ATTITUDE: The Flavorful Ingredient for Losing Weight & Keeping It Off!

[Connie Stapleton PhD 342]

Attitudes come in all sorts of “flavors,” including the obvious, of course: a positive attitude or a negative attitude. Some attitudes might be considered rather bland: cooperative, compliant and tolerant.

What flavor is your attitude? Are you complacent, entitled, enthusiastic, apathetic, grateful, superior, confident, hostile, cautious, suspicious, inferior, sincere, persistent, flexible, decisive, humble, jealous, judgmental, courteous, competitive, gloomy, sarcastic, sympathetic, cynical, critical, caring, earnest, jovial, hopeful?

How important has your attitude been to your journey in your Recovery From Obesity? Recovery from obesity is both a set of behaviors and a mindset (ATTITUDE) about your health, your sense of self worth, and your willingness to do what it takes to have the health you want and to feel about yourself the way you want to feel about yourself.

ATTITUDE IS THE FLAVORFUL INGREDIENT IN THE RECIPE FOR RECOVERY and it makes all the difference in how you approach your Recovery from Obesity. Your ATTITUDE also influences how you choose to use the other ingredients in the Recipe for Recovery: Awareness, Acceptance, Commitment, Accountability and Effort

Attitudes come in all sorts of “flavors,” including the obvious, of course: a positive attitude or a negative attitude. Some attitudes might be considered rather bland: cooperative, compliant and tolerant. These are desirable attitudes, in most cases, and yet some people may not consider them to be very flavorful. On the other hand, a sassy attitude, an exuberant attitude, and a highly determined attitude may be considered a bit more “flavorful.” In some Zumba classes, the instructor encourages participants to add some personal “flavor” to their moves!

What flavor is your attitude? Are you complacent, entitled, enthusiastic, apathetic, grateful, superior, confident, hostile, cautious, suspicious, inferior, sincere, persistent, flexible, decisive, humble, jealous, judgmental, courteous, competitive, gloomy, sarcastic, sympathetic, cynical, critical, caring, earnest, jovial, hopeful?

How important has your attitude been to your journey in your Recovery From Obesity? Recovery from obesity is both a set of behaviors and a mindset (ATTITUDE) about your health, your sense of self worth, and your willingness to do what it takes to have the health you want and to feel about yourself the way you want to feel about yourself.

Attitude is the FLAVORFUL ingredient in A Post Op & A Doc’s RECIPE for Recovery from Obesity. You choose your attitude throughout the day and your attitude most certainly can add flavor to any given moment, whether that is specifically related to the food/weight loss aspects of your Recovery from Obesity or the non-food aspects of your Recovery.

Examples of attitude and food/weight aspects of Recovery from Obesity:

SCENARIO 1: The boss brings pizza, hot dogs, chips, brownies and every variety of sugary drink you can imagine for a Memorial Day office picnic. You choose the flavor or your attitude (keeping in mind what your behavior will likely be in response to the flavor of your attitude)!

• A HOSTILE Attitude: “What a jerk, bringing in all kinds of junk food. Doesn’t she care about the health of her employees? And look at them…they know I’m not supposed to have that kind of crap and yet they bring their plates heaped with food with them to chat with me. How rude!”
  
• A DECISIVE Attitude: “Okay, so it's not the kind of picnic I like to attend these days, but it doesn’t matter what food is served. Anywhere I go, I am prepared with a Protein Bar and a Protein Drink. I’m glad for the camaraderie with my co-workers! And I’ll be grateful for feeling good about my choices!"
  

SCENARIO 2: You are scheduled to meet your personal trainer in 30 minutes. You are comfortably settled in on your couch watching a favorite TV program when you notice the time and realize you need to get moving in order to be there on time. You choose the flavor or your attitude (keeping in mind what your behavior will likely be in response to the flavor of your attitude)! A COMPLACENT Attitude: “Ah… I’ve already paid for the sessions. I can skip one. I’ll let him know I’m not gonna make it tonight. He’ll probably be glad to get to go home early.”

• An ENTHUSIASTIC Attitude: “You know what? It might be nice to stay home and relax tonight but I made up my mind to get and STAY healthier. Exercise is part of the Recipe for Success, so I’m gonna get moving so I’m there on time.”
  
• An ENTHUSIASTIC Attitude: “Well! It might be nice to stay home and relax tonight but I made up my mind to get and STAY healthier. Exercise is part of the Recipe for Success, so I’m gonna get moving so I’m there on time.”
  

Examples of attitude and non-food aspects of Recovery from Obesity:

SCENARIO 1: Your sister-in-law, herself overweight, continues to make negative comments about your appearance since you’ve lost weight.

• A JUDGMENTAL Attitude: You think to yourself, “You just want me to feel bad so I regain some weight. You want me to feel badly about myself because you feel badly about yourself.”
  
• A HUMBLE Attitude: You think to yourself, “I feel sad listening to her make comments about my appearance. Before I lost weight, I would do that to others who had lost weight. It sure didn’t make me feel better and it doesn’t look like this is making her feel any better. I’ll talk to her about it later when all these people aren’t around.”
  

SCENARIO 2: A close friend sits you down to share her observations with you. She tells you she is worried about you because you seem to be seeking attention in sexually inappropriate ways since you’ve lost so much weight. She is kind and compassionate as she shares this with you.

• A GRATEFUL Attitude: You thank her for sharing her observations with you, admitting you were enjoying some flirtatious attention but concerned that you might be giving messages you don’t intend to send.
  
• A CRITICAL Attitude. You tell her you know that she is saying those things to you because she is jealous that you are getting attention that she obviously wants. Just a thought: in all of the examples above, all of the negative attitudes were “A” and the positive attitudes were “B.” Perhaps consider switching these two.
  

• • •

ATTITUDE makes all the difference in how you approach your Recovery from Obesity. Your ATTITUDE also influences how you choose to use the other ingredients in the Recipe for Recovery: Awareness, Acceptance, Commitment, Accountability and Effort. Ultimately, your ATTITUDE has a large impact on your long-term success in managing a healthy weight and in how you approach life!

It’s your choice as to how to use the ingredients in the Recipe for Recovery! Choose wisely!

[Alex Brecher 10,515]

Thanks for this next ingredient in the recipe for success in the Journey to Recovery! Attitude is so important. You provide such great examples of how it can affect our own journeys and the people around us.

I think it’s also important to recognize each situation can have more than one “best” attitude. Or example, you could also be “GENEROUS” to your sister-in-law by waiting until the two of you are alone, and then offering any help she might want in getting healthy.

One thing that’s great about attitude is the control we each have over our own. We cannot control other people and things but we can control our own attitudes and reactions, and that in turn affects what happens next. When confronted by an unexpected or new situation, it never hurts to take a few seconds to think about the best way to respond to get the best results. Having a good attitude and healthy reactions to different situations become habit when we practice it.

Thanks for this help!