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Jun 222011
Something just occurred to me. I took a look at my menu and realized I couldn’t find one thing that I eat that I see commercials for on TV. If you have read In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto
It pays to notice that the most healthful, whole, single ingredient, and truly doctor-recommended foods aren’t advertised. I’m not sure why this is. Broccoli must either not need advertising to sell enough to make farming it worthwhile or the expense of advertising it would not make it more profitable to produce and sell. Hard to say. I am not an economist.
What would a commercial for broccoli look like? What would they say? Would they show cool and sexy twenty-somethings gobbling it up and grinning ear to ear at each other? Or would it be more a concerned homemaker telling you how important it is to her that only the best broccoli be served to her family?
I suppose it would be a matter of demographics. All those advertisements always have to be aimed at a particular demographic. This is why you see certain types of commercials on some TV shows and different types of commercials on other TV shows. You’ll see ads for erectile dysfunction more often during Orange Country Choppers and more ads for anti-depressants while watching The View.
I might be projecting just a little. I don’t watch that much TV and never watch The View.
What is the demographic of people who tend to eat a lot of single-ingredient, healthful, fresh, whole foods? I suppose that is a demographic in itself. The thing is, these people are already motivated to eat the way they do and the commercials probably wouldn’t make the difference. As for the people who eat mostly the type of stuff advertised on TV – I don’t think the broccoli commercials would make much difference to them either.
Three episodes of the A&E Documentary “Heavy” have been broadcast and I watched each of them. One of the first things that I noticed is that the majority of time you see them doing something about their problem you see them in the gym sweating and grunting and being motivated by two superbly fit physical trainers.
A&E's documentary "Heavy" like the rest of pop culture gives exercise a disproportionate amount of emphasis as a solution to food problems
This bothers me. Obviously these men and women who appear on the show have some very deep problems with food. I identify. To watch the show you would think the answer to their problems, or at least ninety percent of it or so, is exercising their body. Most of what you see on the A&E show “Heavy” are the subjects hard at work in the gym. A distant second is some education on nutrition. Behind that is a glimpse of some therapy work. I don’t count the typical attention to the enablers – that’s another external.
The external aspects of weight loss gets more attention than inner work. No one wants to look inside.
I watched a behind the scenes type video of the subjects on the A&E site. This was an interview with the subjects from the second episode. They were taking questions from the audience via the web site. At one point they unanimously exclaimed that the work they did in therapy, looking within themselves, was huge. They indicated this was a big turning point in their progress and seemed to have a very significant impact on their progress. I identified with that too. This is consistent with my experience as well.
Why not show what really works on food addiction?
I did a little more research and found the name of the facility where these people go. It is called the Hilton Head Weight Loss Spa. A major part of what they offer deals with finding inner solutions. There are group sessions, classes, counseling, etc. Apparently, this is what works for their clients. Why so little attention to this element of treatment on the show?
I point all this out not to criticize the A&E television show “Heavy,” but to point out the disparity between what is known to actually work treating food addiction and what mass media and pop culture pushes on us. Apparently, they push what sells.
There are a few out there who have everything they need within themselves to turn things around except enough knowledge about nutrition and physical fitness to begin a productive and healthy exercise program and nutrition plan. Learning how to exercise, some nutrition guidance, and a little motivation is all they need. This is not the case with someone suffering from food addiction.
Long term problems require long term solutions
For the food addict or anyone else with food or weight related disorders knowledge about nutrition and exercise will, at best, be mostly useless in the long term. For many it may even be a liability. Exercise and diets result in temporary changes but the problem for a food addict or someone with deeper issues around food is sustained solutions to their problems.
We are barely seeing six months of these people’s lives. I honestly hope they will be able to do a special in a few years and we’ll see all the participants normal sized, healthy, and happy. If those people only rely on exercise and diets and willpower I doubt we will.
Looking inside does not sell
This is a chicken and egg thing. The world wants to sell us exercise machines so that’s what will populate the media and pop culture. On the other hand, I know from personal experience, not a lot of people want to deal with food and weight problems on the inside. I didn’t.
Depression, marital problems, grief – these are things more and more people are willing to get professional, spiritual, or self-help resources to deal with. But they don’t want to turn over food problems.
Depression, marital problems, grief – these are things more and more people are willing to get professional, spiritual, or self-help resources to deal with. But they don’t want to turn over food problems.
Why is there a disproportionate resistance to inner work when it comes to treating food problems? Is is because we are so attached to food we hide from anything that might actually work? Is it that there is a stigma and cultural expectations which insist it is a willpower or self control thing? Or does it just not occur to most of us that food problems can be a mental/emotional issue?
Why I think it is important
Exercise and diets will help you lose weight, but not keep it off long term unless the regimen is maintained. The weight goal is reached or approached and the motivation to maintain the regimen is reduced. At this point, if the person’s inner health is off kilter they are going to turn to something to sooth and return to what they know. People who suffer from food addiction and other serious problems with food need lasting solutions but pop culture doesn’t want to show them to us.
When I struggled with obesity the solution and reward were two different things. The solution was the next diet, regimen, over the counter diet pill, or exercise routine. The reward was some imaginary point in the future where I reached my goal weight.
It is a good thing I abandoned that paradigm. My solutions always felt like a punishment or sacrifice I had to make in exchange for the reward. There was giving up this or that, feeling guilty if I didn’t push it hard enough when I worked out or feeling pain when I pushed it too hard.
The reward never lasted long on the occasions I did make it. Once in a while I would hit an intermediate goal such as “lose 20 pounds in six weeks.” Once I did there was this sense that I deserved to take a break or reward myself with what I had sacrificed to reach the goal in the first place. Craziness. Those “free days” or breaks never worked out well for me.
Things began working for me in 2009 because I realized the way I live day today has to be the solution and the reward. The reward can not be the light at the end of the tunnel, it has to be flashlight I’m carrying with me. I can’t afford to allow the solution to make me miserable in the long term.
My solution and reward today is being happy and content and at peace with what I eat and how I eat. The effort or willpower I put into my weight loss was directed at making that a reality. For example, instead of investing all my energy into doing something I hated like measuring all my food I directed that energy at accepting the benefits of weighing my food and learning to appreciate the results of that discipline. I came to terms with the fact this is something I need to do for myself. It worked. Weighing my food feels good now. It is part of the reward and solution.
Another example is letting go of the foods that were not good for me. I used to think I really loved pizza. Friday nights, a DVD rental, and a huge pizza was something I could not imagine parting with. When I was on a diet I put my energy into resisting the urge to call for a delivery and burned even more energy feeling sorry for myself. What finally worked is taking a detailed look at exactly what eating things like pizza does to me. I didn’t feel good with a belly full of pizza. I didn’t feel good the next morning. None of the ingredients in a pizza were very beneficial compared to wiser alternatives. Finally I learned to see the connection between stuff like pizza and the misery of being obese. Pizza stopped looking good.
What I never realized when I was in the diet mentality was that eating and living well would feel so good. I sleep well, I have a lot of energy, more mental clarity – the list goes on. Even better, I never feel the guilt about anything I eat, there are no dilemmas, and that leaves me free to enjoy all the other things life offers.
A UPI article reports on a poll where 17 percent of women with healthy body composition said they are fat. A similar number said they were not content with how they look in the mirror.
The poll required men and women volunteers to look at themselves in the mirror and choose from 12 adjectives describing how they believe they looked. Those taking part were weighed and measured to determine whether they were overweight or of a healthy weight. Study: Women more ashamed of obesity
Twice as many women than men who are overweight said they felt shame.
I see an indicator that society, mostly by way of all the diet advertising, is telling women they have a problem and they need to be ashamed of themselves or feel inadequate until they buy xyz. I have no hard numbers at hand but I would guess that at least two thirds of all diet and exercise schemes are marketed towards women. To advertise something you have to convince someone they have a problem or lack in their life. A connection is plausible.
Women are inundated with this message and obviously it sinks in effectively. What doesn’t seem to last are the benefits of the diet or exercise products they are sold.
Diets fail for men and women because they are temporary and because they take them on to please society or others rather than enhance their own life experience. I don’t see a lot of diet or exercise advertising where the main thrust of the message is “buy our product and you’ll experience peace of mind and body.” What they usually say is you’ll look better, be sexier, be more desirable.
The advertisers over-convince us of the problem and fail to deliver a real solution. That leaves people feeling discontent with themselves.
Meanwhile junk food manufacturers are telling them they’ll enhance their life experience – they they’ll be soothed, comforted, cheered up, etc by consuming their products. A vicious circle.
January is a special month for me. This month marks the beginning of my own success story. It has been two years since I changed my heart, then changed my mind, and began seeing the resulting changes in my body. Beginning in January of 2009 I began getting rid of my old ideas and abandoning the unhelpful paradigms about my weight problem. This is when I turned looked inside myself for the solution. I lost 130 pounds of body fat in 2009 and haven’t gained an ounce of it back.
Losing that weight was fantastic and a lot of fun. Yes – it was fun – if not fun, it was at least rewarding. I loved all the positive attention and the surprised look on people’s face when they saw my weight loss. The thing is that didn’t happen that often in 2010 so the everyday fun of weight loss sort of faded.
Fortunately, something else has kept me going and kept me grateful. Gratitude for never feeling regret, worry, or discomfort around or about food. Until I got some distance from it I never realized how miserable all that obsession about eating made me. It didn’t matter whether it was daydreaming about what I’d have at a restaurant later that day or feeling shame about how much I ate at the restaurant afterward or the ice cream I ate later that night once I’d made room for it. All of it was crazy-making.
I haven’t felt bad once in two years and that keeps me grateful each and every meal. Gratitude is a powerful thing.
I wrote the articles you find here over the last year. Writing them was part of my morning quiet time and a labor of love. I sense a big part of keeping myself healthy and happy is passing on what I’ve learned and sharing my experiences.
A lot of people are beginning diets and exercise programs as I write this at the beginning of 2011 as part of their New Year resolution. My heart goes out to them. Another source of gratitude is that I have no resolution to make today. My hope is that Solution In You will be a part of that kind of peace and happiness for many others.
Happy 2011!
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