On the surface, the recipe for weight loss sounds so simple – “eat less, move more.” Yet there are many smart, busy women – high-achievers – who are incredibly frustrated with their lack of success with lasting weight loss.
Here’s why high-achievers struggle to lose weight – and what to do about it.
Superwomen, who pride themselves on willpower, discipline, and results in other areas of their lives, sometimes feel like overeating and weight loss are the only places they don’t feel effective – no matter how determined they are or how hard they work.
When things don’t work out, frustration levels, feelings of guilt, and even shame can get pretty high. It’s so simple after all.
The problem is, it really isn’t that simple. Eat less, move more is not the complete equation, and if that’s all you focus on, there are some critical areas that are likely to sabotage you – especially if you are a high-achiever who wants to lose weight.
Especially if you are superwoman.
Why superwoman overeats (and yes, I’m talking to you).
You may not wear a cape or a spandex outfit, but if you’re reading this, you just may be a busy, high-achieving superwoman.
If:
You’re the woman who makes things happen in most parts of your life. People count on you to get the job done.
You juggle family, work, home, and everything else.
When the going gets tough, you keep going.
You are busy busy busy.
You are a smart cookie who’s accomplished some pretty amazing things in many areas of your life, and you may just have (almost) perfected the art of being in two places at once.
Unfortunately, none of these things make dieting any easier. In fact, your high-achieving life probably makes weight loss more complicated and may actually add inches to your waistline. And it’s likely that dieting and an eat less, move more approach is not the appropriate solution. A strategy like this ignores why high-achievers struggle to lose weight.
There’s an essential piece to the weight loss puzzle, and without it, even superwoman—especially superwoman—is almost guaranteed to fail.
The critical piece? It’s having a strategy that addresses the reason you find yourself polishing off the bag of chips, mindlessly snacking at your desk, or nervously cutting off endless slivers from the pan of brownies in the kitchen.
Superwomen succeed at weight loss when they shift from a diet approach to one that truly allows them to create peace with food and this happens when they address the reasons they overeat.
Here are five important reasons busy women and high-achievers overeat and struggle to lose weight:
- Exhaustion
- Emotions—like hurt, anger, sadness, or worry
- Stress
- Avoidance and procrastination
- Being too busy
If you don’t have a smart plan that addresses these very real issues, and instead push harder and harder just to stay on your diet, you’re not only missing the point, you aren’t aiming at what’s necessary to create a lasting solution.
For most of us, the key to NOT eating the whole bag, and to staying on track and actually losing weight, lies in figuring out how to deal with our complicated lives without turning to food for comfort, stress relief, quick energy, or to help us cope with our emotions.
This is a huge part of what I call creating peace with food. It’s an approach that creates lasting changes because it’s a process that guides you to create solid solutions to the problems that trigger overeating in the first place. The journey towards peace with food makes our whole life better.
High-achievers don’t need another diet (and they definitely don’t need to work any harder. The real-life superwomen I know could usually benefit from methodically addressing the reasons they overeat.
What are your hurdles and triggers? Are you using food as a band-aid when it’s really life that is out of balance? What small step can you start taking today to feed yourself the non-food things you really crave?
Talk soon,
