Refire, Rewire

I watched a fascinating segment on the Today Show earlier this week about how women relate to their bodies.  Shockingly, 97% of women have negative thoughts about their bodies and the psychologist on this Today segment said that the average woman has 13 negative body image thoughts per day.  She said that we emotionally abuse ourselves in a way we wouldn't tolerate from others.

The psychologist went on to say that whatever we focus on shapes our brain.  She said that "neurons fire, then they wire" and create strong neuro pathways in our brain.

That is a critically important point for us to consider as we are working to rewire our "fat brains."  Most of us spent years telling ourselves that we were fat, undisciplined, etc. etc.  For a long, long time, I spent a fair amount of time and mental energy berating myself for being so out of control with my eating.  I looked in the mirror and began a rundown of all of the things I hated about my body and, at 268 pounds, there wasn't much about my body that I liked.  I told myself that I couldn't lose weight, that I couldn't stay on a weight loss plan.  What I now understand is that I was faithfully laying down strong neuro pathways of negativity in my brain.  As a result, what I told myself became a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

Our challenge is to begin to fire new neurons and lay down new, healthier neuro pathways in our brain.   But how do we do that?  I'm not a psychologist, so I'm coming from a practical perspective here.  My suggestion is that we do two things. 

First, we have to recognize and reject negative thoughts the minute they appear.  That's not an easy thing to do when we've spent years thinking negatively about ourselves, but practice makes better (we'll never be perfect at this!).  When I look in the mirror and start to run down the list of things I don't like about my body, I try to catch myself and stop the negativity.  Sure there are things I'd like to change about my body, but I don't allow myself to dwell on those things anymore. 

Second, we have to start focusing on what we like about ourselves.  By switching my focus to what I DO like about myself, I can begin to be thankful . . . beginning with the fact that I'm now at a healthy weight.  My body isn't perfect, but it's healthy and I focus on that.

Rewiring our neuro pathways also applies to how we think about what we can and can't do.  We have to start stopping those negative "I can't" thoughts as soon as they pop into our brain, replacing them with affirmations about what we CAN do.  It may be easy to think that doing that is just kidding ourselves because we may not believe that we can, but as we keep telling ourselves that we CAN do this (and say it out loud, looking at yourself in the mirror!), we will begin to replace negative thoughts with positive ones and literally begin to rewire our brain. 

We CAN make our next meal a Medifast meal, we CAN stay on plan today.  We CAN get to a healthy weight and we CAN learn healthy habits that will enable us to maintain our weight.  These are true statements, so tell yourself this over and over again today . . . and tomorrow and the day after that!

Proverbs 23:7 (New American Standard Bible) says, "For as he thinks within himself, so he is."  Our thoughts are powerful and they will help to shape our future.  When it comes to both your eating and your thoughts today, choose wisely :-)