Many people fail in their attempts to lose weight because they don’t truly understand how their lifestyle affects their diet. Dr. Ian Smith, founder of the 50 Pound Challenge, encourages everyone to be aware of how your behavior dictates how, why and when you eat. Making necessary adjustments can oftentimes mean the difference between reaching your ideal weight or suffering through another failed weight loss attempt. “You can never over estimate the importance of lifestyle changes,” Dr. Smith says. “You have to try to control your food environment.” Dr. Smith preaches the gospel of planning. “If you go someplace and you have no plan of how you’re going to eat or what you’re going to eat — or you don’t make healthy food available to you — then you are vulnerable to the environment that you’re in.”
“Someone once said to me, ‘I have to go out socially a lot for dinner because I’m a businessperson and they don’t always serve the healthiest food. What can I do?’” continues Dr. Smith. “You [should] eat something before you go to the dinner party because you can control that food environment and then when you go to the dinner party – you still may eat but you’ll eat a lot less and you can be more selective with what you eat.” Dr. Smith also stresses recognizing the habits of those around you — and how they affect your own. “People who have friends who are overweight tend to also be overweight,” he says. “You tend to adopt the behaviors of your social circle. It behooves you to associate with people who [are] healthier.”
5 Tips To Help Improve the Health of Those Around You:
1. If you love someone, tell them that they have to change their life.
2. Get them to join the 50 Pound Challenge. It’s completely free and there’s a ton of information.
3. Get them to either form a team — at your church or school or social circle because that kind of support you can’t underestimate.
4. Make sure they understand it’s about their relationship with food. We abuse food, we use food for more than sustenance [and] we must help friends understand the proper use of food.
5. Help them understand that weight loss is not just about body image. Weight is about health. You want to live longer, live healthier.
