How will being happy help us lose weight? What if I told you happiness is the beginning of successful weight loss? You see, our equation for attaining happiness is backwards. Society tells us that if we lose weight, work hard, gain more success, then we will be happier. To drive us even further away from happiness though, every time we reach our goal whether it be a sales goal or a promotion, we are off setting the next goal to attain and never celebrating happiness. This is true of weight too, don’t you think? When were you completely happy with your body?
It turns out we need to be happy first in order to attain success in weight loss, being healthy, career, relationships, and across every category of life. When we are happy/positive, our energy level rises. Intelligence and creativity also improves. With the body and brain working, we are able to focus on health goals and actually do them.
Across different fields, when people are positive versus negative, neutral, or stressed, they are 31% more productive, report 37% greater sales, and doctors have faster, more accurate diagnosis by 19%. Being positive, makes us more resilient, less burnt out, and have superior productivity in anything we do including losing weight and being healthy. Dopamine, as a result of happiness, turns on all learning centers in the brain.
So, how can we work towards being more positive? Do this for at least 21 days in a row:
- Name 3 new things you’re grateful for daily (gratitude)
- Journal 1 positive experience daily
- Exercise daily (behaviors matter)
- Meditate daily (train the brain to focus on one task)
- Engage in random acts of kindness (praise or thank someone)
If you need help understanding nutrition and all the mixed messages out there, give us a call. We will address your stress level, eating habits, exercise, cravings, emotional eating, and overall health and happiness. Start with a free health consultation at www.HappyFoodHealth.com or (619) 876-2655. See if this is the right match for you. I do things very differently to make health a natural lifestyle and this is not for everyone. Check out Yelp for other people’s opinion of Happy Food.
~ Samantha Hua, Nutrition & Holistic Health Coach, San Diego, CA
