The noise around weight loss in January can be deafening. But what if you’re asking “can I lose weight without going on a diet?”

Because the truth is that you’re done. You’ve realised that on the surface, quick weight loss looks and feels like the ultimate life upgrade…but your body is screaming “I CANNOT do another diet”.

So in this episode I’m talking directly to that crossroads - the space where you’re done with the restriction and misery, you’re ready to find food freedom, AND you also want to feel good in your own skin. I’ll walk you through why diets may have “worked” on paper but have cost you your peace and self trust - and what to do instead.

We’ll look at how to create diet free weight loss, how to build healthy eating habits more effortlessly and how to stop the binge restrict cycle that you’ve been trapped in. So you can feel more confident in your body AND have the food freedom that you desire.

Key Takeaways:

• Why you can be “good at dieting” and still feel trapped, unhappy, and obsessed with food.
• The real cost of chronic dieting on your body image, self-esteem and nervous system.
• Three core foundations for wanting weight loss without going back to restrictive diets.
• How to start rebuilding trust with your body and relating to it as a teammate, not an enemy.
• The connection between nervous system and weight loss - and how to use that to create sustainable habit change.

RESOURCES:

Work with me: www.lifeeditcoaching.com

Instagram: @lifeeditwithalix 

Whatever you might think of diets, the truth is that the noise around weight loss is at fever pitch at this time of year.

And it feels like now more than ever.

With weight loss drugs booming, we are surrounded by examples of weight loss which are held up as the highest level of achievement that we can ever hope to make.

So it's no surprise that we still feel the pull towards having some of that for ourselves.

After all, we could be just a few pounds away from achieving all the happiness, confidence, and outside approval we could ever possibly hope for.

But what if your gut is telling you no more?

What if you know on a deeper level that you cannot put yourself through yet another miserable New Year diet, but you do also want to lose a little bit of weight?

Well, that's what we're diving into today.

How can you balance these two things, and what are the steps that you need to take to achieve the body confidence you desire without sacrificing your mental and emotional health to get there?

Welcome to the Busy Woman's Guide to Wellbeing, the podcast for women who are done with the hustle and are ready to feel at home in their own skin.

I'm your host, Alex Life, therapeutic and fitness coach for busy women who want to do less, live more, and feel good from the inside out.

Every week, I'm going to help you to cut through the noise, challenge the shoulds, and find new ways to live and move that actually feel like you.

Welcome back.

And of course, I could not do January without talking about diets, because they are likely a big old topic.

Good conversation.

Right now, you might not be talking about them, but even if you're not, there's a decent chance that old Mavis in the office is gabbing on about how amazing she's feeling now she's on her super easy new diet, or she started her first dose of that weight loss drug and look, no shade on Mavis.

We can all agree that we have been there before.

We've been in that early honeymoon phase of that new diet where it feels like it is the secret that's been missing from our lives for way, way, way too long.

But I'm gonna take a wild guess that if you are listening to this po, and certainly if you'd listened to more than a couple of episodes, you're probably not in that camp anymore.

Or at the very least, you have become a little bit more discerning about diets and you're aware that they're probably not the answer, and you're curious about some other options because we all know how destructive diets can be to our mental and our emotional health, to our body image, to our self esteem.

So if you have made the decision that that is not a road you're willing to travel anymore, that's what we're going to talk about today.

And that can be a really tricky time because we have all sorts of thoughts running through our heads when we reach that crossroads.

You know, I don't want to diet, but I do still want to lose weight.

We're not sure what that's going to look like.

We feel a bit lost in that because we don't have a roadmap for it.

The only roadmap we have is go on a diet that's going to get you the weight loss.

So we, we feel a little bit lost in that space of I don't want to do that anymore, I can't do that to myself anymore.

What am I going to do instead?

We also get worried that we're going to end up giving ourselves permission to eat everything and we're going to go in the complete opposite direction and we're going to ruin everything.

And there's sometimes also that little voice in there that's trying to persuade you, just one more diet, just one more, then you can finally relax around food.

But you're a smart woman.

You know that that is not going to fly anymore.

You've been there, you've done that.

It time to move on.

So today we're really talking about how to navigate that crossroads.

Because it's not as simple as just going right.

I'm just going to start listening to my body.

Everything's going to be okay.

It's not as simple as that.

But the good news is that there are some steps you can take to figure out this new balance, to figure out this new way of looking after yourself that is going to feel less like restriction and control and is going to be more about finding peace with yourself and finding a place where you can make the best possible choices for you.

And I honestly, I feel particularly qualified for this one because I have been through that exact moment myself.

It transitioned a few years ago from a life of constant diets to one where I have literally no desire to go near one ever, ever again.

And I remember that moment really clearly.

And I actually think it was one new year that my immediate instinct was, oh, well, I'm gonna have to go on another diet, aren't I?

I've just had a blowout over Christmas, probably put on a few pounds, so I'm gonna have to go on another diet.

But I just remember really clearly having this feeling of I can't, I cannot do that to myself again.

Just couldn't face the thought of another diet.

So instead I started to get more clear on what I actually wanted.

I started to get clear on how I wanted that relationship with food and my body to look like.

And I gradually started letting go of all of those areas where I'd been trying to stay so in control for so long.

And so I'd love to take you on that journey today too.

And the great thing about this is that when I did this, I didn't really know what I was doing.

It was messy.

I didn't really, I suppose, recognize what I was doing until later on.

It sort of happened naturally, it happened organically for me, but it took a really long time.

So I'm hoping I can cut your journey short.

Right.

I can tell you what I've experienced, I can tell you the route that I took and that's hopefully gonna help you.

And it's going to help you to make it a little bit quicker as well, I hope.

And the thing about this is it's not about just letting go.

Like I said before, we have that fear, don't we, when we're in this space, that if you go the route of just allowing yourself to listen to your appetite and eat what you want when you want to, you are going to just balloon.

You're going to put all the weight on, it's going to feel horrific and you are going to go in the complete opposite direction to the one that you want to be going in.

So I don't want you to feel like this means it's either one or the other.

It's either the diet or the complete opposite of that.

It's not.

We can find something in between.

We don't have to throw out every single food rule on day one.

We don't have to become diet free overnight because for most of us, that's just way too scary to contemplate.

So instead it's really about.

What are the things that you can start letting go of?

What are the things that are going to be safe or feel safe for me to let go of?

What can I do right now that's still going to feel good so that we can gradually lead ourselves to that bit more food freedom without completely giving up on the weight loss goals that you have for yourself now?

Sure.

Do you know what?

That weight loss might be a little bit slower.

Maybe you'll have to pause it for a little while.

While you get your head around this and while you really work on creating the right foundations.

But believe me, it's a lot flipping quicker to do that than it is to spend another year, another three years, another five years just going in and out of diets all the time, losing the weight, gaining the weight, losing the weight, gaining the weight.

At least this way you can spend a little bit of time up front, but you're creating a much more solid foundation for yourself in the longer term.

And I think a good start point for this today is really looking at why diets might not have worked for you in the past, or even if they have, why they're just not feeling good for you anymore.

Because the latter honesty was true for me.

In theory, the diet worked.

I put that in inverted commas because I lost the weight.

For the most part, I kept it off with that.

You know, those usual fluctuations you have as a dieter where you're always putting a few pounds on and then losing a bit, and then putting a few pounds on and losing a bit.

But I had just got to the point where, yeah, I was keeping my weight low, but there was a huge price that I was paying for that.

There was a price that I was no longer willing to pay because I was always thinking about food.

I was always thinking about my hunger.

I was always planning what I was gonna eat next.

I was always negotiating with myself.

I was constantly counting calories, counting points.

It was 24 hours a fricking day that these conversations would happen in my head.

I was never free of them.

There was also the negative body image feeling like however much I lost, it was never quite enough.

Because believe me, even when I was at my lowest weight, even when I was hungry all the time, I still felt like it wasn't quite enough.

Even when I reached the goal, it needed to be more.

I'd say to myself, okay, that's great, but if I could just lose a few more pounds, I'd finally be where I want to be.

I was never happy.

I was never happier.

My body image suffered because of that.

And I ended up in that binge restrict cycle all the time.

And it always felt like such a battle.

It felt like I had to gather so much energy to just go in there and start all over again.

It felt horrible.

And like I say, I did it.

I did it for years, but ultimately the price was too high to pay.

And that's the problem with diets, because either they don't work because you're constantly pinging around between.

Between being on it and Being off it, or, yeah, you do get to your goal, but there's a massive price to pay.

And the thing is, diets are built on mistrust.

They're not built on wisdom.

They're built on overriding your body's messages, because you feel that your body's messages cannot be trusted anymore.

So your default becomes override the hunger, override the instinct, and basically override everything that keeps you actually connected to your body into what you need.

And that in turn then creates a lot of stress instead of safety, because your nervous system feels threatened in that situation.

And it then leads to various behaviors that end up being completely counterproductive.

The binging, the stress, the emotional eating, things like that.

And when you reach a point in your life where you've just hit a wall with it all, where you're just not available anymore for that level of disconnect, it can feel really impossible to keep doing that to yourself, to keep putting yourself in that position over and over and over again.

So what's the answer to this?

Well, it's to kind of lean into the opposite of what I've just described.

And like I say, that doesn't mean big old scary.

Throw out everything and just trust your body.

Because if you have spent a long time not trusting your body, that is going to be virtually impossible.

That is going to feel way, way, way more stressful than even going on a diet.

So you don't have to lean all the way into intuitive eating.

But what it does mean is it means building a very different relationship with your body.

Building a relationship where you can actually work together, but doing it gently, doing it in a way that feels safe, doing it in a way that allows you to gradually take one step after another towards that level of freedom that you want to feel around food while still feeling like, okay, I'm also moving to a place where I'm taking better care of myself.

Because once you get there, that's when you can start to look at the weight loss in a different way.

You can start to take different actions that are going to be much more sustainable, that you can stay much more consistent with.

So here are the three steps that you can start making now that are going to help you to build this new relationship.

Because that really is what this is, is about.

A new relationship with food, a new relationship with your body, a new relationship with yourself.

We've got to create that first if we want to get out of that cycle.

So number one is starting to listen more closely to what your body is telling you.

And that is not just when it comes to food.

It's everything.

Noticing when your body is stressed and needs nurturing rather than your normal reaction, which probably is to push more.

That used to be mine.

I'm really stressed.

I'm really overwhelmed.

If I just do more and cross it all off the to do list, then that.

That's going to be amazing.

I wasn't listening.

My body needed nurturing, my body needed a bit of space, and I wasn't giving it that.

Noticing when you're hungry, but you're telling yourself you can't possibly be hungry or you can't eat now you've only eaten two hours ago.

Just noticing that.

Noticing when you're tired.

But your default is to either force yourself to do the workout or maybe skip the workout and then just feel guilty rather than just going, okay, I really needed that break and I'm glad I gave that to myself.

But what diets do and what diet culture does is it persuades us that the things that our body are telling us are not to be trusted.

And so we don't listen.

So when you start listening more closely, it's going to help you to start rebuilding that trust and rebuilding that sense of just.

You're working as a team with your body rather than against it.

I've worked with quite a few women where we've sort of talked about that.

We've talked about this idea of working together as a team.

And they'll always say to me, like, oh, my gosh, I'd never really realized how.

I almost saw my body as separate from me.

I almost saw my body as something that I had to fight a battle with all the time.

And that I really need to.

We need to be a team.

We need to be working together.

And that lack of trust, it means that you can't work as a team.

And the thing is, you're going to get it wrong.

You're not always going to know what your body is saying.

You're not always going to do the things that your body is telling you to do.

But this is just about starting to get into the habit.

You don't need to do anything with it yet.

And again, this is another concept I talk about with my clients.

They'll often say, okay, so now what do I do about that?

And I will always say to them, you don't need to do anything about it yet.

Yes, eventually.

But right now, you just need to be aware.

You just need to listen in.

You just need to reacquaint yourself with the signals with what your body is telling you that is such an important step, that reconnection.

So that's number one, start listening.

Not so you get it right straight away, but just so that you start to get curious about it.

Number two is to start building a more positive relationship with your body.

So again, a lot of our relationships with our body are about, ugh, God, I hate my thighs, I hate my cellulite, I hate the way my arm is jiggling, I can't stand the way that I look.

I need to change everything.

Okay?

We can't build a positive relationship with ourselves if we feel like that about our body.

So again, I'm not asking you to go in the complete opposite direction and stand in front of the mirror and say, I love my body.

Cause again, that's gonna feel very hard to do.

But start asking yourself, what do I actually like about my body?

What does my body enable me to do?

What feels good in my body?

So asking yourself those things.

So you're starting to build a more positive relationship.

This is more of a kind of two way relationship.

It's not just about you hating on it, it's about you understanding it.

Because I firmly believe that you cannot build confidence in your body while you're at war with it.

Nor can you do good things for your body when you're at war with it.

And I know that it feels like, well, I need to motivate myself by moaning about something like if I don't feel good about this, it's going to make me go to the gym.

But all I will ask you is, how's that worked out for you so far?

Probably not very well.

So where can you just make friends?

Where can you start to make friends with your body again?

You don't have to love it tomorrow, but you can start to make friends with it.

You can extend the olive branch, so to speak.

And that's on you to do that.

You have got to do that.

This step is so, so, so important because when you start to do that, it means you're ready to do things differently.

You're already saying to yourself, hey, I'm going to do things differently.

I'm not going to be at war with myself anymore.

I'm going to start to be more positive, going to start to build that relationship again and you'll still have bad days.

I have, but I went to try some clothes on the other week and I've got this real thing.

I should start a campaign actually.

I've got this real thing about changing room mirrors in shops and I'm sure that you, you feel exactly the same.

It highlights every single bit of cellulite that you've got.

And I'm fairly convinced creates cellulite that isn't even there in the first place.

And it's almost as if I don't, I, I actually don't understand why they do this, but it's almost like they choose lighting on purpose to highlight every lump, bump, everything that you don't like about your body.

And so just because you've got a more positive relationship with your body doesn't mean you're immune to standing in that mirror in the shop going, oh my God, I didn't even know I had cellulite there.

That's annoying.

I'm not immune to it, but 90% of the time I am a lot kinder to my body than I ever used to be.

Doesn't mean I don't want to change it sometimes.

Doesn't mean that I still don't have goals around what I want my body to look like.

But it comes from a different place.

That's number two.

And number three is working on nervous system safety.

Because when we're in fight or flight, especially when it comes to food and to our body, we are unconsciously driving the very behaviors we're trying to eliminate.

We are creating the perfect breeding ground for binging, for emotional eating, for comfort eating.

So the less regulated we are to start with, the more we're going to lean into those things which are not serving us.

So nervous system safety is really, really, really important part of this process as well.

And you know, I'd argue that that is domino number one in many cases is how can I be safe in my body as I am?

Because we're often living in a state of low level stress.

And we're actually going to go into a little bit more about that next week as well because I think it deserves its own time and space for a bit more exploration.

I think it is such an important part of this that I can't just say a few words on it and leave it.

So I am going to talk about this in next week's episode a little bit more deeply.

But suffice to say for now that it is part of that process.

So number one, listen more closely to what your body is telling you.

Just start to practice it for now.

You don't have to do anything with it for now.

Just practice it.

Number two, start to build a more positive relationship with your body.

Doesn't mean you have to love yourself overnight.

But what do you like about it what does your body enable you to do?

What feels good in your body?

And then, number three, starting to work on nervous system safety.

What are the practices that you can start to introduce to your life that are going to make you feel calmer, that are going to take you out of fight and flight more often?

What are those things?

Because that.

That is necessary.

That is very necessary if we are going to be successful in losing weight, but if we're going to do it in a way that is going to feel really good and really nourishing for ourselves.

So those are the three steps that are a really important part of this process.

If you want that relationship to look different, if you're like, I can't, I cannot do another diet.

This is not something that I'm willing to entertain in my life anymore.

But you, you still have these goals for yourself.

I think the two things, I know the two things can coexist because I've seen it.

I've seen it in my clients and I've seen it happen.

When we start to work on these elements and these things in our lives, like I say we are, we're going to go into a bit more depth, particularly around the nervous system stuff next week, because I think that that for me is domino number one.

If somebody is coming to me and their nervous system is unregulated, I know there's no point.

There's no point in adding a load of changes in.

There's no point in trying to make loads of progress because that nervous system is not going to support that.

But we'll talk about more of that and why that is next week.

But, yeah, we're going to really set you up this week and next so you can really start to pursue those positive actions to reach the goals that you have for yourself.

But do it in a way that is more aligned to how you want to feel about food, how you want to feel about your bodies.

And for now, I'm going to love you and leave you.

And I'll see you back here again next time.

Thank you, as always, for joining me.

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And come connect with me on Instagram @lifeeditwithalix for more real talk, mindset shifts and daily inspiration.