Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Thoughts on Loss

If you tell someone you lost something, it usually means you want it back or you're grieving because it's gone. You will search high and low to recover a lost item.

A lost earring.
A lost love.
A lost job.
The lost treasure of the Incas.
Jimmy Buffet's lost shaker of salt.

You get the idea.


The dictionary lists these definitions for loss:
  1. Detriment, disadvantage, or deprivation from failure to keep, have, or get: to bear the loss of a robbery.
  2. Something that is lost: The painting was the greatest loss from the robbery.
  3. An amount or number lost: The loss of life increased each day.
  4. The state of being deprived of or of being without something that one has had: the loss of old friends.
  5. Death, or the fact of being dead: to mourn the loss of a grandparent.
So why do we say we loose weight?  None of those definitions fit what I am working so hard to accomplish - the whole Ideal Protein experience has been an extremely positive one.  Once these extra pounds are off me and I'm at my goal weight, the last thing I want is to find them again or have them returned to me!  I am happy they're gone!


Maybe that's one of the reasons why so many gain weight back after they've shed it:  Somehow the subconscious mind (which takes things very literally) takes the term "weight loss" as a literal loss - a deprivation - and undermines our efforts in trying to regain that which is lost.

I've been doing a lot of reading about the subconsious and how it works and it's fascinating stuff! The subconscious mind is a funny thing.  It has no sense of humor, no grasp of irony.  It believes everything you say.  If you flippantly say to a friend "Man, I have a fat butt!"  the subconscious mind believes it and works towards maintaining that reality.   That is why I've been working so hard to take derrogatory remarks about myself out of my vocabulary and have been retraining myself to maintain a constant positive dialogue with myself.

Words have power.  Anyone who has experienced an answered prayer or watched a child shrink after an adult mocks them knows how powerful words can be.  Sticks, stones AND words can all make an impact.

So, aside from a change in established attitudes and habits, I'm thinking it's time to take the "loss" out of my weight reduction dialogue.  It will be a challenge to come up with other ways of stating my progress, but I'm good with words and think I am up to the challenge. 

If anyone out there has suggestions on other ways to express decreasing weight, just put them in the comments below!  We need to come up with terms that mean "Gone for good!"

Pound number 42, you're fired!




  

2 comments:

  1. Ha! Yes, you will never see that number on the scale again. Good-bye 247...here comes 246, 245, 244....

    I'll be thinking of some terms.

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  2. I think this has the potential of being a fun word game. We're so accustomed to using the "l" word in relation to weight that it's hard to think of ways around it!

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