Many of us start a new eating program because we feel like what we’re doing now (and the program we did before) doesn’t work. Just like the saying goes, “smokers who quit a lot get good at quitting” but never at being a non-smoker. Do non-smokers blame the cigarettes? Of course not, that would be crazy.
An idea or object can’t do anything on its own.
So we move to another cigarette (plan or program) and those don’t work, and when “things” don’t work enough times, we carry the belief in our back pocket that says “this isn’t going to work either.”
And we’re right. Not because an approach doesn’t work. But because we already believe that WE won’t. Change is a dance between principles and the user.
We find and carry the “it won’t work” belief from those botched attempts into the new endeavors, and by carrying the belief “this won’t work” into the picture, we’ve already given ourselves permission to not work the program. Because it’s not going to work! So why give 100% to something that we don’t even believe will turn out?
“Maybe this approach doesn’t work for me?” I’ll give all of us that one. But, which type of cigarette would you like? At the end of the day, we are the ones with the lighters. Where do we believe the power is? The cigarette or the fire? The fire or the person?
No program is easy. They involve work, and work means leaving our zone of comfort and complacency, but we need to start further back.
You need to believe, first. Not in “it,” but in you.
Step one in changing is believing you can change because whether you think you can or can’t, you’re right. So, your first bit of work is not to track food or eat a salad. It’s to believe.
