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DEL.ICIO.USDon’t Compare Yourself to Others
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Weight loss and achieving optimal fitness and health can be very challenging. Even with the help of someone such as a personal fitness trainer, most of the responsibility lies on you to reach the goals you want to achieve.
Clement Stone once said, “Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” By applying this ideology, you are more likely to reach your weight loss and fitness goals. As Clement Stone understood, failure or the perception of failure can be a road block.
Often times, I see this road block occur when you begin to compare your achievements against someone else. Here you are, weight training, doing cardiovascular exercise and eating right and you lose a couple of pounds in six weeks time. Then your friend goes to one of those diet centers and loses 20 pounds in 3 weeks.
The only problem with this, is that you are not trying to lose weight. What you’re trying to do is improve your overall health, increase your fitness level, and decrease body fat. As I have said a million times, “weight is nothing more than the force of gravity pulling you toward earth.” There is no diet that can improve strength, bone density, flexibility, etc.
When you are doing the right things and find yourself where you are comparing your success against others, just remember the story about the tortoise and the hare. At first, it may seem like you are not making that much ground. However, by the end of the race you are the winner. Don’t be concerned about others, just know that you’re going to get there.
Have you found yourself at a “mental roadblock?” If so, please share as to what you did to get through it and ultimately reach your goal?
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Comments
By Lynne Eldridge M.D.
July 23, 2007 1:14 PM | Link to this
Working with patients on a cancer prevention lifestyle, the biggest roadblocks in nutrition and fitness seemed to be money and time.
Instead of focusing on expensive health club memberships or their friends that were losing weight at the latest weight loss program, I would have them look across the pond.
In Sweden, individuals are trimmer and more fit than we are, but health clubs are fewer. They walk more. Period. Portion sizes of course are also smaller. Researching cancer prevention and weight control in Austria I also noted a similar trend. I don’t remember seeing a health club, but 80 year olds were passing me with ski poles hiking in the alps. Walking is free.
If you don’t have the time or money to get fit like your friends, invest in a good walking book with trails in your region and a Mediterranean cookbook. In addition to helping with weight control, the Mediterranean diet has been shown to lower the risk of death from all causes, not just cancer. If you struggle with portion-control (huge, since the average American woman is eating 335 calories per day more than she did 30 years ago) try out some recipes from the American Institute for Cancer Research (www.aicr.org), where they approach weight control from a “proportion” standpoint.
Lynne Eldridge MD Author, “Avoiding Cancer One Day At A Time” http://www.avoidcancernow.com
By Ed
August 2, 2007 8:41 AM | Link to this
Hey Lynne, It is apparent you completely went away from the point of the blog. Instead, you went on a rant about health clubs and just walking can be done for free. It is also obvious that you are promoting your own agenda to sell your book. Maybe, if more M.D.’s such as yourself would understand that telling someone to go on a diet and just go walk it off isn’t sufficient enough, more people would seek true professional help for a sustained lifestyle. -Ed