by Howard B. Richman
Do you know which behaviors and habits are associated with the thin personality? Did you know that if you could adopt these habits that the weight will naturally start to reduce, without effort? You probably know all you need to know about diet and exercise but something tells you that there must be something else. We’ve attempted to compile the most innovative NON-diet and NON-exercise approach to dealing with the problem of being overweight. There are behaviors that have NOTHING to do with food that have a direct influence on your physical weight. These free tips are excerpted from the ebook, Act Thin, Be Thin and are offered as a unique perspective to help and inspire you to attain your weight-loss goals!
After you read the free tips below, please see our unique and helpful non-diet weight loss products.
1) DO I PUSH COMPLIMENTS AWAY?
(Behavior #3 out of 65)
If someone compliments you on your hair, clothes, appearance, talent, ability, etc., do you immediately apologize for not being even better? If someone wants to pay you money for something, do you feel guilty and feel obligated to give them a “deal?” This behavior is an artificial habit that many of us get into as if it is polite or spiritual. The truth is that it not only is hurtful to the person who just tried to give you something, but it is incredibly damaging to you. If you continue to push away the nurturing things that come your way, you will feel empty all the time. This hunger is usually and wrongly interpreted as a physical hunger and leads to over-eating.
2) DO I SKIP MEALS?
(Behavior #51 out of 65)
Have you noticed that naturally-thin people do not skip meals? Why do you? Especially breakfast — Do you skip meals hoping to lose weight put on from the previous day? Please stop this — it backfires for two reasons. (1) When you skip a meal, your body enters “starvation mode” and (for survival purposes) keeps weight on! Then, (2) because you’re so famished from having skipped a meal, you’re more inclined to eat too much at the next meal, or to eat foods that are unnecessarily high in calories!
3) DO I EAT WHILE DOING OTHER ACTIVITIES?
(Behavior #61 out of 65)
Reading the paper or watching TV while eating may be “efficient” use of time but you risk swallowing a lot of unhappiness along with your food. Some people can do this with no problem, as they have the ability to remain detached. If you find that you are becoming passionately concerned about what you are reading or watching, you should not do this.
4) DO I ATTEMPT TO DO MORE THAN ONE THING AT A TIME?
(Behavior #1 out of 65)
Our physical reality is simply a projection of our thoughts. If you have a distraction tendency then it means that you have an “expanded” attention span. This mental expansion manifests itself as a physical expansion in the form of extra weight! Giving yourself the best chance to learn focusing skills begins with doing one thing at a time. For example, don’t balance your checkbook while you are having an important talk with a loved one. You’ll surely make errors in your checkbook as well as say something you regret. The human brain really can only attend to one task at a time consciously. If you are doing more than one thing at a time, you only have the illusion that you can handle it. In reality, you are only focused on one activity for any small moment. Then your concentration flips to the other activity, and back again. So you can delude yourself that you are clearly focusing on more than one thing, but you are in reality alternating your attention between activities at a rapid pace. This is DISTRACTION. Remember: DISTRACTION = WEIGHT GAIN! Please realize that this idea of doing one thing at a time refers only to activities that require focused concentration. For example, If you are running and you notice your mind thinking of 100 things, this is actually OK. That’s because running is normally a mindless activity and does not compete for the attention of your thoughts.
5) DO I INTERRUPT PEOPLE?
(Behavior #6 out of 65)
Interrupting and inability to receive are related. The tendency to interrupt stems mostly from a discomfort in really hearing another person. (Inability to receive information from another.) This inability to listen actually creates an inner void. This void or emptiness is often later “filled” by overeating. Also, if we could talk less, and listen more, we would also be better able to “hear” the true needs of our own being as well! The tendency to interrupt also stems from a fear of really revealing who we are inside. It is kind of deflection technique. Sure, it seems that people who interrupt a lot are creating dominance over a conversation. But often, it is another way of getting the attention off the overweight person and onto the other person. This habit is like a verbal armor, just like the fat itself is a physical armor. Both insulate and separate the real person inside.
6) DO I FIDGET?
(Behavior #13 out of 65)
Am I constantly moving — touching objects or scratching while engaged in conversation or other activities?
7) DO I TEND TO BE A PERFECTIONIST?
(Behavior #34 out of 65)
Perfectionists are DISTRACTING themselves on two levels. First, the whole idea of needing to be perfect becomes obsessive and consuming. The attention goes into being perfect as a goal and the very steps needed to attain the goal therefore are shortchanged. To be a perfectionist is to create an unnatural level of expectation, which results in never being satisfied. This “all or nothing” mentality leads to giving up too soon, so that the original goal is not met. Ironically, the non-perfectionist often has more successes because he or she doesn’t play this self-sabotage game. The second way perfectionists distract themselves is by dwelling on the fact that (now) they have failed to achieve their goal. A classic example of this type of pattern is the perfectionist piano student who cannot tolerate the fact that the first attempt at a musical passage is not perfect. So, instead of working on it, it is avoided. Later, on successive attempts it still is not perfect. So time goes by and the passage never actually gets learned. This makes the student feel like a failure. Since the student is so DISTRACTED, it is understandable that there is no more brain power available to actually do the task at hand. (The brain is first thinking about the need to be perfect, and then about the fact that there is failure.) Is there any room in the brain left to attend to the music and play? (No!) It is no surprise that the more laid-back, non-perfectionist type often achieves things with greater mastery (perfection!) Relating this to decision-making, the perfectionist wants to make the best decision. So he/she goes back and forth on the issue, for so long, that in effect, no decision is made at all! Repeat this pattern for career, residence, relationships, children and any other major issue in one’s life. It’s kind of like the clown at the circus, trying to keep all the plates spinning in the air — the attention is definitely not focused! All this energy is being expended and wasted, and nothing is actually getting done! Ironically, the result is far from perfect. Relating this to food, the perfectionist will often declare to his/herself: “OK, no sugar for one year!” Not only is this not a perfect goal in the first place (emotionally we need the pleasure of sweets once in a while) but it is so unreasonably strict, that we are doomed to fail! To sum up, SET REASONABLE GOALS AND GIVE YOURSELF PERMISSION TO MAKE MISTAKES ON YOUR WAY TOWARDS THESE GOALS.
About These Tips.
These tips were prepared by Howard B. Richman and are offered for free as a courtesy. They are excerpted from his breakthrough ebook, Act Thin, Be Thin.