天博体育

What鈥檚 the hardest part of trying to lose weight? For most people, it isn鈥檛 figuring out what to eat and what to avoid鈥攜ou know you need to scale down your portion sizes; focus on fruits, veggies, and whole grains; and hold off on the chips, donuts, and other high-calorie treats. The biggest challenge for most dieters is the 鈥渋ntention-behavior gap.鈥� That鈥檚 the disconnect between knowing what you need to do and actually doing it. Or, as one of my friends once put it, 鈥淚 know I shouldn鈥檛 eat an entire bag of fudge caramel gourmet popcorn. But it tastes so good!鈥�

One way to bridge the intention-behavior gap is by using smaller plates and eating slowly. Another tried-and-true technique is writing down everything you eat each day, or recording it on a weight-loss app like Lose It! or Intelli-Diet. Doing this makes you more aware of what and how much you鈥檙e eating.

Another approach involves creating a behavior chain. This is a tool counselors sometimes use to help people recognize how a series of seemingly minor events can lead to an unfavorable outcome, such as overeating.

In the behavior chain I鈥檝e posted here, notice the little missteps that lead to overeating and what can be done to break the chain, such as packing a lunch for work so you don鈥檛 need to hit the fast food restaurant down the street.

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You can and fill in your own dietary downfalls. Think back to a time when you blew your diet and jot it down in the last red oval in the chain. Next, fill in the other red ovals with other circumstances earlier that day that might have played a role. Finally, brainstorm your own chain-breaking strategies and put them into the yellow ovals. Need some more suggestions? See this from Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women鈥檚 Hospital.

You can read more behavior-focused changes in the 2011 edition of 鈥�Healthy Solutions to Lose Weight and Keep it Off.鈥� At this link, you鈥檒l find an excerpt and a Table of Contents for this new Special Health Report from 天博体育 Publishing.