Most folks who think they are struggling with their weight, forget that they are really struggling with habits, and despite their stress relief of overeating they are highly functional people who are managing everything else. If this resonates with you below you can find a few reframes for stress relief habits of overeating, and/or spending too much time in front of a screen. May this reframing language help you see that you are highly capable of losing weight but you need to find ways to address what’s really weighing on you.

1. Take your last heavy meal at least 4 hours before bedtime, unless you’ve got a sugar regulation issue (see #4). If you’re also having a hard time waking in the morning, then have a light meal for dinner and a heavy meal for breakfast. Ensure you go 12 hrs fasting every day, this is easy if it’s between breakfast and dinner.

2. Listen to the desire for salty snacks…treat it like it really is…it’s really, really, really a call to drink water! Drink water instead of grabbing for that salty snack, in an amount that would equal your body weight if it were converted to kilograms: divide your total pounds by 2.2 and then transfer that number to units of ounces. So, if you weigh 187 Ibs then that would be 85 kgs, put ounces in place of the kgs and you’d have 85 oz water each day. Which is a little more than 2.5 quarts per day. I like to get at least half of my water when I wake up in the morning to start the day.

3. Eat lots of fiber- 35 grams/day or more. That’s seems like a lot in our culture where we eat so many foods that come out of packages. If this is your lifestyle, then a great way to streamline it and a fast way to lose weight is to get a powdered mix of fiber -I prefer psyllium husks, or chia-seeds, and drink it 20 minutes before meals. Not only will you feel full faster, it will help normalize your insulin response so that your blood sugar levels remain balanced- even in the rare instance when you’re not eating the healthiest food.

4. Get good sleep, those who are sleep deprived may have an excessive outflow of adrenaline (to keep them in a semi-awake state, if you were well rested and had the same amount you’d feel panicked!) This excess cortisol/stress response is why you see women with lots of central fat between the breasts and the hips, (whereas for men beer and tv sports are the leading causes, ;).

5. Walking, or engaging in any activity with vigorous focus. Hot Yoga is a great way to lose fat and gain muscle tone and strength, though you’re not moving fast you’re kicking up a sweat and your increasing your depth and rate of breathing which is a natural detoxifying act. Far Infrared saunas and swimming are great ways to lose weight, and care for your body. Both are detoxifying and tonifying, and remember to exercise that diaphragm by breathing in deeply and slowly exhaling. Body scrubs every 2-3 weeks will help too.

6. Find out what your allergic to! For the strangest reason, which I’m sure is connected to the property of magnetism, we are many times highly allergic to those things we crave the most. Wheat and dairy are the most notorious for food allergies disguised as cravings.You see both casein, a dairy protein highly concentrated in cheese, and gluten form compounds that pair up with the opiate receptors in our brains. Wild, huh? Perhaps, that is why the stereotypical French picnic of cheese, baguette and a bottle of wine is so appealing?

7. Motivation—-this is really the seed of success and I put it at the end because if you read this far you’re already quite aware that this is the key to focus on. I suggest focusing on a certain clothing size and monitoring your progress with handfuls not numbers on a scale. That’s right it’s time to amp up the motivating factor of comfort by getting rid of the “comfy” clothes that can range a few sizes and start shopping (try Goodwill for transitional sizes) for clothes that just almost fit. Matching this practicality with your imagination of what you want to look like in 3 weeks, 6 weeks and 2 months will also help feed your courage. You can do it with some focus, a practical foundation in what to eat, and faith you will surely do away with your old habits of weight mismanagement and uncover a healthier wiser you.