Chapter 1
This book is primarily for overweight and obese people, in particular those who cannot seem to control their eating. If you are fat and find it impossible to control the amount you eat or the foods you choose, then this book is for you. It is also for anyone who cannot seem to stay on a program of exercise. It is especially for you if you are in a state of desperation or despair, if you have tried everything under the sun to lose weight and, in the long run, failed every time.
I say “the long run” because every fat person I know has had partial, temporary success at least once. That’s why all the diet books out there are so popular. They work—temporarily. You can lose 40, 80, even 120 pounds on a diet of control and restriction. The problem is that when you run into a rough spot in your life, you lose control and put all the weight back on, and then some. That’s what is missing from those before and after photos. What about the “after the after” photo?
This book will explain the fatal flaw in diets based on control or restriction. And it will offer an alternative that is easy, natural, and that resonates deeply with your common sense. I have a very ambitious goal in writing this book: to transform your eating habits, your body, and your life dramatically and permanently. I am not going to tell you what to eat and what not to eat. This book goes deeper than that. Instead I will show you how to realize for yourself what foods truly nourish your body, and to choose them effortlessly, without self-discipline or willpower. This book will be fundamentally different from anything you have ever tried before.
You have probably been told that your problem is that you lack motivation and self-control; that you are lazy or indulgent or weak-willed or ignorant, and that’s why you are fat. You have been told it in a thousand ways, by a thousand judgmental glances as you push your cart through the supermarket, even when you walk into a room. Reading this book, you will see how it is not true. You already know it in your heart. You know that you have done your best. Soon you will bring this knowledge into your life.
The same goes for exercise as for food. This book is also for people who have ultimately failed to maintain every exercise program they’ve tried. I will show you how to free yourself forever from the drudgery of burning calories, and unlock the natural joy of movement.
It may surprise you to know that some obese people actually eat very little. Is this information comforting to you or alarming? It might be both, because it means that the key to healing your condition is bigger than changing what you eat or how you eat. The change will go deeper than that. You will not find a magic formula that allows you to change your diet and leaves the rest of your life the same. A saying goes, “You cannot change one thing without changing everything.” The result of this book will be a life, a body, and a relationship to food so different from what you have known, that you may hardly recognize yourself.
This book is especially for the obese, but anyone who struggles with food, exercise, or health may gain some valuable insights. Anyone who suffers from poor health due to uncontrollable urges to eat too much food or the wrong food will benefit from this book. If you are at a point of confusion or despair, so much the better.