Ep 152: Top 10 Weight Loss Tips for Women from 100 Episodes

Dr. Deb Butler: Welcome to Thinner Peace in Menopause and Beyond. This is Dr. Deb Butler, master life and weight coach, and as always, your coach. Today is episode number 152, and I am going to play you my top 10 tips from my first 100 episodes. They were so good then, and they’re so good now. Enjoy.

Hi, all my dear friends. Can you believe it? This is number 100. I’ve been doing these podcasts once a week for 100 podcasts. I can’t believe it myself. And I have to tell you that when I first started, I really had a mission. And the reason that I wanted to do it because I’ll tell you what, you know, I’ve talked to you a lot about things that feel scary, and this was one of those things that felt very, very scary to me like, “What am I going to talk about? Will anybody listen? Will I be helpful?” You know, all of the stuff that runs all those crazy thoughts that run around in your mind, in my mind, that create emotions that either help us or hurt us do the things that we want to do. So in the end, when I finally decided that I am going to do this, the thought that I had when I started, and this is really serious, is that I want to be able to help as many women as possible through this crazy, crazy thing of weight. Because it is insane—the problems and the suffering that comes from how we see ourselves. And I really felt that I had an answer that was very, very different from what a lot of things and what a lot of people are saying, what a lot of programs are saying.

And I felt that a podcast would be the very, very best way to do it. It would be a vehicle for me to get to so many people—so many more people than I can talk to individually—and so I decided to take the adventure. And believe me, this was also an adventure because I really didn’t know—I think an adventure is just something that you do that you think is going to be exciting, but you have no idea what the outcome is going to be, and the outcome is scary. Will you like me? Will you think I’m weird? Will nobody listen? You know, all of those things. And what I decided in the end, that my message was more important than my fear, really. And now, you know when I talk to you when I do this, I really don’t have any fear at all. I’ve gotten so many letters, I’ve had clients. All the things that have made me know without a doubt that starting this podcast was exactly what I thought it would be—it would be helpful. And I have talked to women and gotten letters from women, and I am serious about this, from all over the world.

And you know what? The things that I talk about are universal. And they’re not just universal to women who are going through menopause, which, you know, that’s who I talked to because that’s when I made my biggest changes, but you know what, this problem is universal. And I talked to women from 18 all the way to your 80s. It’s not good. I want this to change. I believe that this podcast is a vehicle for that kind of change. And today, this is my 100th podcast. And I was going to do—I had all these ideas of the things that I wanted to do. And then just yesterday, I was talking to one of my very beloved clients, you know who you are, who gave me this idea about my Top 10 Tips. And she said, “Why don’t you make it your Top 10 Fearless Tips?” And I was thinking about that, you know, because, right, there’s so many things that create fear that actually give you such great results, right? So it’s like, you know, feel the fear and do it anyway. But in the end, I just decided to call it my Top 10 Tips.

And the way that I’m going to do it today is I’m going to start with number 10. Do you remember David Letterman when he was doing his—I don’t know if it was Tonight Show or whatever his late-night show—and he had his top ten things, and he always started with number 10, and he did the drum roll. And he went from 10 to 9, and then the drum roll to number 1. That’s what I’m going to do today. And a lot of the tips have come from you, what you have liked the most, and also, of course, from my most beloved client that I talked to yesterday who gave me some of her ideas. Thank you very much. And also, a little bit of what I have seen after helping hundreds and hundreds of clients personally, through many sessions, through letters, what I think has been the most helpful. So if you’re ready to start, we are going to start with Dr. Deb’s Top 10 Tips from her 100 podcasts. And if you’re ready, we would like to start with number 10. Are you ready? Okay.

So number 10 is, and this is really—it could be number 1 too—but this is what I want to say about number 10: Change the way you think. And ultimately, by changing the way that you think, you will end up changing everything that you do, and this is what I want you to think about food. I want, for you, food to be boring and life to be exciting. And if you’re listening to this, and the most exciting thing to you when you’re listening to my podcast is going home at the end of the day to have a glass of wine, or to have a whole thing of ice cream, or a cup of ice cream. But if that’s what you’re looking forward to, sweetheart, we need to talk. Because that means that food is more exciting than your life. If a glass of wine is the most exciting thing that you’re looking forward to—call me.

Okay, but that is number 10. I want food to be boring for you and life to be exciting. And that does not mean that you can’t enjoy when you feel eat. Of course, I want you to enjoy your food, but I want that to be so low on your totem pole of the pleasure and the joy that you get from your real life. So that is number 10. Because you know what, if you don’t get that, everything else that I tell you means nothing. And of course, you know, from all of my podcasts, that it is the changing of your thinking that will change everything. Okay.

Number 9 – you’re not gonna like it. Food journals. They cannot be skipped. And this is also from my client that we spoke to yesterday because, you know what, she didn’t want to do these either. Most of my clients go, “Oh, not that again.” Most people think that the food journal is just a chart, what you’re eating. But really, a food journal is a way of taking responsibility and looking at what you’re doing. So what my client said to me yesterday, and I think it’s a really a good quote to use for you, is that “Sometimes, the things that you want to do the least will help you the most.” And this was certainly true for her. And I will tell you, it’s certainly true for a lot of my clients.

And in the beginning, some people don’t want to send them to me, or they want them—they want their food journals to look perfect. In other words, they’re just eating between the twos, all they’re doing is just eating perfectly healthy foods—that’s how they want their food journals to look when they send it. It’s never like that, and then they don’t want to send it. And when they start looking at what they’re actually doing, the first thing that happens is they become very, very hard on themselves.

So, of course, the idea of food journaling, not only is to be able to look at what you’re doing but to be able to look at what you’re doing with compassion and curiosity so you can see what actually is going on. Not only so you can see it, but so that if you’re working with me, so you can share it with me, and we can compassionately look at it. So learning compassion and curiosity around what you see about yourself is probably the most important tool that I ever teach anybody. You’ve heard me talk so much about self-compassion, right, that’s how to be kind to yourself. And when you see yourself doing things that you don’t want to be doing, that’s when you have to ask yourself, “Sweetheart, what’s going on?” If you’re working individually with me, that’s basically what I say to you when I see your food journals. “Well, tell me about this. Let’s look at this.”

And if you can look at it with curiosity and compassion and not with shame and meanness and punishment, you will learn why you do what you do, which is the point of everything— why?  If you’re coaching with me, that’s the question I’m—that’s probably my most favorite question: why? Right? Because behind my why’s, are all of your thoughts, and you know how many thoughts you have that do not serve you? A lot of them end up showing up in your food journal.

In fact, I’m thinking about one of my clients that I’m working with now who is very diligent about sending me her food journals. And you know, you can look at these food journals exactly how I have my clients do them. If you get my podcast companion workbook, it’s on my website. You know, you can get that at drdebbutler.com/change. That’s where the workbook is, and the food journals are in there, and you can even get more. And one of the things on the food journals, the very end, is what are your thoughts about what you did or what you saw. And those thoughts are very, very important. And one of the things with this specific client that I’m talking about is that, and this happens a lot too, is you feel worse before you feel better when you start actually seeing what’s going on, right, because you’re not liking it, you’re expecting perfection out of yourself, and you’re not seeing it. So first she’s, you know, kind of going through this a little bit of a blue stage, as she calls it because number one, she’s not using food as much, and so she’s looking more how she’s thinking and feeling. A lot of these feelings do not feel good, right? And she’s been eating her way through those feelings, and now, she’s starting to feel them.

The food journal brings up this stuff, and then we get to talk about it, and then I get to teach how to have compassion for yourself when you’re struggling, which is exactly what I’m teaching her right now. It’s to teach her it’s not easy to see what you’re doing and what you’re thinking and what you’re feeling. It’s not easy. But once you’re willing to look at it, that’s where change takes place. When you can look at it and feel it and feel a feeling all the way through and not have to eat it or to realize how hard you’re being on yourself—that’s where she was at. She was so hard on herself that she couldn’t figure out why she was doing what she was doing. The only thing she knew for sure is she wasn’t doing what she wanted, she expected out of herself, and that’s where she stopped. She started punishing herself, and she kept feeling worse, and then she wanted to eat more. So food journals bring up all kinds of stuff, and it’s very important that you do them. So tip number 9: do not skip your food journals. Okie dokie. Drum roll, please.

Now, we’re going to number 8. Okay, now this is a tip, and I want you to think about this. I want you to pay close attention if you don’t, in a regular fashion, bring yourself up to satisfaction. So what I see with some of my clients is they do not bring themselves up to a +2 a lot during the day. So they’re not eating to full satisfaction, and then they wonder why, at night, they overeat. Many people are restricting themselves during the day and don’t realize that the restriction or the not eating is causing them to overeat at night, right? They’re hungrier because they haven’t been getting what they really needed during the day.

Undereating during the day is almost like a formula for overeating at night. I remember in my old days, I kind of wanted to save everything, you know, just not eat, so that I could eat more at another time, as opposed to just taking care of my hunger throughout the day. That’s really what I want for you. So if you’re one of those people who tend not to really bring yourself up to satisfaction, start eating just a little bit more and bring yourself up to full satisfaction and see if that doesn’t help.

Okay. Now, how about tip number 7? What you don’t want to do may be the best thing for you. Now, I want you to think about this—What are the things in the podcast that you’ve listened to so far that you still haven’t done. Is it the food journaling? Or is it some of my newer tools where it’s planning your joy eats? Now, this is what I want to offer you is that, and this is also coming from one of my clients, is that when she would do the thing she didn’t want to do, that’s where the most rewards were.

Now, one of the things that I think a lot of people have trouble with and don’t want to do is they either, one, they don’t want a food journal when they’re on vacation, they don’t want to food journal if there’s a celebration. They want to skip over it, especially if they’re working with me. They go, “Well, I’m going to be on vacation for a week, so I’ll start food journaling when I come back,” and of course, what I say is, “Oh. Well, that’s the very best opportunity to start food journaling.” And you can hear this, “Really? Oh. No.” Or, you know, I have some really, really tricky clients that go, “Well, you know, I’m kind of sick of food journaling. I think I’m doing pretty good. I don’t think I need to do it while I’m gone.” Are you like that? What you least want to do may be the best thing for you.

Because here’s what a lot of my clients learn when they’re willing to do this – they find out that when they go on vacation, sometimes, what they’re doing is they’re putting all of their eggs in one basket, which means all they want to do is eat. They’re thinking that the vacation is all about eating. If that’s the only reason that you want to go on vacation, think about this: are you sure? I’m thinking, like when I looked at that Caribbean Sea and everybody there who was on vacation, the only reason they were there is just so that they can eat. They’re missing out on all of this other stuff—connections with people, the beauty of the island, all the activities that there were to do, the air, the way it smelled—oh, my gosh, so much stuff.

But some of us think that when we go on vacation, that’s when we want to feel the most free, when we can eat whatever we want. But really, what happens is, if that’s what we do, we come home, and we feel terrible about ourselves. Don’t you want to go on vacation, and when you come home, you want to feel just as good as when you left? Well, part of the way that we do that is by making sure that we don’t turn away from ourselves when we go on vacation; we stay with ourselves. Right? And if we’re feeling something that we don’t want to feel, we feel it. But more than anything else, we eat when we’re hungry, we stop when more full, and we fuel ourselves.

Now, listen. During vacation, sometimes, you may want to plan some joy eating, right? And I’ve talked a lot about planning your joy eats. Yeah. So hey, you want something special to eat that day? You plan it a day ahead of time. And then when you want to eat at the time that you want to eat it, you go ahead, and you enjoy it. You put it on your food journal, and you don’t make a big deal about it, and you don’t make it mean anything than what it was. It was just a joy eat, and the vacation goes as if it was. And when you come home, you feel just as good about yourself as when you left.

The same thing with planning joy eats. Since I started incorporating planning your joy eats, I would say that that’s probably one of the hardest things for many of my clients to do, and this is what they say to me, “Yeah, but what if something comes up that I don’t know about?” And I go, “Yeah, what if something comes up that you don’t know about?” I had one client, actually, say to me, when she had her joy eat planned, and then she ended up eating something that wasn’t planned, she says, “Yeah, but I didn’t know it was coming. And it looked delicious, so I just let myself have it.”

Here’s what I want to offer you—is when you plan your joy eat, the reason that you’re planning it is because you’re using a different part of your brain to plan it than what happens in the moment. In the moment, you see a chocolate cupcake, and your brain goes, “Oh, my god, I have it,” right? It creates this big urge. And when you know that you have something planned, and that’s not what it is, and you don’t give in to that urge, guess what? You get much, much stronger, right? Because you know what’s planned, and that’s just an urge and you never want to reward an urge—which, of course, I’m going to come back later because it’s another one of my tips.

But for now, the most important thing is, tip number 7, what you don’t want to do may be the best thing for you. There is no doubt about it. The people that plan their joy eats and stop giving into urges feel much, much stronger—much stronger—when they’re food journaling, and they see what they’re doing, and they’re willing to be responsible for what they do, and they’re willing to be kind and compassionate for what they see, get the best results.

Okay. Are you ready for number 6? Number 6 is exercise minimums. Exercise minimums—if you heard my podcast, the most important thing that I want you to know about exercise is that exercise is like joy + play. It’s something that you really want to do, not something that you have to do. And so you have to go gingerly along this if you’ve been looking at exercise as just a burn, right, which is a lot of my clients, so, “I don’t have time,” “It’s too hard.” But when the exercise minimum, what I say, what I’m telling you as a reminder—and you can always go back and listen to them—is that when you start moving your body, you start with something that you can commit to and that you can follow through with. So for many of my clients, that might be something as simple as walking three times a week for 10 to 15 minutes. You put it on your calendar, and you commit to it. Every time you honor a commitment to yourself, and you tell yourself, “This is what I do, and this is how I move my body,” you feel stronger about yourself. If somebody says to you, “Oh, do you work out?” – because we say “workout” instead of “play,” but you could answer them back and go, “Yes, I play three times a week,” because that’s who you are now. It’s like you give yourself the honor of honoring your own commitment to yourself.

This is what I have found: number one, it feels so good. Number two, when you do, even 10 to 15 minutes of some sort of movement, 99% of the time, you always feel better. And number three, most of the time, you’ll do more. Right? Because the hardest thing is starting.

So who are you? Who do you want to be? Do you want to be a person that honors your own commitments to yourself? Do you want to be the kind of person that moves their body on a regular basis? Because really, what we know from science, is the only way the body actually gets rid of stress is through movement. It’s the most natural thing that the body does other than eat when it’s hungry and stuff when it’s full. Right? It’s the two most natural things: moving and fueling. Right? And those are the things that we create the most amount of drama over. So from here on out, start your exercise minimums. It’s tip number 6. Most of my clients have found it invaluable. If you haven’t done it yet, start with it.

Alright. Are you ready? This is going to be a longer podcast, for sure. But hey, this is number 100. So what do you expect?

Okay. So number 5 is overeating is caused by a feeling called desire or overdesire – and overdesire is always caused by a thought. Now, I want you to hear this again because these are some of my newer tools that are probably in my last ten to fifteen podcasts, where I am finding out that the only reason that we overeat is because of overhunger and overdesire.

Overdesire is created by your own mind. Desire is a feeling, and the feeling of desire is caused by a thought that you create in your own mind. Thoughts like, “I don’t want this meal to end.” Thoughts like, “Oh, this is so good.” Thoughts like, “Oh, I’ll never have it again.” Thoughts like, “I can’t waste the food. I have to eat it.” All of those thoughts create this feeling that is called desire, and desire and overdesire will always cause you to eat—overeat—and will always give you a result of something you don’t want unless you like gaining weight. Right? Because if you overeat, you’re going to be overweight. Overdesire creates overeating. Overdesire is caused by your own mind. Overdesire is a feeling, and it’s an urge, which I’m going to talk about too. Alright, that’s number 5.

Okay. Now, onward. Overdesire is learned and can be unlearned. Unlearning desire comes from allowing an urge and not answering it, not rewarding it. Now, you’ve heard me talk about this—about urges—all overdesire, really is, it’s an urge. And if you remember in one of my podcasts where they talked about with urges—urges is a feeling inside of you. It comes from your brain from a thought, right, “I want it.” And then you have the strong feeling like you have to eat it, right? So many people feel like they can’t control themselves when really, it’s just an urge. When you don’t reward the urge with food, what you learn is that when you don’t reward it, it starts getting less. So in the beginning, when you have these urges, and if you don’t eat, it will feel very, very uncomfortable. When you can sit in discomfort, that is where you start strengthening your own brain because pretty soon, what your brain knows is, “Oh, I don’t need that.”

Tip number 3: the model. This is what I want you to realize about how your brain works, and I did about three podcasts on the model. And basically what the model is, is that you have a circumstance or a fact in life—and I’m going to show you how the model works with eating and with overdesire. Okay, so you have a circumstance or a fact like this: cupcakes at an event. It’s just a fact. That’s just where it is. And a circumstance can trigger a thought. Now, in this instance, your thought may be, “I can’t not eat one.” When a circumstance triggers the thought, “I can’t not eat one,” a thought always triggers a feeling. And in this case, it’s the feeling of desire or an urge. And when you feel this desire an urge, it always creates an action. In this case, the action is eating the cupcake, and an action always creates a result. In this case, the result is, is it creates more desire for more cupcakes, right? Because when you reward an urge, it makes it stronger than next time.

And the way the model works—t’s something that’s in your head. So we call it the CTFAR model. The C is the circumstance. A C triggers a Thought, a Thought triggers a Feeling, a feeling creates an Action, and an action always leads to a Result. And in this instance, the result is creating more desire for cupcakes. And of course, your result will always create evidence for your thinking. So if your thinking is, “I can’t not eat one,” that’s your thought, the evidence is, of course, you go right ahead, and you eat it, and you create more desire and less control. So I think you should go back to the podcasts that I did on the model, and you can even download some worksheets on that. But for now, I just want you to remember the model, that—the CTFAR. Tip number 3.

Okay. Tip number 2. Feel what’s real, and don’t try to escape it. Now, here’s the thing. The feelings that are real that you don’t want to feel are usually things like disappointment, irritation, frustration, overwhelm, boredom, restless—you know what I’m talking about—those kinds of feelings. Now, in the moment of feeling that, I’m not gonna lie to you—a chocolate chip cookie tastes a whole lot better than feeling those feelings. But here’s what I want to offer you, is that if you’re willing to sit with those feelings—number one, you might see what you’re thinking, and number two, you might actually create something that will help resolve the feelings that you’re feeling like actually, move you forward in your life. Eating the chocolate cupcake, what does that do for you? Nothing that helps you deal with the feelings. So what you want to be able to do is feel what you’re feeling and not escape it. I know chocolate chip cookies might taste good, but they certainly do not help you feel better and learn how to feel what you’re feeling. Alrighty.

And finally, here it is. Tip number 1. Are you ready? [drum roll] Tip number 1. And this is from my most beloved client that I was talking to yesterday, you know who you are, I got a couple tips from you in the whole idea of this podcast. But here’s what I want to offer you that she offered me—I’m just telling you this from her—and basically, what she said is you need to have a coach. She says you need to have someone that you can be accountable to.

And this is how I want to interpret it because I think a lot of people think, “Oh, I just want you to control what I can’t control.” You know, “If I am accountable to you, then maybe I don’t have to be accountable to myself.” So what I find is that, basically, what a coach really does, is a coach helps you get rid of all the mental drama that’s going on in your head. You can call it being accountable, or you can call, it’s like taking out your brain, emptying it out, finding what’s actually in there, finding the feelings that you’re creating, teaching you how to feel the feelings, feel the discomfort without eating it. And I’ll tell you what, according to her, one of the best things that she ever did, and this is what she noted—she had been listening to my podcast for eight months and actually had gained some weight while she was trying to learn my tools—and she said the biggest difference between listening to the podcast for eight months and working with me for six weeks was the difference between night and day. So, that’s what she said. You didn’t hear it from me, you heard it from her.

And you know what, really what I think, everyone deserves a coach. So this is what I want to offer you, as this was my last tip—my number 1 tip—is that if you would like to have a mini session with me and either you have been following my podcast for a long time, and you’re still needing help applying it—because I think that’s what she was saying—is that she was intellectually learning the tools, but she was having a hard time applying it. And that once she started working with me, she actually started applying the tools to what she was doing and to her life, and that’s what made all the difference. You know you can have a mini session with me. You need to go to drdebbutler.com/workwithme, and you can set up 30 minutes. It’s free. That’s what she did. You may or may not hire me. That’s perfectly fine with me. I know I can help you. So if that’s what you want to do, and you want to take me up on my number 1 tip, go to drdebbutler.com/workwithme.

Guys, I got to tell you, I can’t believe it’s been 100 podcasts, and this is my longest podcast. It has been such a pleasure being able to do this every single week for a year and a half. I plan on doing it for as long as possible and to keep coming up with brand new information. And that’s what I want to tell you, is that as my 101 podcast comes out, I have a lot of new tools on overdesire and overeating. Some of it is very different from my earlier podcast because I start talking to you that overdesire also comes from the food that you eat and how certain foods affect your brain so much that it creates overdesire in itself. So between the food that you eat and the thoughts that you think, sometimes, it seems impossible, but it’s all manageable. And that’s all coming up in my brand new podcast. So as I end my number 100 podcast today, you know what I want to say because I ain’t changing that—you must learn, no matter what, to be very, very, very kind to yourself. Bye-bye.

Dr. Michael Butler: I hope you enjoyed this podcast with my wife, Dr. Deborah. I’ve enjoyed working with her and living with her. That’s right, we worked and lived together for 40 years—more than 40 years. It’s amazing how time flies, and it’s been like a little tree growing in the yard. Now, it’s a big tree—our love. So I would like to invite you to correspond with Dr. Deborah. Go to iTunes, drdebbutler.com/itunes, and you can review the show, and you can even give some helpful suggestions on what you would like to talk about in the future to accomplish your mindfulness in your journey into mindfulness. Thank you.