I’ve done more diets than I can count.
(if you are reading this, you probably have too).
Under the female delusion, if I could change my body, everything else would be somehow magically right itself in the process.
It didn’t work.
Hitting my goal weight hundreds of times. Looking in the mirror and seeing a flat stomach. 19% body fat, 18% body fat…. even 16% still left that sinking feeling.
It wasn’t enough. There was always more to do. In using THINGS to measure how I was doing; I was utterly disconnected from myself.
There is always something else wrong. My stomach looked great, but my ass had too much cellulite. Even though the scale says I only have 23 pounds of fat on my entire body, my arms still looked flabby. In aiming to find some sort of physical happiness, I found every possible flaw,
reminded by them by always seeing changing numbers on the scale.
Through 10 years at the gym, working with and talking to countless women, I have found some practices always fuck us up.
Mainly, I never do two things that have completely changed my relationship with myself, which, by default, changed my relationship with food. If you work with me, I will demand you stop doing them because they are bullshit practices that add no value to your life.
And if you are working with me, you know one thing to be true: We do not indulge in our bullshit anymore.
Never weigh yourself. Ever.
Weighing yourself does nothing for you but confirm what you already know.
If you feel chubby, bloated, and gross, the scale will show you a number that confirms it.
If you feel svelte, lean, and trim, the scale will show you a number that confirms it.
Or it won’t.
How many times have you stepped on the scale expecting to see one number only to see a number that was 1-5 pounds heavier? Then what happens?
Your whole day is ruined….
Weighing yourself is never productive. Ever.
If you feel “fat,” bloated, and not fabulous in your body, why do you need ANYTHING else to tell you that?
No. Stop using the scale. You have all you need to validate yourself already. Stop telling your body and divine intuition that you can not be trusted by always requiring a source outside of yourself to tell you what you already know.
Feeling skinny mini, slim, and trim like all your efforts are paying off? Great! Keep it!
You do not need anything else to tell you what you FEEL.
You are a grown-ass woman; you cannot trust the most basic feelings about your body? Do you really need a twenty-dollar piece of plastic to tell you something you already feel sure of?
Using anything outside of your body to tell you how to feel is trash.
How many times have you been sick, like really sick, throwing up basically shitting your pants and (of course) you step on the scale after, see you lost weight, because duh; you haven’t been able to keep food in your body, you see a smaller
number, and you feel proud.
Like you running to the toilet was something you did. If that isn't a HUGE red flag for us all, I do not know what is.
STOP. USING. THE. SCALE.
It is trash.
If I could drill this into every female brain, I would. You will never make a positive change with your relationship with your body if you think you need the scale to tell you how to feel.
Did you lose a pound? Great excellent we will have a good day!
Gain a pound?? Oh ya fat loser, you only get salads.
Does that make sense??
The scale could be down because you are starving yourself.
That is not good!
It could be up because you had an excellent workout, which causes your body to hold a little water, which will repair and rebuild your muscles. The scale will tell you that you are doing something wrong when you do the best thing you can do for yourself.
It rewards you for awful behaviors, telling you good job when you are dehydrated, under-nourished, and losing muscle. It punishes you for the stupidest things that are entirely out of control, like getting your period or merely needing to take a solid shit.
Stop. Using. The. Scale. Throw it out, now. Not tomorrow, not later on, and do not even bother hiding it. Toss it where it belongs.... in the trash.
Delete your calorie counting app.
This is the same as the scale. You are a grown woman; you can do amazing things, BUT you think you cannot self-regulate your calories??
Knock it off.
These apps are hugely problematic for so many reasons, the most prominent being they will give you enough calories to make it through 10am and then have you feeling like a failure when you go over 1200 they gave you.
I tracked for YEARS. Before, there was a My Fitness Pal to use. I had a straight-up notebook and calculator. For the record, I hate math….
I told so many people from the gym to use the Lose It app… and I hate myself for it! By then, I had the sense to know it drastically underfeed people, so I told everyone to put their weight in over 200 pounds with a goal of maintenance *which should have been a huge red flag for me not to use it! Hey, you can use this but do not put your real weight in. It will starve you…. When you know better, you can do better.
But Heather, if I am not tracking, I will fall off the wagon. Y’all. If I had a dollar for every time I heard that!!
If you are falling off the wagon, it is because of the calorie counting!!! (!!!)
What do you think is going to happen when you micromanage and restrict calories for days on end??
You will get hungry and eat!
That is not falling off the wagon! It is biology!
Stop using sources outside of yourself to tell you how and what to eat.
You know how to eat. We are all born with that fundamental knowledge. We just get all fucked up because diet culture feeds us lies that we can not be trusted to properly provide our bodies.
I have a deep metaphysical belief that women cannot hear or trust their intuition because we literally do not trust our guts. We need scales and apps to tell us what to eat. It makes zero sense. If you want to hear what the universe has to say to you, you first need to learn how to listen to yourself.
You will never be able to trust your gut when you refuse to listen to its most basic needs every single day.
Throw your scale out. Delete the App.
Both things will never serve you; they put a band-aid on a gaping wound that you need to let heal properly.
There is so much work we must do, so much we need to UN-LEARN. The first step is telling yourself that you can be trusted. You do this by allowing yourself to eat without measuring and FEEL without needing validation from a scale.
You are a divine being with incredible knowledge of how to nourish yourself. I know this to be true with every single fiber of my being. Start allowing yourself to tap into by tuning out the bullshit noise around you.
Clearly, this is something I am passionate about, and we have only touched the surface here. If you want to dive into un-fucking yourself from past diet bullshit, check out my January program linked below.