Naming my Nemesis

Those of you who have known me a long time will be forgiven for thinking that cancer is the problem that haunts me. Dread disease takes a huge act of will to overcome and, all too often, saps the life force out of people, even when they survive.

So people have been surprised over the last few months as I’ve crept out of the closet and admitted my shame and frustration with the weight problem I’ve struggled with since I was old enough to say ‘More, please.’ Apparently, I’ve hidden my discomfort so well that close colleagues, clients and even family members have assumed I’m comfortable in my oversized skin (and there was me, thinking it must be glaringly obvious to anyone with eyes)!

Overweight and undertall

My nemesis is, and always has been, my weight; I weighed in at 9lbs 4oz in the delivery room and never looked back. Through school, my weight was higher than everyone else’s, while my height was lower. Despite my cuddly, smiley persona I’ve always struggled to come to terms with the woman in the mirror. Even my midwife insulted me as I stepped optimistically into the delivery room, ready to give birth. ‘Short, stocky women. My worst nightmare!’ said she. I should have punched her but I was too scared.

Over the years I’ve tried to maintain a balanced view, taking into account my strengths and talents, but all my successes and my proudest moments have been marred by a little whisper in my head, reminding me I’m fat, while many of my failures have been blamed on the same problem. It’s probably why I’ve always tried so hard and smiled so much – part of me is always apologising.

No wonder. Fat people are supposed to feel ashamed, aren’t they? The media and medical profession (while themselves having no sustainable solution to the problem) regularly vilify fat people in words and pictures. There is even talk of withdrawing medical care. Fat people are widely discussed as deluded, lying to themselves about how much they really eat, and lazy. Sometimes I think it’s the last permissible form of discrimination.

Calories don’t add up

I’ve often wanted to say to people, ‘Look, I faced cancer with optimism and determination, don’t you think I’d lose the weight if I could?’ But I  save my breath. It seems that very few people understand that the problem is more complex than calories. Previous attempts at dieting (and there have been many) have been futile or quickly reversed; gym memberships have been expensive and fruitless; self-help approaches have put sticking plasters over a very deep wound. In a world where nearly everyone is watching their weight, it’s difficult to convince people (or yourself) that you’re eating carefully too but just not getting the right results. The whole thing becomes one gigantic mind mess. At least it did for me.

My excess weight isn’t down to a lack of trying, it’s down to a lack of demonstrable solutions. I’m a logical person with a scientific mind and I have never been able to see a linear relationship between any of my attempts to lose weight and the result. I’m no quitter, but I’m not prepared to waste my time with schemes that don’t work. I always knew that there was a missing piece of the jigsaw – some metabolic detail that had eluded me and, presumably, anyone whose advice I had tried to follow. When I chose to change career mid-life it was with the hope that, in becoming a nutritionist, I would finally find the answer to my weight problem. Not many people are prepared to study for 3 years to find a solution. I held on to that as proof of my bona fides.

Still the answer didn’t materialise. Eight years after graduating and completely re-engineering my diet I found myself 35 pounds heavier than when I started. I was genuinely bewildered. And worried about my health.

A hopeless case?

I want to be normal-sized, healthy-sized. I don’t want to look as though my eating is out of control, as though I don’t care about myself or look after myself. I want the way I look to be a reflection of the way I eat and the way I care for my body. But I’ve never had that luxury. I’ve always looked as though I eat too many pies (and I’ve always known that I don’t).

When I decided to add coaching skills to my portfolio I decided ‘once and for all’ to tackle my weight problem. I started writing a weight loss blog early in 2010 and, during the course of the next 5 months, lost 20 lbs in a virtual starvation regime. My health, mood and social life suffered in the process and I realised it was an unsustainable way to live. I tried to kid myself that being slim wasn’t such a big deal, that there was so much more to life…

So I spent most of 2011 trying to ignore the problem. There had been other times where I’ve tried to double bluff my way out of the problem, believing that it may have its origins in a deeply repressed psychological trauma. I’ve argued that if I stop endlessly stressing about my weight and beating myself up, my body will eventually return to equilibrium. So I tried looking the other way again. Not surprisingly, I gradually put on all that I had lost.

My sense of failure was overwhelming. I felt hopeless.

Back to basics

It was from this place of deep and angry frustration that I decided, earlier this year, to have another look at what I ‘know’ about weight loss. My background as a fat lass, and my training as a nutritionist mean that I understand far more than the average person about how the body manages its food supplies and energy metabolism. I knew something was wrong with my body at a metabolic level and I was determined to find out.

Months of avid reading and research led me to look at one area of nutrition from a new perspective. I experimented with some dietary changes and the weight started to come off. The results were instant and impressive. I was recording my ideas as I went along and the notes were building into a book.

While this was happening I was also suffering from a sense of disbelief. Being bigger is so deeply ingrained in me that it feels like part of my identity and, even though I was finally losing weight, it felt as though it would all grind to a halt. On the other hand, I was excited. I’d discovered something ‘new’, something that other people hadn’t spotted, and it was working for me.

Facing my fears

It’s difficult to convey the energy that was driving me at this point, energy – and excitement. The ideas and the book were coming together at great speed. I was so excited by what I’d spotted that I was getting up in the early hours, reading, researching and writing all day, and going to sleep with my mind still buzzing. I’ve always found my work exciting and enjoyable but this was something else. My energy levels were fuelled partly by the dietary changes and partly by the knowledge that I was facing up to something that was such a big deal for me. Succeeding in this was important in ways that were so fundamental to my self-belief that they had been deeply buried beneath layers and layers of denial. It was like waking a sleeping dragon: terrifying and thrilling at the same time.

As a therapist I realised that I could be on to something important, something worth sharing. I realised that I needed to see if it could work for others too. It was in this frame of mind that I sent out an email asking for volunteers. Full of excitement and yet strangely scared that I would make a fool of myself. How could a fat woman like me help other people lose weight?

I needn’t have worried. I was inundated – both with volunteers and messages of support. Of course I was! Half the population needs to lose weight. It slowly dawned on me that this was not just something that was deep and meaningful for me, but had the potential to change the lives of hundreds of people. I managed to see beyond ‘my’ problem and started to see it as ‘our’ problem. That was an important turning point.

Over the summer I recruited a group of volunteers and we embarked on a trial together. The diet worked for everyone who engaged with it. From stressed-out executives with a few pounds to lose, to busy mums with a few stone to shed, the diet was easy to follow and showed impressive results. The Dissident Diet was born.

It’s Dissident because it looks at the whole idea of why we gain weight from a completely different angle, and challenges some of the conventional dieting myths. It’s Dissident because it recognises the disenfranchisement and frustration of people who feel victimised and pilloried by the fat phobic climate we’re living in and the lack of answers. It’s Dissident because it directly contradicts the idea that the only thing wrong with fat people is that they are greedy and lazy. It’s Dissident because it not only helps you lose weight it helps you gain health in a way that is the exact opposite of some of the commonly believed healthy advice.

Daring to be dissident

There are two possible happy endings to this story; I’ve been juggling with that knowledge for a number of years. In the first story the fat lady learns to love herself, warts and all, and they all live happily ever after. In the second version – the one I prefer – she overcomes her problem and then helps other people do the same thing.

There’s a good argument for learning to live with your flaws and embracing the ‘gift of imperfection’. But there is no justification for living with something that is crippling your spirit, which feels insurmountable, which makes you feel powerless and ‘less than’.

Only you can decide which ‘happy ending’ is the one for you.

I’ve been around enough overweight people now to know that it can cripple lives. People with huge talents to share with the world face prejudice and hold themselves back because of the size of their bodies. It’s ironic that obesity is one of the biggest and most widespread health epidemics in the world, affecting a growing percentage of the population, and yet obese people feel so alone with their problem.

The Dissident Diet is for all those people. It’s for everyone who is baffled by their size, who knows their body isn’t a true reflection of the way they eat, who feels the frustration of being overweight but doesn’t know where to find the answer, who feels defined by their weight but doesn’t want to be.

Since 1st July I’ve lost 2 stone. I’ve never before managed to lose weight on that sort of scale and I’ve enjoyed my life and my food and my social life at the same time. It’s a source of joy and excitement for me. I really can’t keep it to myself.

Stranger than fiction

Funnily enough, I never wanted to be the weight loss lady. My preoccupation with my weight has played such a dark role in my life that I’d rather put miles between me and the subject of obesity. My beliefs about the value of human beings – at least on one level – are that we should look beyond size and see the person. In my most frustrated moments that’s exactly what I wanted for myself, just to learn to live with being fat. So I find it ironic (and a little daunting) to offer my services as a weight loss coach.

But, like a reformed smoker, I understand the subject from the inside out. That puts me in the perfect position to help other people overcome their own weight challenges. I also have a little way to go myself. I need to lose at least another stone so don’t expect to meet a ‘perfect 10′ when you get in touch.

If you are struggling with your weight, I’ve got the answer you’re looking for.

Please call me.

01892 512842.

PS If you’re a regular reader of the blog and you know friends and family who would benefit from The Dissident Diet please feel free to pass this on to them!

PPS Nailing your Nemesis

It’s not unusual to discover that the thing that you’ve been ‘carrying’ all your life, the thing that seems to single you out from all the other ‘normal’ people, the characteristic that makes you feel ashamed and small and defeated, that you believe will hold you back, is also your opportunity to reach your highest personal potential. The dyslexic businessman, the blind composer, the orphaned philanthropist, the para-Olympian… we are surrounded by people who take the duff cards that life has dealt them and turn them into a Royal Flush.

My weight problem has been my nemesis; for you it might be a different challenge. If you’ve got a problem hanging over you that feels insurmountable and which is crippling your life, I hope you might reconsider and find the courage to tackle it. If you do, you might want to give me a call and book some coaching.

Will you throw the first stone?

The news is full of shocking stories about Machiavellian antics of our politicians, our press, and our bankers. It’s difficult not to experience a thrill of Schadenfreude as people who thought they could get away with it are brought to account for their actions. Tempting, too, to think we are rooting out some of the endemic corruption in our society.

Sadly, when I observe what we are doing to the next generation, I fear we are making things worse. My misgivings have crystallised as I’ve helped my daughter choose her university options and consider writing her ‘Personal Statement’: the one personally written piece of the application that is supposed to reflect who you really are and why you deserve a place at college.

Everyone says it needs to be really upbeat and positive, projecting yourself in an exciting and persuasive way. Tick. A few people have told me it’s normal to exaggerate. OK… One or two have told me it’s fine to lie: everyone does. Wot? Except, they say, you can’t lie on an Oxbridge application because you have an interview and you might get found out.

Oh, right, I get it. It’s OK to lie unless there’s a risk of getting caught.

Sounds like something I’ve been hearing in the news.

Of course, this puts us all in an impossible situation. As parents we rightly want our children to have their fair share of the world’s resources. We’re genetically hard-wired to help them compete and to sniff out ways to fast-track them to the top. It’s called survival of the fittest. If you know everyone else is exaggerating, are you really going to encourage modesty? What’s wrong with a little exaggeration?

But where is the line?

As we did our mini-tour of a couple of universities last week the tutors we met were, quite honestly, scathing about personal statements. ‘Sorry, but we’re not interested,’ said one Oxford tutor, ‘ in whether or not you’ve been away saving Bolivian orphans.’ In Bristol, they told us they’re only interested in why you want to study your subject and not to ‘waste words on why you want to save the world.’

Why? Because they’ve heard it all before and they’re intelligent enough to know that most teenagers don’t organise trips to Bolivia off their own bat and that they, and we, are being exploited and manipulated to build juvenile CVs that look exciting before they’ve had their first legal pint. Our expectations of our 17-year old population are so crazy it’s no wonder they feel the need to lie.

Why am I sad? Because underneath the sophistry that encourages our kids to start ‘exaggerating’ their good points is another, even more damaging, message. We’re telling them they’re not good enough, not special enough, not unique enough to impress us. They must pretend to be someone bigger, better and more accomplished than they really are.

Frightened? Because we can see all too clearly the effects on our society of lying and cheating to get ahead. Most of my generation were brought up to tell the truth; imagine what havoc can be created by a generation brought up to lie from the cradle!

Of course, you won’t want to put your child in harm’s way, or make an example of them. So you may tell them they have to do it like everyone else because that’s the way the world works. Which is another way of telling them that they are not strong enough to change the world.

And that, I’m afraid, is the message that will set the example for yet another generation that cheats really do prosper.

In a world were everyone has done something ‘amazing’ it takes something very special to be exceptional. That would be the person who is brave enough to tell the unadulterated truth about themselves.

But how would they get anyone to believe them?

__________________

There is a spooky similarity between mine and the wonderful Neil Crofts’ Monday Morning message this week. Maybe there’s hope after all.

Dealing With Infinity

We are living in the age of infinity. Never before have we had so much: so much money, so much opportunity, so much leisure, so many ‘things’, so much to eat. It’s difficult to cope with such abundance. Most of us can’t handle it, we don’t know when we’ve had enough: whether it’s money, status, fun or food, many people feel hopelessly out of control, unaware of where the stop button is. We plan our lives around what we are going to have next rather than what we are going to do, or be, next. Some of us need to invent a feeling of scarcity so that we can feel better, more contained. While we watch the gap widening between the financiers, the celebs, the footballers and the rest of the world we know that there is no longer any reason why we couldn’t be living like that too.

We’re told that the only constraints are our own limitations, our own blinkered perspectives, our inability to think big. It can lead to a state of permanent dissonance, a gnawing discontent or restlessness that’s hard to define. We can always do more, think more, earn more, exercise more, spend more.

Maybe. Or maybe, if you take the time to look at what you want out of life, you’ll find that for you happiness lies in a different direction.

Much of the dissonance we feel is around the way we measure abundance. What does it mean to be fulfilled? We tend to believe that the answer is to have more but the state of our society, where people own and earn more than ever before, doesn’t bear that out. One reason people were happier and healthier during the war because there was an intrinsic comfort in being told what to do, what to eat and how to behave. Many of life’s big decisions were taken away. Self-discipline can be more comfortable than self-indulgence. Having it all may not be the answer we need.

Of course, it’s natural to want more; it’s deeply imbedded in our human nature. But more what?

There is a middle way between self-discipline and self-indulgence; let’s call it self-actualisation. It’s about deciding what you want out of life, working out what ‘more’ means to you. It’s not necessarily easy – you’ll have years of conditioning in seeing yourself through the eyes of others. You may be a complete novice in working out how you feel and how that relates to what you want. You might also have to deal with internal or external resistance as you set your sights elsewhere – higher or lower than people around you think you ‘should’ be aiming for. It’s certain that you will struggle to decide what enough means for you and it will be difficult to stay true to your own definition and ignore the messages all around you to live it larger.

Above all, it’s a decision to enjoy your life. To value your days as much as your holidays. To value your time and the work of your hands as much as the package you’re on. To swap mundane for meaning, to switch from effort to flow, to change from their agenda to your agenda. It’s a decision that silences the cacophony of the more, more, more society and allows you to achieve that rare feeling of ‘enough’ that is so elusive and yet infinitely more comforting than the alternative.

Pay Careful Attention – Your Life Depends on it!

You know this already, but today is my day to remind you.

Your attention span is finite.

You are allowed to choose what you pay attention to… but you probably don’t exercise that choice as much as you want to, or need to.

You can spend all day paying attention to your normal routine, your computer screen, your aching knee, or your plans to spend money (often disguised as the next exciting thing in your life). Or you can spend your day creating a more interesting route, taking the chance to look out of the window, finding a new way to stretch and move your aching knee, or exploring life beyond the constraints of what money can buy.

Some forms of attention are mutually exclusive:

You cannot appreciate your wellbeing while focussing on your poor health.

You cannot be creative while doing what everyone else does.

You cannot be true to yourself while betraying someone else.

You cannot enjoy your wealth while worrying about your poverty.

You cannot be at peace when you are waging war.

You cannot enjoy now while planning what’s next.

You cannot learn until you are willing to now know.

You cannot love yourself while you are hating others.

You cannot win if you are not prepared to lose.

You cannot be unless you are prepared to not do.

The things we focus on and which claim our attention are the most important indicator of the life we experience. It really is that simple.

Nothing else has to change – just the things that we let our mind settle on.

Find your own Genius

I felt so sorry for the orphaned Apple execs who were tasked to get audience moving in the Apple Special Event yesterday. As I watched the presentation I found myself missing Steve more than ever – and really rooting for the guys on the stage.

And they needed it.

Don’t get me wrong: the products are still out there and the presentation still rocks – but something is not quite right. At around 22 minutes Tim Cook was clearly struggling to maintain his momentum and, quite simply, to remember what he had to say. The effect was that he disappeared into himself and lost vital connection with his audience. He didn’t display that relaxed and easy confidence that we’ve come to associate with the Apple Events. He clearly wasn’t in his comfort zone. He wasn’t doing it his way. The pressure must have been unbearable. I wanted to take him to one side and make him a cup of tea.

Having just finished the Steve Jobs official biography I know how hard Apple have tried to inculcate Steve’s values, inspiration and, yes, rules deep into the organisation to ensure the continuity of the phenomenon that made a dent in the universe. I’m sure they’re right to do that. Apple has a unique way of working that needs to be captured and nurtured.

But it would be a mistake to think that individuals in the organisation also need to copy Steve’s style. You simply cannot be your best while copying someone else. We all know that Steve could present without notes, and without prompts and that he detested Powerpoint presentations. His ability to mesmerise audiences by simply being there was part of his own special genius.

Steve had an inimitable style. Inimitable. No one else will ever be quite like him. So don’t try.

To Tim Cook – and everyone else who feels they’re following in the footsteps of giants – the simple message is to stop trying to be like someone, anyone, else.

Find your own Genius.

It’s in there somewhere.

And when you do, and you add it to the achievements of those who have gone before you, you’ll be creating something even bigger and better than you – or they – ever dreamed of.