help to achieve the weight-loss mindset? Annette Larner is an accredited clinical hypnotherapist and NLP practitioner, working from London’s Harley Street, as well as running regular clinics in Rickmansworth and Radlett in Hertfordshire and offers offer Skype and telephone sessions for those further afield.
Annette uses a combination of methods including clinical hypnotherapy, neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), cognitive behavioural techniques (CBT), mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) and clinical sports psychology to re-train the mind and allow you to lose weight naturally and for good.