Losing weight may not be simply about the food you eat. Some behavior change research shows that your mindset may be a key factor in your healthy weight loss success.
That’s because our thought processes can:
- set and maintain our motivations;
- boost our confidence and commitment;
- shape our actions and goal;
- create new healthier habits;
- and help manage the stress and challenges that might cause us to slip.
All this mental preparation may add up to better outcomes and more sustained health and weight loss improvements — especially if linked to an eating plan that you enjoy and helps you manage your hunger and cravings.
This practical guide highlights our top 7 positive steps and mental skills that you can foster to create a winning mindset that lets you be ready, willing, and able to succeed with the diet you adopt.
- Motivation: Find and stay focused on your “why”
What’s your motivation for losing weight? What difference will it make to your life, your happiness, or your health?
Is the reason coming from you, or is someone else saying you need to slim down?
Your own internal reasons, arising from your own values and desires, appear to be more motivating and lasting than those suggested by others.
Finding your “why” can help sustain you through inevitable challenges and slips. You can ask yourself some specific questions:
How would you benefit from losing weight or changing your diet?
What are the good things that would come from weight loss?
What are the risks or negatives of not changing your diet or not losing weight?
What consequences might you face from not making a change?
You may have many different motivations. Common reasons often fall into two broad categories: health and appearance.
Appearance-related reasons can be compelling, but research shows they may be less enduring and more likely linked to possible negative results, including poor body image, low self-esteem, using unhealthy methods to lose weight, and, over time, gaining weight back.
Health-related motivations are linked to more positive long-term outcomes, including more weight lost and less weight regained, and — bonus — an improved appearance and body image as a by-product.
Explore a few health-related reasons to lose weight. It could be that you want to have more energy, better mobility, reverse metabolic syndrome, improve your heart health, experience less joint pain, sleep better, or to discontinue certain medications.
Some people post their “why” on their fridge, mirror, or cupboard, so they will see it daily.
Your “why” may change over time, so re-visit, alter, or update it to keep your motivation relevant and inspiring to you.
- Choose a diet that’s right for you
Once you know your “why,” the next mental task is to think about what diet will be best for you.
We believe a successful weight loss diet should be personalized and feel like a natural lifestyle choice and not a diet you have to muscle through. It should be satisfying, not leave you feeling hungry or deprived, and fit with your values, lifestyle, and food preferences.
- Plan for key challenges
What challenges and obstacles may arise when following your diet? What strategies could you use to overcome them?
Research shows that we are more likely able to avoid temptations when we anticipate them and have tailored our environment and relationships to support us.
Do an honest inventory of all the people, places, or things that may threaten to derail your commitment. Analyze when cravings or temptations are apt to arise. What environments, events, or emotions may make sticking to your diet difficult?
For every challenge or obstacle that you identify, think about possible actions you could take to avoid or overcome that challenge.
Does someone bring tempting food into the house? Can you ask for their support or plan an alternate food to eat alongside them?
Do you often pass a favorite donut shop? Can you take a different route?
Are you used to snacking as you watch TV or drive in the car? Can you change the habit or substitute a healthier snack?
Do stressful situations or unpleasant emotions tend to drive you to food or drink for comfort or release? Examine instances where uncomfortable emotions like stress, frustration, anger, sadness, shame, guilt, worry, resentment, boredom, envy, loneliness — or any other unpleasant feeling — has you trying to numb it with food or beverages. What could you do instead?
Is an event on the calendar where it may be tough to stick to your eating plan? Can you bring a diet-friendly dish? Or make a plan around the foods you can eat?
- Examine — but don’t believe — self-limiting thoughts
The mental exercise in tip #4 may have revealed an inner critic in your head.
This is the voice that finds fault in what you do or undermines your confidence in your ability to do it.
We all have that inner critic, but some of us have voices that are louder or more persistently negative than others. That nagging voice of self-doubt can undermine our efforts because we actually believe those thoughts to be true.
Thought stopping or other cognitive skills can help, but research shows that trying too hard to suppress negative or self-critical thoughts can actually make them more persistent.
Instead, people can be taught techniques to examine negative thoughts and diffuse them.
Approaches to disarm thoughts include the following basic steps:
Notice the thoughts that you are having. When and why did they arise? Is there a pattern to their arrival or a common situation in which they occur? How do your thoughts make you feel?
Accept or allow the thoughts to exist. Don’t try to change, suppress, or deny them. This allowance puts space around them. Some call it “watching your thoughts” as if they were balloons or clouds in the sky.
Don’t believe or identify with the thoughts. They are not you, nor are they true facts. They are just thoughts. When you notice that you are having a negative or difficult thought, say I am noticing that I am having the thought that …
- Make SMART goals
When we are trying to lose weight, it’s common to make vague aspirational goals or goals that are not in our control to reach.
A vague goal could be “I’m going to lose weight.” A goal that we can’t control is a number on the scale.
Instead, make SMART goals. These are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-based goals.
These are small individual steps that we can commit to for a specific time period and that we can control. SMART goals can often be translated into a series of healthy habits. For example, you can start preparing food ahead, shopping with a list, switching drinks to water or other no-calorie options, having healthy snacks in the car, or ready as grab-and-go items in your fridge.
- Reframe “failures” as learning opportunities
It’s inevitable: There will be days — or even weeks — when you go off your diet plan.
If it happens, don’t label yourself, or the diet, as a failure. Rather, mentally investigate what happened. What can you learn for next time? How can you get back on track?
Learning from failure is a key tenet in the business world. But it is also fundamental in the psychology of behavior change.
Whenever you find yourself “cheating” or slipping on the diet, just use it as a chance to learn what happened and then start again.
Some of your learnings may come from re-visiting this list of mental preparation. Tweak one of the tips and try again.
- Seek support
You don’t need to travel your weight loss journey alone.
A positive mindset for weight loss can be bolstered by support. Can a partner, friend, or family member do your diet with you? Or, look for an in-person support group, or an online community, to share your questions, struggles, and triumphs.
An “accountability buddy” — a friend or acquaintance who you report to or do the diet with — can be an effective way to keep your commitments and stay on track.