In the words of one of my good friends, “that guy needs to put the fork down!”
People will offer all sorts of excuses for their excess weight... and some of them even seem to be completely oblivious to the impact on their health, as well as the way they appear.
So why don’t they lose the weight?
Many would say it’s a lack of “willpower.”
Maybe. Maybe not.
Growing up, my little sister was kind of a chunker. The various matriarchs in the family did everything they could, guilt-tripping her, patronizing her (“you just need to learn to watch your sweets”) and trying to get her to lose weight, accusing her of all sorts of subterfuge, and especially of lacking that virtue-of-all-virtues, willpower.
I could probably make the claim that I “struggle with my weight,” and get away with making that claim, but it is not entirely true. In fact, it’s not at all true. Since I began my efforts at 223 pounds, I have steadily lost weight... but at an overall rate of less than a pound a month. I’ve been “dieting” for over 3 years, and have 38 pounds of lost weight to show for it. And when I say I’ve been dieting, what I mean to say is that I have been watching what I eat. Not “how much” I eat — but the selections.
Why has it taken me so long? I never yo-yo’ed ... it’s not as if I gained, lost, gained, lost... no, my weight went through up and down cycles of perhaps 3-5 pounds over a few days at certain times, but has never even come close to the 223 where I started, and it never will.
My struggle is not with weight — my struggle is with my appetite. I love things made with sugar and flour. Sometimes donuts, french toast, biscuits and gravy, and things along those lines all sounds so good that I just toss caution to the wind, and eat ’em. It’s not really a conscious decision... I just do it.
So, you say, I have a problem of willpower — or do I?
Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert, wrote a very bizarre book called God’s Debris: a Thought Experiment. It was one of those books that certain people would not be able to even bring themselves to read, lest the words on the page magically infiltrate their brains and turn them into some kind of satanic mush, or something. Even the chapter on willpower would strike certain nameless people as just too off-the-deep-end to read, but I have to say they had a distinct impact on me, and were one of the keys to me growing enough to shed my self-righteous attitude.
You don’t have to take this at face value... but parts of it certainly make sense to me:
“You’re very fit,” the old man observed.
“I work out four times a week.”
“When you see an overweight person, what do you think of his willpower?”
“I think he doesn’t have much,” I said.
“Why do you think that?”
“How hard is it to skip that third bowl of ice cream? I’m in good shape because I exercise and eat right. It’s not easy, but I have the willpower. Some people don’t.”
“If you were starving, could you resist eating?”
“I doubt it. Not for long, anyway.”
“But if your belly were full you could resist easily, I assume.”
“Sure.”
“It sounds as if hunger determines your actions, not so-called willpower.”
“No, you picked two extremes: starving and full,” I said. “Most of the time I’m in the middle. I can eat a little or eat a lot, but it’s up to me.”
“Have you ever been very hungry—not starving, just very hungry—and found yourself eating until it hurt?”
“Yes, but on average I don’t eat too much. Sometimes I’m busy and I forget to eat for half a day. It all averages out.”
“I don’t see how willpower enters into your life,” he said. “In one case you overeat and in the other case you simply forget to eat. I see no willpower at all.”
“I don’t overeat every time I eat. Most of the time I have average hunger and I eat average amounts. I’d like to eat more, but I don’t. That’s willpower.”
“And according to you, overweight people have less of this thing you call willpower?” he asked.
“Obviously. Otherwise they’d eat less.”
“Isn’t it possible that overweight people have the same amount of willpower as you but much greater hunger?”
“I think people have to take responsibility for their own bodies,” I replied.
“Take responsibility? It sounds as if you’re trying to replace the word willpower with two new words in the hope that I will think it’s a new thought.”
I laughed. He nailed me.
“Okay, just give it to me,” I said, knowing there was a more profound thought behind this line of questioning.
“We like to believe that other people have the same level of urges as we do, despite all evidence to the contrary. We convince ourselves that people differ only in their degree of morality or willpower, or a combination of the two. But urges are real, and they differ wildly for every individual. Morality and willpower are illusions. For any human being, the highest urge always wins and willpower never enters into it. Willpower is a delusion.”
“Your interpretation is dangerous,” I said. “You’re saying it’s okay to follow your urges, no matter what is right or wrong, because you can’t help yourself anyway. We might as well empty the prisons since people can’t stop themselves from committing crimes. It’s not really their fault, according to you.”
“It is useful to society that our urges are tempered by shame and condemnation and the threat of punishment,” he said. “It is a useful fiction to blame a thing called willpower and pretend the individual is somehow capable of overcoming urges with this magical and invisible force.
Without that fiction, there could be no blame, no indignation, and no universal agreement that some things should be punished. And without those very real limiting forces, our urges would be less contained and more disruptive than they are. The delusion of willpower is a practical fiction.”
“I’ll never look at pie the same way,” I said. “But what about people with slow metabolisms? They get fat no matter how little they eat.”
“Have you ever seen pictures of starving people?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“How many of the starving people in those pictures were fat?”
“None that I’ve seen. They’re always skin and bones. But that’s different.”
“It’s very different but still, according to your theory, some of those people should be starving to death while remaining fat.”
I didn’t have an answer for that. I was happy when he changed the subject.
The book had a sequel, The Religion War, which I, after reading a synopsis on Wikipedia, have not bothered to look into any further. Maybe some day.
But that aside, we can still glean the value out of this little lesson, can’t we?
Forget about food and weight for a minute. Consider anything that you have a desire to do, that someone else wants you to think you can’t or shouldn’t do? Sex, drugs, rock & roll, drinking — whatever — and ask yourself if that person is so readily willing to condemn that particular thing primarily because they, themselves, don’t have an appetite for it?
Slam! I think I’m onto something here. It’s much easier to condemn something that you, yourself, don’t particularly enjoy. Weigh that in the balance the next time you have to listen to someone tell you what you can’t, shouldn’t, or even “mustn’t” do. Is the person’s perspective on how you should be actually a reflection on how they aren’t?
Before you look down on someone for something they think or do, consider the probability that you and that person have a different appetite for whatever the issue at hand might happen to be.
To put the final touch to this concept, the only thing that can be done if you want things to be different is to change your appetite. This is not a word game. I don’t mean tell yourself to change it, and expect a *poof* magic change... leave that psychobabble for someone who’s a sucker for it. When it comes to sex, there are diseases; when it comes to drugs, there are bad trips; sometimes these things can change your appetite.
What about food? Clearly, some people, me included, have metabolic issues — but don’t break out the tiny violins for me! If you are like me, your body overreacts to to carbohydrates. A vicious cycle ensues, prompting you to crave (that’s appetite, see?) more... so you eat more, crave more, eat more, crave more.
This is not a game of “woe is me.” Answer this: what does a genuine alcoholic do? He gets off the bottle. There’s very, very little room for moderation. The proverbial slippery slope. The same thing applies here: the highly refined carbs that kick up your cravings have got to go. Eat all the red meat you like. Lose the artery-clogging margarine, and eat real butter. Stay away from white bread and mashed potatoes, except in small quantities, if — and only if — the quantities don’t resurrect your cravings. Our ancestors had bacon and eggs, butter and cheese, and they did fine. What’s our problem? It’s all of the refined junk that our food is made of. Carbs aren’t the problem — tomatoes, carrots, and oranges are all loaded with carbs. But the refined carbs, plus our absolute phobia of eating fat, are ganging up on us to make us fat... and sick.
My total cholesterol is 125. It went down when I started eating eggs and bacon or sausage every day. I often eat a nice fat-filled avocado with chicken and whole mayonnaise at lunch. Shriek with trepidation if you must, but these things are not bad for you. My cholesterol went down.
Incidentally, the next time you even think about buying anything “lite” or “low-fat,” read the labels on the diet junk, then read the labels on the real thing. Almost without exception, you’ll find that when they take away the fat, it’s replaced with sugar. So much for “lite.” Even skim milk has more sugar than whole milk. Skeptical? Look at the labels!
Also, try this: one night, eat potato chips on the couch... the next night, try ham cubes with cheese cubes and green olives. I bet you can guess which one you’ll eat less of... and ironically, that’s the one that will leave you feeling more full, despite eating less.
Trim the refined carbs, don’t fear the fat, and your appetite for sweet and starchy goodness will go down, and will take your cholesterol levels and triglycerides right down with it. No willpower needed.
Oh — and please don’t tell me that the ideal weight chart calculations that doctors use are wrong, because (insert lame excuse here). If you want to believe that, go ahead, but it doesn’t make you right. It only keeps you happy in your obesity.
I’ll see you at 150... if I stop there.
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