BodyBoffin goes Live!!

The most exciting news!  My new BodyBoffin website is being launched tonight.  www.bodyboffin.com

The website will be dedicated to finding ways to improve our body image and break down barriers to feeling fabulous.

The response to my initial blog has been fantastic.  There are so many men and women out there that are constantly beating themselves up about the way they look and focusing on all the negatives.  BodyBoffin.com will show people that feel like me that they’re not alone and there are ways to turn your thoughts and feelings around. 

Come and visit!  See you soon.

www.bodyboffin.com

Is your Inner Dialogue holding you back?

If you passed a stranger in the street chatting away to themselves you’d think they were ‘not quite right’.  Well, I would!

But what about the internal chit chat that’s going on in all our minds?  Other people are not privy to our inner conversations and thank goodness for that!  Well, unless by some obscure mind reading ability.

Georgia Foster, in her book The Weight Less Mind, defines this internal chit chat as our ”Inner Dialogue”.  What’s really interesting is that this Inner Dialogue consists of numerous voices, each representing a sub-personality or part.  This is known as the Psychology of Selves.  The different sub-personalities develop unconsciously during childhood with their main aim being to protect us.  As babies we’re completely vulnerable.  Our core selves build within the first few months and years, controlling our behaviour in order to deal with all that comes our way.   

Georgia identifies 4 key selves that tend to control the inner dialogue of people struggling with weight and food related issues.  These are:

1. The Inner Critic
2. The Pleaser
3. The Perfectionist
4. The Inner Child

Georgia explains that although these voices developed to help us avoid pain they “have the power of holding us back” and are often emotionally self destructive.  Our inner conversations become our reality and therefore the controlling (loudest) voices drive our feelings and actions.  I know for me my Inner Critic is horribly vocal, constantly reminding me how big I am and that nothing looks good on me so why do I bother trying.  After years of my Inner Critic leading my thoughts I truly believe that I am over weight and always will be… no matter what the scales tell me.

The Weight Less Mind uses Voice Dialogue tools and techniques to enable us to recognise, understand and work with the different selves that influence our thoughts, feelings and behaviour.  It then goes a step further, aiding communication with our core parts and also, strengthening the opposing personalities that have been pushed back.  Georgia specifically talks about the Slim Confident part that exists in all of us that has been suppressed by bullies such as the Inner Critic.

What makes Georgia’s methods so successful is that she uses hypnosis to reach the unconscious mind and fill it with more positive, helpful messages.  Georgia equates this to filling your “memory bank … library” with “information that reflects what you want to feel” rather than how your Inner Critic and other core parts have led you to feel.  The mind doesn’t understand positive and negative, only what it hears more of.  It therefore follows that the more we fill our minds with thoughts we want to believe, such as ‘I do not need food to deal with stress’, these thoughts will become habit and will help change unwanted behaviour such as overeating.

I highly recommend reading The Weight Less Mind.  It’s opened my mind and I feel more aware of my core parts and where the self destructive thoughts are coming from.  The book comes with a self hypnosis CD packed with positive statements.  The only struggle I’ve found so far is staying awake when it’s played – so relaxing!

Visit Georgia’s website … www.georgiafoster.com The book and selfhypnosis CD is available as an e-book.

Long term, sustainable weight loss…

I was very sad to learn last week, although not surprised, that there’s no quick fix solution that results in sustainable weight loss.  Bugger!

I had the pleasure of meeting Vanessa Shaw, the founder of Simply Zest (www.simplyzest.com), last week.  A BIG thank you to Vanessa for sharing the following fabulous advice with us… (I’ll post the interview recording very soon – once I work out how to download it off my audio recorder!!)…

“Lifestyle Guru” Vanessa Shaw’s philosophy is based on long term, achievable weight loss.  Although the media is filled with tempting short term answers, such as our favourite 2 week diet and exercise blitz, they will not lead to lasting weight loss or help to increase vitality.

Vanessa focuses on health, well being and particularly weight loss.  Unlike some professionals, Vanessa believes that losing weight is important (where there is weight to be lost!) and through achieving realistic weight loss goals your overall health, well being and outlook on life is improved.

A key success factor in Vanessa’s work is understanding ingrained habits such as those inherited from family, relating to food, exercise and the way we deal with stress.  I was amazed to find out that about 85% of our behaviour is actually habit and undertaken subconsciously.  That’s pretty much everything we do!

**Note: the above picture of Vanessa Shaw has been copied from www.simplyzest.com

Another important aspect of behavioural change is the way we actually think – our thinking habits.  This includes our beliefs and state of mind, all those lovely negative body thoughts included.  Yikes!  That’s a whole lot of bad habits!  The Simply Zest approach is to support us to not only identify and understand these bad habits but also to “create new healthier, more helpful ones for the future”.

Readers out there will be excited to know (as I was!) that the starting point with Simply Zest is taking action and helping us to actually lose some weight.  Ah, music to my ears!  Although I really need to learn to love myself more and change my inner thoughts, deep down I also know that I truly want to lose weight.

Vanessa’s advice is to take a whole of life approach and look at the big picture.  Physical exercise is not enough and in order to achieve our goals we need to feel good about ourselves.

Wouldn’t it be absolutely fabulous to have Vanessa work with you one to one??  After we’d talked I felt like signing up there and then.  But I know that it’s not possible for everyone.  So, Vanessa left us with these tips and advice:

• Life is too short to be spent miserable.  Think about all the time and effort you’ve spent focused on feeling crappy about yourself and make a conscious decision to take action.  Re-educate yourself about healthy eating and set realistic, achievable goals.  And the most important part, “bask in the glow of achieving those goals”!
• Set realistic goals that are achievable.  Remember that real women aren’t perfect!  “Move beyond the quick fix”.
• Try keeping a food diary.  Write down everything you eat and drink each day and the time you ate.  This will help to increase your awareness about what you’re eating and not eating.  Look for trends and triggers.
• Find out what works for you.  Be realistic and make sure your goals fit in with your lifestyle.  “Life is for living”!

Interview recording to be posted shortly!!