SO, YOU WANT TO LOSE WEIGHT

You're reading this because you have, more than likely, tried many forms of weight loss in the past and been unsuccessful. The sad fact is that many of my Clients view hypnotherapy as a 'last resort' as opposed to something which they could try before dieting. This is a shame because I've designed a program to specifically help Clients address their relationship with food and lose weight - never to find it again. The program is in essence, a distillation of current thinking based upon sound science and psychological research into weight loss.

The program aims to change your established eating pattern and begin a new and positive relationship with food. No more dieting, but a new way of healthy eating which will be easy to follow and last a lifetime. You won't feel deprived, hungry or miserable. No 'fad' foods, no 'superfoods', no calorie counting and no weekly 'weigh ins'. There are no 'gym sessions' - just a gentle increase in the amount of exercise you are currently taking.

A good question to ask yourself is 'How did I get to be the weight I am?

This simple question has a surprisingly complex answer and I'm willing to bet that you've never heard this as part of the answer ... 'It's not all your fault'.

Food and Society

Food is central to our existence. We have to eat and there can be no doubt that eating is a social activity. We eat together, share meals, give and receive food as presents, celebrate occasions with food and make mealtimes an event. Media focuses our attention on the food we eat and its effect upon our physical and mental well-being. Here in the UK we are literally surrounded by food. We can buy food virtually anywhere, at any time, 24 hours of the day. Food is easily accessible to us and at relatively low cost wherever we are, at home, work or leisure. Shockingly, research undertaken in 2019 by the Guardian found that three quarters of the best selling snacks in hospital shops and canteens were rated as unhealthy.

I'd suggest that it is not society's fault that a particular person is overweight however, I believe that society certainly reinforces the difficulties of those who are attempting to lose weight. Society does this in a variety of ways through its emphasis on food. We are surrounded by food advertising. Whether it be Fast Foods, 'Health Foods', Junk Foods, Sweets, Fizzy Drinks Etc. Etc. Society promotes junk food. Almost daily we hear about research which offers conflicting advice about food. For example, until recently it was thought that drinking a glass of red wine every day was beneficial to health. Cancer Research UK now tells us that alcohol is one of the most well-established causes of cancer. We receive the message that some foods are 'bad' whilst others are 'good.' Some foods are 'trendy' whilst others are 'out' We are told that drinking alcohol is an enjoyable, social adult pastime, but other sources convey the message that drinking alcohol is dangerous, leads to accidents and causes cancer. These contradictions lay the foundations for confusion - just what is the real truth?

Switch on television and we are offered a vast range of cookery or food related programs to watch. TV celebrity chefs all make approving noises whilst tasting their creations and look like they are having a lovely time as friends pop round to try their culinary masterpieces. They want us to buy into the message that if we cook/eat this, our lives will be better.

When it comes to food, Society is saying - THIN IS GOOD. Just pick up any fashion magazine and you'll see stick thin models. The fashion show features similar catwalk models. Celebrities images in magazines and on-line are airbrushed to make them appear thinner.

Supermarkets conduct ongoing and extensive research into consumers and their shopping habits and they are adept at persuading us to fill our shopping trolleys. You do not realise it, but when you enter a supermarket, you are entering a psychological minefield. You are entering an area specifically designed to make you buy food. Just think for a moment - where in your local supermarket are the eggs and milk? They will be sited well into the store - why? To make you walk deeper into the shop passing shelves of tempting products. Bakery and flowers are at the front - why? You've just walked in and your trolley is empty, you're immediately face to face with beautiful flowers and delicious bakery items. Flowers reinforce the 'fresh' message and so you buy some bakery items! Vegetables usually near the entrance - why? Because you'll feel proud putting 'healthy' food in your trolley and will reward yourself from a less 'healthy' aisle later on in the shop! What about those free samples they give away? Yep, designed to make you feel guilty if you accept a free sample but decide not to purchase.

Supermarkets employ psychology with packaging (plain suggests cheap), colours (blue and gold suggests luxury) and product placement (sweets low down for children and those special offers are always at the end of an aisle at eye level). Supermarkets will routinely change their aisle product layouts because shoppers 'learn' where items are placed. Such changes are designed to make you search other aisles for your normal shopping items. The three for two or 'bogof' offer is a direct appeal to our primitive hoarding instincts.

Food is associated with good times. Good food, good company and good times right? The wedding breakfast, Christmas, Easter, Birthdays, Celebrations, even the Funeral Feast where good times concerning the recently departed are remembered and recounted. Food is deeply ingrained into our individual psyche. We use food as 'social glue'. The coffee and cake mornings, friends around for dinner, we give and receive food as gifts - birthday cakes, cup-cakes, hampers etc etc.

So, society is selling and promoting the message that thin is good. Yet society is bombarding us with food adverts, Supermarkets are using psychological tactics to encourage us to fill our shopping trolleys and serial dieting results in weight gain. Whilst all of these psychological tactics may sound simplistic, they've been shown to be very effective in persuading us to buy more food than we planned. Insidious really isn't it? It's no wonder then, that the overweight person may sometimes feel unaccepted, ostracized, depressed and confused.

The fact is that food is not only a requirement for survival, but is actually central to the positive functioning of our lives. That's a very sobering thought if your relationship with food is out of control.

The reality is that most people who want to lose weight are like you. I'm willing to bet that you have struggled with weight loss (sometimes over many years), experienced the misery of dieting, been a member of a slimming club, may even have tried pills and fad remedies - all to no avail. Most have not achieved the desired weight loss these regimes promised and some are suffering low self esteem, heightened states of anxiety and depression as a result.

If you really do want to become slimmer - forever - YOU CAN and I can help you do it in a supportive, sympathetic and effective program which if you follow and stick to, I guarantee will work for you.

If you want to lose weight, why not contact me? I can help.

Ian McLeod CHP(NC), MNSHP&M, DPLT