My affinity for Body Positivity and Feminism have kept me quiet about weight loss for a long time. The truth is, being in the body of your dreams is the most empowering and positive way for you or I to live our lives. I’m breaking that silence now.

I’m sharing what it truly takes to cultivate a weight loss mindset for reasons far beyond just getting into the body of your dreams. Thinking yourself thin isn’t a hokey “law of attraction” technique, it’s a method that gets you in touch with your true self, the most authentic version of you, and gives you the strength to live the life you so desperately crave.

A Weight Loss Mindset is Synonymous with an Empowered Mind

Let me begin by saying, I actually hate the term “weight loss” and I certainly don’t think it describes what I mean when I say a “weight loss mindset”. All transparency inclusive — I’m literally using this term for the sake of convenience —SEO (Google) and the public will understand the essence of what I’m offering at a glance at this term.

Most of the time, people who want to “lose” weight would be ecstatic to stay the same weight and tone up, drop a few inches, and get stronger. That’s a viable outcome of the mindset I’m going to teach you about!

What I call “a weight loss mindset” is actually your “Ideal Body Nature Mind”

Here’s the main misunderstanding in the weight loss industry (that keeps us losing our minds and gaining more weight): your body isn’t out to get fat at every opportunity. It wasn’t made to be fat. You don’t need to wage a war on it to dominate your will over its desire to be a sack of potatoes. Seriously.

Think about animals and children, we’re not ‘made’ to be overweight. All that hating on our bodies is going to do is produce more disharmony… and a crappier mind-body connection. This is a major contributor to weight gain.

Ideal Body Nature Mind (or IBN: Mind) is a mindset that is in harmony with your Ideal Body Nature. What you choose, how you think & talk, how you treat yourself is all aligned with the natural best body within.

Yes, that best body is aching to get out as much as you’re dying to experience it. You two are on the same side.

Consider how much you could accomplish for your holistic health with an aligned mindset intent on your highest well-being! That’s Ideal Body Nature Mind.

Practicing IBN: Mind MODi (an UpRoots Wellness technique) puts you back in touch with that disconnected wisdom within you that holds the key to your joy, and your health.

10 Ways to Think Yourself Thin (and Cultivate a Weight Loss Mindset)

This is a list of ways that you can begin a relationship with the mental faculties associated with your Ideal Body Nature Mindset. Id highly recommend getting the “Ideal Body, Ideal Day Planner” to help you put these principles into practice (it’s a Mind MODi). Practice is the missing step between understanding weight loss and actually losing weight.

You can get your Ideal Body, Ideal day Planner for free here.

1. Accept that mindset is making you overweight.

I’m sorry for getting all in your face about this, but I care. I toiled over this sentence thinking I’d say that your mindset “may be” contributing to weight gain instead of “is”. The truth is, no matter what challenges you face with your weight, mindset is playing a major role in any of them.

The good news is, your crappy weight-gain mindset isn’t your fault. The bad news is, it’s now your responsibility.

2. Take responsibility for your healing (not your weight).

Ta-dah! Being overweight is not your fault my friend. (It feels so great to be the nice guy again.) That’s right: all the shame, blame & lame you’ve received for being a bad, undisciplined and unhealthy person is misguided victim blaming. And even if all that bad ju-ju is actually coming from inside your own head — it’s still not your fault (see ST Tool in 9).

Chances are pretty high, OK absolutely true, that you’ve inherited behaviour, thought patterns, beliefs, even epigenetics that promote overweight. Trauma is another cause. Either way, it’s not your fault (hoorah!) and totally your sole responsibility (boo).

3. Commit to forming one healthy habit at a time — and just do it.

I read this amazing book that explained how this real estate tycoon was trying to get his (high-rolling) team to accomplish tasks from week to week. These highly successful and motivated people kept failing miserably — even though he allowed them to choose their own tasks! He kept paring the number of tasks back until he was so frustrated he essentially gave up and said “Just get one thing done. Can you please just. get. one. thing. done!”

Guess what happened when they focussed on one thing? Productivity went through the roof. He cracked the code: focussing on a few new things can be a bit too much for our feeble little brains, but putting all of our mental power towards one thing can literally produce close-to-miracles.

4. Figure out what scares you about succeeding.

Zing! I bet you hadn’t thought losing that weight you’ve always wanted to lose would be scary. I must be crazy, right? Wrong. Any change is scary and believe it or not, that extra weight is a kind of security blanket for you… and it’s probably been protecting you for awhile.

You’re going to be scared to be seen, to be ridiculed by people who you anticipate will be threatened by your healthy lifestyle changes, to lose people and the sense of self you’ve grown being overweight. Think about it. What are the negative aspects of losing weight for you? What are you scared will happen?

5. Practice gratitude (if you want confidence anyhow).

No, seriously, I almost crapped myself on my own journey towards confidence when I realized it was actually gratitude. I wrote a whole post about it.

Take my word for it, because the University of California at Berkeley has my back (their practices are what I base the UpRoots Wellness GRATi therapies on), gratitude is one of the absolute freaking best things you can do for your brain.

6. Embrace going forward, not back.

Who the heck wants to get “back” into their high school jeans (or whatever). Screw “back”. Back is fixed. Back hems you in. Forward into the unseen, unknown future is literally limitless in potentiality.

Do NOT let me catch you saying “get back to” such and such a time/size/weight, swap it with “getting into the best health of my life” or “getting in better shape than” such and such. Give yourself credit for having the best of you life ahead of you!

7. Flex your “Base Reality IQ” to realize you can do anything.

Everything is hard, OK, staying the same is especially taxing. With that reasoning, I’m going to pull out some philosophical tools on you and say nothing is hard. Because you can go for all you want and it’s going to be tough, or you could not and close out this page, forget I exist, and guess what Susan, sh*t is going to be tough.

Thinking you “can’t” is a form of Reality IQ deficiency (RIQ-d) and getting objective about it (like realizing you can do literally anything with the right time and resources) is touching on Base Reality IQ (RIQ 0). Everything has a solution, including genetic factors. No joke. It’s what I teach.

8. Anticipate failure.

I know. I’m a jerk, right? It’s for your own good, Bob. Listen, lifestyle redesign is a long road. You need give yourself time & patience on it. You also need to realize you’re a darn fallible human being who is going to mess up and, nary one stumble nor a million can permanently hold you down.

Remember: everything in moderation including moderation. You will make mistakes on your road to a better body, and sometimes those things you think are “mistakes” will actually be part of a healthy life! Anticipate where you’ll stumble back to the road of overweight and make a getaway plan.

9. Re-work your “Self-Talk Tool” to be a good parent.

OK, you’ve heard this one before. “Speak to yourself like you are a friend” that kind of thing. It’s imperative. Your mind chatter, and especially when it’s coupled with cognitive distortions, can actually dictate whether you’re overweight or not!

I’ll explain more about the Self-Talk Tool later in the month, so grab a Wellness Planner and get on my email list to hear more. For the time being, speak nicely to yourself! And combine this with 7 above.

10. Give yourself a present – ditch tomorrow.

The present is the only moment from which to act. Like my Mom’s recording of Janis Joplin addressing her crowd at Woodstock says: “Tomorrow never happens, man.”

Make a plan for your goals, but ask yourself what you can do right now to help them off the ground. Do NOT put things off until tomorrow. Let the spirit of Janis Joplin show you that tomorrow doesn’t actually ever come. Now is literally all there ever is. It’s a trip, I know. But it’s simple. And it’s true.

So much love to you my friend!

Join me & the R(E)volution towards sustainable, empowered weight loss today for absolutely free! Click here.

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