Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

The more I think about this, the more it makes sense. Weight loss is all a mind game. If you think you will lose weight, you will lose weight. Most of the time, it’s because we have a trust in a certain diet or exercise regime, but in actuality, it’s all in our heads. Jason Kottke wrote a pretty intense article about the subject here:

• Better living through self deception (kottke.org)

In the end, he uses a strange logic to sum it up:

“Perhaps the way to true personal acheivement and happiness is through lying to yourself instead of being honest, loafing instead of practicing, and purposely forgetting information. There are plenty of self-help books on the market…where are the self-hurt books?”

We want more. Sorry to break it to you, but no matter how awesome your car is, after a couple of months, you’re going to want a better one. No matter how lovely your house is, you’re going to want a better one (either bigger or in a more prestigious neighborhood). No matter how thin you are, you’re going to want to be better. As humans, we are wired for MORE.

How can we make eating healthy more like a video game? How can we give ourselves a score that we can compare? Maybe if we had some sort of composite number that rated our eating, exercise and mental state, we could compare numbers and compete to try to get it higher. We’re wired for this kind of competition, that’s why places like Weight Watchers work. We’re secretly very proud that we have our little five pound bookmark and all of its stars on it.

So much of weight loss is about LESS, though…

Losing weight is literally about making LESS of yourself. Eating less food. It’s the whole “Eat Less Move More” movement. I’ve got the Move More part down pat. I love to exercise. The Eat Less thing, however is really difficult and I think it’s the LESS part that makes it hard. Since we’re so wired to want more, the idea of less goes against every instinct programmed into us. Less is inherently AGAINST evolution.

Unfortunately, we’ve kinda made evolution obsolete…

We have been able to conquer famine, disease and even our aggressive nature. All the things that helped us survive famine are now causing a disease of their own. Our instinctual desire for more is making us slow and lethargic.

I have no idea how to get past this. Anyone have any ideas?

As an owner of a beloved black swimsuit, I thought I would disagree with Tish’s article when I saw the title. Instead, I was rooting her on!

• love and hope and sex and dreams: No More Black Swimsuits!

It’s time to buy a swimming suit for the season. This time, don’t hide behind black. Let yourself wear the suit you always wanted to wear, no matter what your current size. Life’s too short to wait to buy your dream swimming suit. You don’t have to be a size 0 to be beautiful. You’re already beautiful right now.

What if I could convince myself that I’m just that kind of person? You know what I mean. That kind of person that just eats whatever she wants and somehow stays thin. There are people like that everywhere. Medical science conjectures that it has something to do with genes, but what if it isn’t? What if it’s a decision?

If you could decide today what kind of person you could be, who would you be?

Would you be a thin person who wants to eat healthy?

Would you be an athletic person who likes to go for runs and bike rides?

Would you be a creative cook in the kitchen who can concoct delicious and healthy recipes?

Would you be a naturally simple eater, choosing only the healthiest foods?

What if all you had to do was believe it enough and you would become that person?

What if it’s not genes, it’s belief?

What would you do to change your belief about yourself?

I don’t know if I believe the idea that I have no control over my body’s ability to gain weight, but I do believe that part of the equation is my beliefs in myself.

This week, Iportion had a wonderful entry about why she likes and dislikes her home gym:

• Iportion: Book News, Home Gyms, thankfull

Here are her ideas:

Why I dislike home gyms

• Can be distracted by the open fridge or home snack bar. “This is my biggest issue which is why I do a lot of walks”
• Can get distracted by the computer.

Why I like home gym

• I do not have to wait long time to use my equipment. If I want to use my stability ball I use it. If a family member wants it I just use another favorite equipment since everything is what I like.
• I have no monthly fees.
• I don’t have to find a baby sitter. I don’t have to wait till my husband comes home.
• I can exercise even when I can’t make it out.
• If I don’t use my equipment I am wasting money.

What about you? What are you doing for exercise?

Do you have a gym membership?

Do you have exercise equipment at home?

Do you even need exercise equipment?

I love my treadmill, but I also get a lot of benefit from exercising around other people. I don’t like cleaning up their sweat, though…

In my past, I have done so many things to lose weight that I really regret now. Every time I starved myself to lose weight, I just made things worse for myself. Sadly all that starvation didn’t even work and just made my bingeing worse.

What have you done to lose weight in the past?

What worked, even if only for a short amount of time?

What was a complete and utter failure?

If you could go back in time and stop yourself, what would you stop? What would you encourage?

Can you stop the cycle now and start encouraging yourself today? What would you tell yourself today to help your future self?

I find it so disappointing that everything I tried as a teenager to lose weight was actually harming me and I didn’t even get thin in the end. If I could go back in time, I would tell my past self, “You can eat anything you want. You just can’t eat everything you want. God knows, I’ve tried…“

As a child, my grandma told me that no one would want to be my friend if I was fat. That’s why I try so hard to have friends. It’s like I measure my self-worth based on how many friends I have. Even if they’re not good friends…

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

Threadless T-Shirts is a clothing company that is a little different. The t-shirts are designed by the readers of their website. The designs are voted on by the readers of their website. They make limited editions of the designs and once they are gone, they’re gone. They even advertise thier t-shirts with pictures from their readers.

That’s what today’s shoutout is about.

Threadless uses a wide variety of their readers’ photos to promote their t-shirts. They have enough readers that they could choose only the hot girls with the large breasts to feature in their catalog, but they don’t. They choose the most interesting photos they are submitted. They are truly blind to discrimination based on body type. Here are some examples:

You can see their full catalog here:

Threadless T-Shirts – The full catalog of Awesome T-shirts

If you like these or any of the other shirts in the Threadless catalog, order them NOW. They only do limited runs and once they are gone, they are GONE. Once again, a Diversity Shoutout to Threadless for choosing models of all shapes and sizes!

Eating healthy and exercising regularly is work. Sorry… I know you’d like to hear that it’s just a walk in the park after you get skinny and being thin is a piece of cake. It’s not. It takes some effort. When you get thin, you have to keep eating healthy and exercising to stay that way. That’s how it works.

So, it better be worth it, right?

Why do you want to be thin?

What do you think will be better for you when you are thin?

What problems do you think being thin will solve?

What if you get skinny and you still have all those problems?

Is being fat really the issue?

Is there a way to solve those problems NOW while you work your way to being thin?

When I have arguments with myself about overeating, the wild child inside of me discounts all the reasons that I want to be healthy. I have to have some serious ammunition to fire back at her to remind her of all the benefits of eating healthy. What is your ammunition?

Just this morning, I looked at myself in the mirror. I was having an argument with the wild child inside me that wants to eat everything. Even though I felt sick to my stomach this morning, that little girl inside of me wanted to eat. “Why, why, why? Why won’t she let me eat healthy?” I asked her. “Why is it so important?” she asked me.

I don’t have an answer and it looks like thin people don’t either…

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.