The Only New Year’s Resolution You Should Make!

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Spoiler alert: The resolution is to NOT to make any more resolutions to diet or lose weight!

How many times have you made a resolution – most likely regarding weight loss or your body or your exercise regimen – only to “fail” and beat yourself up?

How many times have you tried to diet, hoping for sustained weight loss each time, but ended up gaining back what you lost (and maybe a little extra too)?

Doesn’t this seem self-defeating to you?

Why do you continue to treat yourself this way?

Why am I asking you so many questions??

Here’s why: January is National Dieting Month (I don’t think it’s an official title on the health observances calendars, but it’s fitting!) and I want you to take a pause and think about all of the “whys” I just posed, before potentially harming your body in the name of cultural ideals.

Diets don’t work (I’ve mentioned this before). They not only mess with your metabolism, they mess with your mind and your self-acceptance. Instead of setting an intention on New Year’s Eve to lose weight, switching your focus: If you are going to make a resolution, make one that will support your total health and one that supports the body you are in right now. Not sure what total health means? Think about a bicycle wheel and all of its spokes.  Each spoke represents a piece of your health – physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, social and environmental.  If one spoke is missing or damaged, it makes the wheel less stable, leaving it unable to support the rider of the bicycle.  The same can be said for your total health; if one part of you is not well – be it your physical health or your emotional health, then all of you will suffer.  When we focus only on our physical health, we miss out on some pretty cool things we could be doing to live life to its fullest.

This year, if you are going to make a resolution, pick one that focuses on your total health – something achievable and sustainable – that will ultimately bring you balance and joy.  

Weight loss is not going to do that for you!

It hasn’t worked before, and it won’t work this year either.

 

Here are a few ideas for some new year’s resolutions:

  • I will practice self-care regularly.
  • I will ditch dieting for good.
  • I will find the joy in each day and write it in a gratitude journal.
  • I will move my body because it feels good to do so, and not for purposes of losing weight, but because it reduces stress, gives me energy, and I enjoy it.
  • I will listen out for, and honor, my hunger and satiety and nourish myself.
  • I will no longer punish myself because of what, when, or how much I eat.
  • I will eat all foods and destroy the notion that foods are “good” or “bad.”
  • I will strengthen my Inner Girl Power and quiet my Inner Mean Girl.
  • I will make room for positivity by removing negativity from my life, from my social media feed, and from within.
  • I will no longer participate in body shaming – myself or others.
  • I will show myself compassion.
  • I will spread the message of Health At Every Size and shed light on fatphobia and stigmatization.

In this new year, I am wishing you all freedom from dieting,

food rules, and cultural ideals.

If you are ready to take the Food and Body Freedom plunge, check out all of the details of my online course!

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Beth Rosen

Eating Attitudes™ & Gut Expert

Beth Rosen, MS, RD, CDN is a Registered Dietitian and owner of Beth Rosen Nutrition. She practices a non-diet philosophy and is a Health at Every Size" practitioner. Her goal is to end the pain of diet culture, one person at a time. Beth's techniques and programs empower chronic dieters, and those who consider themselves emotional and /or stress eaters, to ditch the vicious cycle of dieting, eat fearlessly by removing Food and diet rules, and mend their relationship with food and their bodies. Beth's works face-to-face with clients in Southbury, CT, and virtually with clients, worldwide.

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