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Do you ever find yourself asking, ‘Why can’t I lose weight?’. Feeling frustrated, heavy and stuck in your body and not reaching your goals? There can be strong mindset roadblocks standing in your way to successful weight loss.
There are lots of reasons why people can struggle to lose weight and keep it off. It could be down to physical illness, lifestyle choices, or simply your body shape and biology.
What we are exploring, are the mental blocks that often sabotage your weight loss.
Mindset Roadblocks Getting in Your Way
Setting Goals that are Unachievable
You’ve probably heard of SMART goals before, have you ever considered using them for weight loss?
There are so many diets and quick fixes sold to us daily that losing weight fast seems like the only way. Maybe, you’ve even tried some of these diets and failed?
So really consider if these extremes are achievable within your current ability. Your our lifestyle may not allow it to be possible to commit to crazy eating schedules and gym sessions.
Additionally, attempting to lose weight in such a short period of time can increase the pressure and stress that put on yourself. Ultimately, decreasing your chances of success.
Therefore, setting realistic and achievable goals is really important in your weight loss journey. If you want to be successful, you must be honest with yourself and what you can commit to.
How often can you make it to the gym? Will you be more successful with a restrictive diet or nutrition lifestyle change? How long do you think it will take to reach your goal weight with these factors considered?
With a realistic approach to your lifestyle and weight loss then you can encourage positive thoughts and progress in your body and self.
Failure Outlook
As mentioned earlier, many of us, even from a young age, have tried various diets to lose weight fast. However, this can lead to failure after failure, weight loss, and weight gain.
This takes it toll on your mindset. Creating a negative opinion of yourself, a failure outlook and can reinforce feelings and thoughts such as:
- I am not am not good enough
- I am unable to lose weight
- My happiness is dependent on my appearance
- No one will find me attractive…
These thoughts are strong and debilitating for your weight loss goals. A failure outlook is a huge mindset roadblock and can stop you from succeeding just as much as crazy dieting.
If you have a much more positive mindset, you are more likely to succeed. This is something you can change right now with a little training.
If you don’t know where to start, Mind Medicine can help with Mindset Coaching to help you on your journey to success.
Pleasure Over Pain
What you might not know about the brain, is that it likes to repeat the past. This is to avoid pain and seek pleasure and security. Diets often restrict us from pleasure and therefore, causing pain and panic in our primitive brain.
What do we associate with pleasure?… You guessed it, FOOD.
Food is very closely linked with happiness which can make dieting even more challenging. Without a diet, you probably go for the most pleasurable option which leads to long term pain regarding your weight and body image.
Therefore, a more successful approach to a diet would be knowing that you are suffering short term pain, by not choosing the most pleasurable option. This short term pain contributes to long term pleasure, losing weight and improving your health and wellbeing.
Ultimately, this thought process will greatly help you achieve your goals and see a more positive result. Overcoming the mindset roadblock of pleasure can be extremely difficult.
However, if you practice and maintain the outlook of long term pleasure, you will begin to see change and success, and overcome this mindset roadblock.
Accountability
Is life something that happens to you or are you deciding how you live it?
Are you holding yourself accountable for your actions?
Emotions can make you do extreme things and repeat bad habits such as binge eating, drinking or throwing your diet out the window. This can be a result of something that has happened in your day, how someone else has made you feel or even how you make yourself feel.
Living life based on the consequences of what happens means you become a victim of your situation. When the reality is that you are responsible for all of your actions and emotions. This is taking accountability and deciding to take action for your goals.
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Applying accountability to your weight loss journey will help you be successful. Holding yourself accountable for your successes and your failures. You are responsible for counting calories, making time for exercise, and creating the environment to encourage positive weight loss.
This mindset also means you decide how you want to be, how you feel and the actions you take to make a change.
Lack of Understanding
The last mindset roadblock affecting your weight loss can be your lack of understanding. Our bodies are complicated and amazing physical beings and need to be nurtured the right way.
Do you know how your body reacts to different foods? What body shape you are and how that affects your weight loss? How many calories the balanced nutrition you need to burn fat?
This lack of understanding can be setting you up to fail from the start. It doesn’t seem possible that you can choose the right diet without this knowledge.
Therefore, educating yourself and being aware of your body means there is a higher chance of success. Removing this mindset block can be much easier than others. It takes research, personal experience, and expert knowledge to create an effective plan for your body.
Want help with a plan of action for your weight loss? Mind Medicine can create custom plans for your lifestyle and body shape to ensure the greatest success for you!
What Mindset Roadblocks Are Sabotaging your Weight Loss?
Look at your past attempts at dieting, do you see the similarities in your mindset now? Have these mindset blocks sabotaged your weight loss in the past?
Now you aware of your lack of understanding towards your body, you can begin to educate yourself and set realistic goals for success. You can begin to take responsibility for your journey, choose short term pain for long term pleasure, and turn your failure outlook upside down.
Doing all of this can encourage positive and effective weight loss for you and overcome your mindset roadblocks. Overcoming these mental blocks means you can build a positive weight loss mindset instead.
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