Ep #86: What Freedom in Weight Loss Really Is

You are listening to the Weight Loss for Successful Women podcast with Shannan Christiansen episode number 86. Welcome to Weight Loss for Successful Women, a podcast for women who are ready to break the diet cycle and end their struggle with weight for good. Here’s your host, fortune 100 executive, and certified life coach, Shannan Christiansen.

Hello love, so happy to be back with you. Episode 86. Ooh, I love today’s show. This was critical what I’m going to teach today for me to learn in my own weight loss journey, and I cannot wait to share it with you today. But first, as always, I want to give a listener shout out. This is where I’ll read a review of the podcast every week. And this week’s listener shout out is to museforyou1963.

She left a review on iTunes. I love listening to Shannan’s podcast, and the most recent one on quick fix!! In the past, this was my middle name. I tried everything and this kept me stuck on the rollercoaster. Shannan explains that it’s detrimental to be present with the process and living every inch of our imperfect roadmap. She reassures us it’s not always a straight line. This is where we can be intentional with our new thoughts, new habits, and make sure we keep our mind on our successes. This will help us navigate to our goals. I love listening to Shannan’s podcast as I learn a new a nugget each and every time to help me reach my goals. So much love Shannan.

Oh, so much love to you museforyou1963. I love the reviews. I do. I read everyone. I like scout out iTunes just so I can see if I have a new review. So I really appreciate them. And I just want to thank all the ladies who take the time to leave a review. It really does mean a lot to me.

So ladies, I am so excited. We are getting ready for some fun stuff in Transform. We are getting ready to do a five day challenge. And you know ladies, I love the five day challenges. They are free. And this is how I like to do an immersive experience for free for ladies so they can get an introduction of this work. If you’re new to this work and you’ve never done a challenge, or I know we have lots of repeat challengers and some of my Transform ladies love to do them too. They just love the immersive experience. You can still register until May 22nd at bflycoaching.com/mayfun. I just love watching ladies show up and learn this work. It is so life changing.

So I’ve had the best week. I mean, most of them are pretty amazing, but we went up north and I spent a couple of days resting and relaxing. It was so beautiful and Paul and I can not wait to go again. It really made me slow down. And when I came back I knew I needed to do some work on this. I did a little bit of, well, a lot of reflection while I was there. I have a pretty full life and I’m always going. So when I came back, I recommitted to rest and relaxation, putting it on my calendar. I took most of Sunday off to rest, spend time with Paul and just relax. It was so amazing. We also celebrated our little Punkin, Wyatt’s third birthday.

I can’t believe he’s three years old. He is so sweet. It was super fun having a little party for him. He is such a cutie. He’s kind of wise beyond his years. I don’t know, he is. He is so smart and just, I don’t know. He is, he’s just beautiful. He is goodness in a little body and you know, I just love all my grandbabies and my family. And I just always feel so blessed to have them around. It really is truly a blessing in this life for me.

So let’s get into today’s show. So my love, I was an all or nothing kind of girl. I mean, that is how I labeled myself. I was either restricting or overeating. There was not much of in between. I had been on diets for so long and just believed that I never could find sort of a middle ground. I thought this is who I was. It was not just dieting. It was many other areas of my life. Like money, relationships, movement. What would happen is I would tell myself, I should do this or should do that.

Then I would restrict, tell myself that I did not have the freedom, the freedom to choose. When I was eating foods that fueled my body I would think of it as restriction, as I could not have the foods I enjoy because I have labeled my food good or bad. So many of the foods I enjoyed were on the “bad list.” When I first work with my clients, I want them to make a realistic plan, a plan of what they’re going to eat, that’s realistic. I do this because I want to break the diet brain, the brain that tells us when we eat food that fuels us it’s restriction. And when we eat the bad foods, it’s freedom. Yes. What did I just say? Now, come back to me if I lost you.

When we eat food that feels good it’s restriction, and when we eat “bad foods” it’s freedom. We believe that freedom comes from eating all the things. But I want to challenge that thought because it is a Lizzy thought, a thought that comes in when Lizzie wants a dopamine hit. Because when you carry extra weight, when you feel sluggish because you overate, when you can’t get on the floor and play with your kids or grandkids, when you can’t wear the clothes you want. I mean, when you can’t put whatever that is in there for you, I could go on and on, my love, that is restriction. See, it’s just a lie that we tell ourselves, that freedom is eating all the things.

But it’s not. It is actually a prison of weight that you live in. I know because I lived in it for 38 years. It keeps you restricted by not living your best life, the life of your dreams in a body that you love. We often think I can’t have that, and when that happens, Lizzie she wants to rebel. We all have this rebel inside of us.

And when we think of restriction we want to rebel, but the person we’re rebelling against is us. It’s not our mothers, the diet industry, our partners, the person who called us fat when we were 12. We are rebelling against ourselves, because when we carry extra weight, live in bodies that feel like prisons, we suffer, so we are rebelling against ourselves.

We are causing our suffering. This is so important to understand where you’re starting from and the thoughts that are going around in your brain, that then you’re acting from. I think of my grandbaby, and if I tell her no she will want to do it more, maybe not in that moment, but she’ll secretly do it behind me  sometimes. I think of this with markers I have in my office.

I will tell her no, not right now. Then I will come back later and see that she’s drawn all over my easel. See our brains are wired that way. When we say no, we want to rebel. But the crazy part is that we pay the consequences, the long-term consequences for these short-term decisions. These short-term, I’m going to eat the extra thing that’s not on my plan. These short-term decisions have very long-term consequences. See the long-term consequences for my grandbaby is now the markers are up and I don’t let her draw on my easel for a bit. So my love, you can restrict, or you can allow.

So I want to talk about allowance, allowing yourself the freedom to choose what goes into your body, the allowance to not name food good or bad, but just food that fuels you or it doesn’t. I have all the foods in my realistic plan. I allow them. Now you may be thinking, if I allow I will go off the deep end and I’ll eat all the things. And at first, when you’re learning this process, I see this with my Transform bosses, it may happen. You may eat more than you want, but the more that you allow and choose what you want to fuel your body, the more you will lose weight and lose it for good. This is the process because you will start to rebel less. You will start knowing that the real freedom is when you live in a body that feels good, that has energy.

I was talking to one of my mentors, Deb, today and she was talking about how when she used to rebel, it was like an all out binge fest. But as she’s gone through this work and doing it, now if she starts to have an overeat she knows the triggers. She sees them. And it will be a small bag of chips rather than, you know, bags of chips and pretzels and snacks. I mean, you know ladies, the whole thing. And I know this in my own work too, I would go on full on binge fest for days, weeks, months. And now if I have an overeat, I can quickly take the next best action.

I think we believe that we just want to be fixed that we don’t want Lizzie thoughts, but my love, we are humans. We have Lizzie brains and those thoughts will come in. But through this work, through the process that I teach, you will know what to do. You will know how to handle it so you can lose weight for good and get off the diet roller, because our brains they have faulty thoughts, thoughts that are not true.

Like I can’t have this, because my love, you can always have it. You can always eat it. It is just a lie that we tell ourselves so that we can disconnect overeat and buffer with food. My love, you are not off or on, you just are. Food is not good or bad. It just is. Freedom is living in a body that you love, that has energy and feels good. Freedom is not eating all the things.

So to summarize, allow yourself to choose what you want to eat by making your realistic plan realistic. Tell yourself the truth about freedom versus restriction. When you want to start to rebel, come into awareness and tell yourself what the truth is, that you are in control and you’re choosing whatever it is. Remind yourself that rebellion causes your suffering and allow yourself time in the process.

When you start learning how to break your diet brain, allowing yourself to choose what to eat, Lizzie will pipe up. She’ll pipe up with all sorts of lies. But my love, just keep telling yourself the truth. Write it every day. One of the thoughts I love to practice is I choose what to eat and real freedom is living in a body that feels good, and that is freedom.

So the transformational questions are one, What are the consequences suffering that you’re living with right now because of how you think of your weight? Number two, What does allowance mean to you? Number three, What is the next best action that you can do to have more allowance and freedom in your life?

Ooh, so good my love. And if you need help implementing the tools that I teach and going deeper on this work, I invite you to join Transform Weight Loss Program. This program is based on three elements: coaching, community, and a weight loss course. This program will help you implement the tools so that you can live your best life in a body that you love. Go to bflycoaching.com/join to learn more. So much love. Bye for now.

Thank you for listening to this episode of weight loss for successful women. If you love what you heard today and want to learn more, come on over to bflycoaching.com. See you next week.