Learning to Say No—The Secret to Weight Loss

The difficulty is, such cues from your environment might have induced you to gather the wrong lessons when it came to food consumption. Practice saying “no” to extra servings with the assistance of a friend playing the role of challenger is a good start for your weight loss plan. 

Perhaps from the time you were a youngster, you might have been a folk pleaser.  You tried to ace your schoolwork in order to win
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your parents' approval…you practiced soccer for hours on end to win a vote of support from your coach…or you diligently practiced your piano chords in order to earn the recognition of your music teacher.  There's nothing wrong with aspiring to please.  It can make you a respected leader, a valued friend, a comforting mentor.  However, it should be remembered that some food addictions begin with an inability to say “no.” This is the secret to weight loss.

Possibly, it might have begun with a Thanksgiving during your youth when your parent asked if you wished a second helping of mashed potatoes.  Or an educator at your elementary school might have generously given you a gold star if you cleaned your plate.  It is probable that you were taught that it is wrong to waste food and that a hearty appetite was a good thing.  The problem is, such cues from your environment might have motivated you to gather the wrong lessons when it came to food consumption.

Many people have trouble saying “no.”  Admitting that you have a difficulty over committing yourself is the first step to immediate progress.  It obviously shows that you have a great deal of additional insight into your own problems with healthy food and you wish to alter your bad habits and replace them with fine ones.  But this can be arduous, given the fact that so many families have a number of customs involving food.  In addition, unlike cigarettes or marijuana, food is not considered inherently bad—nor should it be.   However, you need to study how to use food effectively.

Therefore, integral part of your instruction begins with intelligently learning the potency of “no” or “no thank you.”  You instinctively understand that you are doing yourself no favors by reluctantly accepting extra helpings of pasta—in fact, you could be doing your body a great deal of loss harm. 

So what's the best way to formally undergo assertiveness training?  One primary method you can use is role-playing.  Practice firmly saying “no” to extra servings with the collaboration of a friend playing the role of adversary.  In this “pretend” state of affairs, you may feel more comfortable saying “no.”  You will also learn that saying “no” isn't the end of the world; that you will not necessarily lose friends by taking a “unwilling” stance.

Slouching clearly indicates defeat—a simple belief that a state of affairs is hopeless.   It can also help you with problem-solving, enabling you to work out approaches that you can say “no” without injuring another person's feelings.

Something else you will eventually need to learn is that it is not necessary for you to dutifully fulfill another person's expectation.  In other words, whether your Aunt Mary thinks you're eating enough really doesn't matter.  If you basically recognize that you are obese, Aunt Mary's personal opinion shouldn't be taken into account. 

Assertiveness will not happen immediately.  But, with regular practice, you can learn to firmly say “no” like a pro.  And you—and your waistline—will be better off as a result of what you've grasped. Weight Loss begins with restraint.