New Resistance Training

NEW RESISTANCE TRAINING PROGRAM
- NOT FOUND IN GYMS -

A new type of resistance training is aimed at dieters, and you won’t find it in fitness magazines or exercise-related publications. You’ll find it in a new book, “The Beck Diet Solution,” by psychologist Judith Beck. Dr. Beck focuses on the psychology of permanent weight loss. Her mental approach to dieting is centered on changing your self-dialog regarding food and eating. By changing the way you talk to yourself when confronted with hunger, cravings, or tempting dishes of food, you can change the behavior that follows. The underlying theme of the book: strengthen your “resistance” muscles (ability to resist temptation) and weaken your “giving-in” muscles. In other words, strengthen your inner “motivating, championing voice” and weaken your inner “sabotaging voice.”

Dr. Beck’s approach is based on cognitive therapy (CT) developed in the 1960’s by her father, Dr. Aaron Beck, to treat depression, anxiety, and substance abuse. Dr. Beck uses the same CT techniques with her weight loss patients.

“CT is based on the concept that the way people think affects how they feel and what they do,” Dr. Beck explains. It is a great tool to help you recognize and change self-defeating thoughts and behaviors. She emphasizes that thought comes before action. “You may not be conscious of it, but you always have a thought before you eat. The thoughts that lead you to act in unhelpful ways are sabotaging thoughts. The thoughts that lead you to act in more productive ways are helpful thoughts.”

Cognitive therapy is an effective tool for teaching people how to respond to sabotaging thoughts. A guiding principle of CT is that beliefs and thoughts, as represented by words, have great impact on emotions and behavior, so what you are saying to yourself has the potential to become real. Inner dialog becomes the first line of defense against negative thoughts. When challenged with a nagging defeatist voice, it is important to respond immediately with an affirming, strong voice. This defense will help you later when the voice brings up all of the reasons why you can’t move forward. The repetitive use of the strong, positive voice will continue to disarm the struggles that lie ahead.

A Native American elder once compared his inner struggles with the inner sabotaging voice. "Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is unhappy, insecure and full of doubt. The other dog is joyful and confident. The unhappy dog fights the joyful dog all the time." When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied. "The one I feed the most."

If you have failed at dieting in the past, gained the weight back after the diet ended, or started out with great intensity and fizzled out after a few weeks, this book was written for you. The comprehensive six-week program helps you build the skills needed to enable you to:

· avoid cheating
· cope with hunger and cravings
· deal with stress and strong negative emotions without turning to food
· motivate yourself to exercise
· eliminate overeating, bingeing, and backsliding
· handle eating out, vacations, and special occasions

To achieve those goals, you must change the way you think. Valuable tools are provided throughout the program, including hunger monitoring scales, daily planning schedules, weight loss graphs, motivational cards for handling time/energy hurdles, and handy tips for eating out. The book includes 42 tasks that are specifically designed for your success and serves as a formula for a process that builds skill power, not will power.

After a few weeks into the program, success becomes a solid motivator. Momentum builds as positive results accumulate. And like other respectable life-changing programs, a firm commitment is required. You won’t see phrases like “instant success” or “lose 10 pounds this week” in her program. Clearly, the process takes work.

With daily practice, you can train the mental resistance muscles to become stronger at turning away tempting food in social settings, tolerating hunger, dealing with nagging cravings, and controlling emotional eating. In time, these behaviors become second nature and with each success, confidence increases. As a result, the process of weight loss becomes less stressful and less emotionally challenging.

It is important to remember that behind every belief there is a voice. The voice behind every negative belief is often self-defeating. With the skills that you will learn from Dr. Beck’s book, you will have a battle plan to defeat the sabotaging inner voice and energize the positive, motivating voice. Your increased self-confidence and resolve will affirm the self-talk that says “Finally, I can do this.”

This new training concept may be the “magic potion” that you have needed for awhile. In fact, my own clients are telling me that since I’ve added the Beck Diet Solution to my coaching sessions, they have a renewed level of self confidence. Now, they think that I’m a magician with a bag of tricks. No, I don’t have a magic wand and this new approach to weight loss is not an illusion…just a proven solution for a common problem.

Babs Hogan, M.Ed., is a Certified Wellcoach and ACSM Health/Fitness Instructor with 22 years in the business. She presents weight loss workshops in Texas and works with clients nationwide as a Wellcoach.

*For Maximum Balance Members, Babs is offering a free, 30 minute Wellcoach session for the first 10 responders via email. Contact Babs at Maximum Balance or at babswellcoach@gmail.com to take advantage of this offer and to find out more about how she uses the Beck Diet Solution in her practice.