It’s a wonderful time of year. I’m a fall baby (September) and I truly love the changes that occur this time of year: cooler weather, soft rain, golden/orange hues, the ocean smells are saltier, the mountain trails more walkable. Currently, the smells of Halloween are in the air - chocolate, pumpkin spice, chocolate, caramel, chocolate…what’s a girl to do? Well, one thing the girl is NOT going to do is deprive. Over the years, as I have tried losing weight, one constant I’ve run into is that DEPRIVATION is the MOTHER OF WEIGHT LOSS FAILURE. I know that’s not going to sit well with some of you diet masochists that enjoy self-sacrifice the way some teenage girls enjoy cutting themselves so they can feel that adrenaline rush, but even you know deprivation just leads to bad feelings like being cheated, obsession, anger, frustration, jealousy, moodiness, etc…and those negative feelings eventually lead to closet eating, overeating, bingeing, giving up the diet altogether, etc. And these undesired actions lead to more negative feelings of guilt, frustration, hopelessness, inadequacy, failure, unworthiness, etc.

Aaargh! It’s a detrimental cycle to get warped up in. My clients ask me, “Why does that happen, that when I do go off my diet I eat the whole box of donuts instead of being satisfied with just one or two?????” Good question, I tell them. 

It’s like this, if I may illustrate. Say you’re eight years old, and daddy gives you a bag of animal cookies, telling you to only eat five. So you eat your five and realize daddy can’t tell whether you ate five or six, so you hurry and eat another one. Then, you realize the bag looks the same full with only one gone, so will he really miss it if you eat just one more? Then you eat another and another, as fast as you can because daddy can at any moment come out and catch you and you’d be in trouble, because YOU’RE DOING SOMETHING BAD AND WRONG! Well, eating a box of doughnuts is bad and wrong and we know it is, and we’d better eat it while we can cause this enjoyment is not going to last - someone is going to catch us and put us in the corner. Only now we’re forty, still feeling guilty and in-troubleable, but the truth and reality is no one is going to put us in the corner but ourselves. As soon as we come to our senses we are definitely going to beat ourselves up. Forget the word deprivation, except for when it comes to beating yourself up. Definitely deprive yourself of that!

Weird, huh?

So, forget deprivation. Cancel, Clear, Delete - as we in the mind-field say. Delete the word All Deprivation (when it comes to weight loss) and replace it with the much kinder word, Moderation. One piece of Pumpkin pie, why not? Whipped cream? Go for it if it’s worth the price you’ll pay - going to the gym the next day and spending an extra 10 minutes running/walking on the treadmill.

One last tip for getting through the holiday feasts (candy, Xmas fudge, brandy cakes, boxes of Sees, egg nog, mashed potatoes, sweet potato pie, pecan pie, jam cakes, custards, Santa cookies, cheese balls and crackers, cornbread stuffing, champagne, bread and butter…should I go on? I could you know, the list is endless…) without adding another layer of fat to the existing one - listen to your hypnosis tapes these days like a fiend! Twice a day if possible. It’s only an hour out of your day, and you’ll be more relaxed, and when you’re relaxed you make better decisions, are more focused, more intentional. You won’t want to overindulge, and you won’t even miss it. Like it didn’t even cross your mind.

Listening to your weight loss tapes will not only make a big difference in your eating this holiday. It’ll also take the edge off the stresses this time of year normally brings: shopping, traveling, cooking, relatives, decorating, finances, mall traffic, entertaining, etc…again the list is endless.

Luv, Gina 

www.EnterHypnosis.com“When you marooned me on that god-forsaken spit of land, you forgot one very important thing, mate: I’m Captain Jack Sparrow.” - Capt. Jack Sparrow (Pirates of the Caribbean)