How NLP Can Radically Improve Your Weight Loss

NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) is a process and practice of understanding how people organize the way that they behave, think, feel and speak to achieve a given result. When you can understand these things about someone who has been successful at something, you can then duplicate that success. This practice cab be applied to weight loss with tremendous results.

If you step back for a moment you'll notice that there is an entire industry of fit and lean folks trying to sell you their solutions but too often those solutions are from an external source. Things like fitness equipment, diet plans, workout plans or books on the science of weight loss. Have you ever wondered why this industry still exists and continues to grow? The obvious answer as I'm sure you have concluded is that their solutions are not working...at least not permanently. And so people continue to look for the next thing outside of themselves to help them lose weight.

Why is it that a multi-billion dollar industry can't seem to solve the overweight and obesity problem? The reason is that these are behavioral issues before they are food issues or before they are exercise issues. With all of the information available online, everyone knows that McDonald's is not healthy and that cereals and cakes and cookies are not going to help you lose weight but millions of people still make the choice to eat those foods, to overeat or choose not to exercise.

You can leap far beyond those millions of people who will continue to fail simply by shifting to a different perspective about how to lose weight and keep it off.

What I Learned

Once upon a time for a period of a couple of years I was very overweight. I weighed 248lbs and although I'm a big guy at 6 foot 2 inches, that was about 60 extra pounds I was carrying around. I'll save the details for a later article but in one of my failed attempts to lose that weight I tried the external solution of doing the trendy diet of the time which was the Atkins diet. I recall clearly one evening while on this diet, driving myself to Baskin Robbins, sitting in the parking lot wringing my hands and then eventually getting out and walking in the store. I ordered a nice big not fudge Sundae and took it out to the car, hunched over like a dog carrying a fleshy bone away to a corner. I got in the car and sat and looked at it. I was conflicted within and clearly had some parts that were at odds with one another. I honestly stared at it for what felt like 10 minutes, then took a bite and then quickly my dominant emotion of that moment (shame) won the battle and I tossed it on the ground in the parking lot.

This of course is an example of what doesn't work. What I was eating was less the problem, it was more so my thoughts, emotions, beliefs and behaviors that were sabotaging me. In NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) the approach is of course to model what does work and so here's the rest of the story that hopefully you can learn from and model.

Probably 4-5 months after the preceding story I had what I can only call an awakening. Again I'll leave the details for a later time but the pain of what I had been experiencing (suicidal thoughts, deep depression) had squeezed me into a place of either changing the way that I think, feel and believe or getting sick and dying. Thankfully I had a supportive family and the knowledge to make the healthy changes needed.

What was left to do was for me to make the most effective choices possible and create a new image of myself.   I had, in my mind, already decided that I would be losing all of that weight and so I confidently asked a buddy if he wanted to take a bet with me to lose weight as well. We bet $100 that whoever met their goal in that period of time won.

Just to let you in on a secret, I didn't even have $100 to be able to pay off the bet so again I had no choice but to reach my goal.

That didn't matter though because I already knew that I was going to lose the weight. The process was just a formality for me. I lost the weight and kept it off just as I knew I would and I even was published in a small magazine shortly thereafter.

​The reason I was successful and have stayed successful at managing my weight is because I did many of the things that using NLP and hypnosis can do for you. Below I'll share what some of those strategies are and how they can benefit you in your weight loss story ending.

Chunking

​That's right, chunking. I know it's an awful word to use in an article about weight loss but I think you'll appreciate the utility of it.

Chunking is the idea that anything can be accomplished by anyone if you break the task down into small enough chunks. In my case years ago, I had weekly weight loss goals and weekly exercise accomplishment goals. I made them small enough that I knew that if I put in the effort I would accomplish them. You can do this too and no matter how small the goal needs to be, as long as it is progress then it is progress.

Positive Intention

Behind every behavior is a positive intention even if that behavior doesn't seem like it is helping you. The positive intention of overeating may be to provide comfort or to even make yourself less desirable to protect yourself from being hurt. This is a good reminder to be kind to yourself.

This is something that is highly effective however it will require you to really self-examine your drives, emotions and beliefs. This part of NLP can be greatly helped by working with a professional. In a hypnotherapy session using NLP techniques we would explore your emotions and beliefs together to uncover what your hidden positive intention or secondary gain may be with keeping the weight.

Failure or Feedback?

There is no such thing as failure only feedback. This is a mindset that all successful people embody and if you can step aside from self-judgement when things don't go the way you were hoping you can quickly course correct and avoid making that same mistake twice.

An example might be the tendency to over-exercise when trying to lose weight. I know I made this mistake and have also since learned that the older I get, the bigger mistake that can be. Many people toil away on the elliptical for hours only to see small changes or even changes in the wrong direction show up on the scale. If it's not working, you have to acknowledge that it's not working and figure out why it's not working. Again we now have the benefit of millions of other peoples experiences and can learn from those who made the same mistakes.

Your Map of Reality vs Reality Itself

I can tell you from my own experiences and that of my clients that your map of reality often times doesn't line up with true reality. Again if you've read my post on hypnotic regression you'll understand that our maps of reality are fairly firmly established by the age of 7-10 years. For better or worse this is how we see the world and the source from which our strategies for survival and social acceptance emerge.

In NLP and Hypnotherapy we are changing these maps so that you can create more effective strategies for functioning within the context of your life. This can be accomplished in literally just a few sessions but even if you start to explore this possibility on your own you will alter your course a bit because you will have brought awareness and attention to something that was previously hidden.

Anchoring

Anchoring is really a great technique for losing weight, especially for those days when you are feeling unmotivated. Anchoring is basically creating a specific emotional and physically felt state within your body-mind and then setting a physical 'anchor' such as touching your thumb to your pinky or making a fist with your thumb inside (something unique). Then the next time you need to access that same emotional state, if for instance you just aren't feeling like going to the gym or getting out of bed early to workout, you can fire that physical anchor. When setting an anchor like this you will want to really connect to the visual, auditory and kinesthetic senses as you create that elevated emotional state. Really build up that state as much as you can before setting the anchor. 

​In my hypnotherapy sessions, I use anchoring quite often and combine it with some even more powerful techniques for shifting the mind and body to lose weight.

​If you are feeling like you are just fed up with all of the diets and exercise programs and are looking for a different approach that will finally last for good, then I strongly suggest trying some NLP techniques on your own or reach out and schedule a hypnotherapy session and I'll help you make that transformation permanently.

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