In the struggle with weight, many times we end up in a self abusive relationship–the way we talk to ourselves and the way we treat ourselves is crueler than the way we would treat our worst enemy.

This inner punishing relationship goes on for years and becomes “normal” Often we don’t even see it as abusive, we just see it as the way we control ourselves. Little do we know, this system of control keeps us struggling.

Join me for the 79th episode of Thin Thinking, as I share some ways on how you can end this self-abusive relationship and how you can start a new inner relationship of self love and self compassion so that you can truly begin to love yourself down the scale.

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

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Transcription

Rita Black: In the struggle with weight, many times we end up in a self abusive relationship. The way we talk to ourselves and the way we treat ourselves is crueler than the way we treat our worst enemies. In today's 79th episode of Thin Thinking, we are going to dive into this self abuse cycle and look at some ways to start creating a new inner relationship of self-compassion instead. So come on in.

Rita Black: Did you know that our struggle with weight doesn't start with the food on your plate or get fixed in the gym? 80% of our weight struggle is mental. That's right. The key to unlocking long-term weight release and management begins in your mind. Hi there! I'm Rita black. I'm a clinical hypnotherapist weight loss expert, bestselling author, and the creator of the Shift Weight Mastery process. And not only have I helped thousands of people over the past 20 years achieve long term weight mastery, I am also a former weight struggler, carb addict, and binge eater. And after two decades of failed diets and fad weight loss programs, I lost 40 pounds with the help of hypnosis. Not only did I release all that weight, I have kept it off for 25 years. Enter the Thin Thinking Podcast where you too will learn how to remove the mental roadblocks that keep you struggling. I'll give you the thin thinking tools, skills, and insights to help you develop the mindset you need. Not only to achieve your ideal weight, but to stay there long-term and live your best life.

Rita Black: Hello, all. And welcome. I really can't wait to dive into today's episode. And I would like to say a shout out to Vivian who one of our listeners and a member of our monthly mastery group. And she asked the question or wanted me to explore why we are so hard on ourselves. So Vivian, this one is for you.

Rita Black: Now, before I do dive into today's episode, I just want to remind those of you who maybe don't know that we have a masterclass coming up on September 28th. This is a free masterclass. I hope you will come and join me. It's called How to Break Through the Weight Struggle Cycle so You Can Lose Weight Consistently and Permanently. So here's the thing. You all know how to lose weight. It is not about that. It's about your shifting your mindset because there are three major - from what I see - there are three major subconscious mind shifts that when you make them, you can change your weight destiny. No kidding. Plus, we are gonna do some hypnosis. So those of you who haven't done hypnosis, or those of you who love hypnosis, are going to love this. So please come and join me. It's, like I said, there are gonna be two master classes, one in the morning, one in the evening on Wednesday, September 28th. So please come and join me. The link is in the show notes. Yeah, that's gonna be a good old time.

Rita Black: So another good old time coming up, and this kind of starts my little self-abuse talk today, is I am going home to Seattle for my 40th. I was gonna say my 40th wedding anniversary, no, and not quite there yet. My 40th high school reunion this weekend. Yuppy. So I've been thinking about a lot about going home and growing up overweight. I was definitely overweight in high school and you know, all the scars that I had to heal about that, I think sometimes when we've struggled with weight, we can become scarred emotionally from abuse from others. Definitely. I can remember one time, my brother had this wonderful saying. He would always was poking fun at my weight, but I remember specifically, one rainy Seattle afternoon, when we were so bored because we didn't have things like games, video games, and phones or distractions, so we had to kind of create our own fun and so, we used to, we had this cassette recorder, and my brother, my sister, and I would do funny, little weird skits and, record them like a radio station. And my brother, who was the DJ called it, K fat, K- F - A -T from Seattle, and he said that I was the stations owner. So definitely, people poking fun at me from within my home, but I also, and, something that I think you guys can all relate to, if you had mothers who are critical of your weight, my mother was overweight, but she could look at me just in a particular way or look at my thighs or touch me in a particular way and kind of roll her eyes or make a look without being too verbally abusive. But letting me know that, hmm, you know, I think at one point she said, your thighs are as wide as mine, you know.

Rita Black: And I know many of you probably had parents who were critical of your weight. I certainly know this from seeing so many clients and hearing horrible stories of criticism from our parents. I remember this other time I was, you know, kind of the, I was always kind of the chunky, heavy, best friend of the skinny beautiful girl, and there were a couple of times in my childhood, I remember one time distinctly in middle school, having this guy named Donald, who really was going out with my best friend and then she dumped him and then he started coming on to me. I unwittingly thought he was really into me. Little did I know, that he was trying to make her jealous and as soon as she did get jealous, you know, he dumped me. I had to learn that lesson kind of over and over again until I really got it. But that was painful. That was a painful time. So, you know, having to put all these feelings and emotions in a place, especially as an adolescent, when you don't really have the skills, the coping skills and the emotional maturity that you have as adult, it's hard enough as an adult, but it's, you know, much more imprinting when our brains are young and vulnerable or subconscious mind is open wide to, you know, latch onto limiting beliefs and ideas about ourselves.

Rita Black: I remember one time, I'll just tell you this last time, because you might get a little kick out of it. I mean, it's horrific, but at the same time I have to laugh. I really, really, really loved to dance, and I took a dance lessons despite being the biggest girl in the room. And my mom was smart and enrolled me in modern dance, which was, you know, at the time, you know, I wasn't going to be a twiggy ballerina, but modern dance was, you could have a little more muscle and a little more heft, you know, and it was more acceptable, I guess. So, I did modern dance for a while. And then there, you know, I wanted to be in our high school musicals and I actually was in every single musical and I always wanted to play a leading role. And in my voice was okay, like, my singing voice was okay, but I really liked dance. And I actually, you know, got cast as the dancer. I was always put in the back of the chorus, you know, in the very behind, because I was also tall, but we did West Side Story. I really, really, really wanted to be Anita, but of course the role went to, that's Maria's story if you know West Side Story, but anyway, she's gets to sing, I like to be in America and she's a sassy woman. And, you know, I thought I did a really good acting audition, but anyway, I didn't get the role. I got the role of a dancer and I remember us, and this was so humiliating, but we all had to dance. We had to learn dance, the specific, a very specific type of dance that was kind of like a swing dance where the guys would like lift the girls up over their head and do all these kind of fancy things. We, took our musicals very, very seriously at our high school. There was a, we were known for putting on good shows and we had a very serious choreographer. And I remember I, they paired me up with this skinny little guy who was probably half my height and I towered over him and I was twice as wide as he was. And I just remember, they were like, okay, guys, grab the girl by the waist and lift her up over your head. And he couldn't do it. And, you know, it was embarrassing enough that he couldn't do it, but then he had to make a big hold scene about like how fat I was and how he couldn't lift me up over his head. So, you know, that's my recollection of West Side Story, but, you know, again, we all have our stories. In fact, they had a nickname for me, which was dancing bear. Everybody called me that. I was the dancing bear, because I was a dancer, but I was kind of also a Teddy bear, you know, according to all my friends, and they didn't mean it in a cruel way, but of course my wounds run deep.

Rita Black: So when I go back to Seattle, you know, I well, not anymore, but in the, in the first years of going back to Seattle after I left, you know, I always kind of wanted to show them, you know, I always wanted to show them, I'll show you, I'll be thin, I'll be successful. You'll see that you were wrong to be mean to me. And I think anybody who struggled with their weight has that fantasy or has nursed that fantasy at some point in their life. And I remember going back to my 10th reunion, I was living in London at the time, and I couldn't, I don't think I could afford to come back, but I went back to my 20th reunion and I remember I was so steeled, you know, because I had, it was right around the time that I had, it wasn't right around the time, I lost weight, I had, I'd kept my weight off for about five years at the point. I'm trying to remember my timeline, but I definitely, wasn't worried about my weight. I was at my ideal weight and I remember walking into this event, I believe it was, we do this big event, but we do event the night before, and everybody was like, wow, Rita, you've been away for so long and we haven't seen you, and oh my gosh, you look amazing. And people were so kind, and it was so lovely to see everybody, but I really remember this feeling of almost like fighting ghosts, if you know what I mean? Like, I feel like there was so much anxiety and pressure within me to prove myself. And as I got into conversations with people, especially the people who I had equated with my weight struggle, people who had called me dancing bear, who people maybe had poked fun of me or guys who had done the old, you know, I'm dating your best friend and now I'm gonna date you so that your best, you know, your best friend will be jealous.

Rita Black: They were the loveliest people in the world. They, we had such nice conversations and I, it was so weird because I left that event and I still felt like I was fighting something. I mean, it was, it was like I had buried some ghosts, definitely in that room, you know. I left some pain behind me. Seeing that I was an equal, that I was, you know, a human being along with all these other human beings. And of course it was lovely to see people from my past. I was very fortunate to go to a great high school, full of beautiful warm people, truly. But I realized, as I left there, those ghosts weren't in that room as much as they were inside me. And, and I realized that so much the pain that I went through during high school, maybe it started outside of me, but it definitely had gotten pulled inside of me and it was now like these ghosts were, were the ghosts of my own creation that telling me I wasn't enough, telling me I was never gonna measure up, you know, that still feeling lesser than all those people in the room, even though I could rationally say I measure up or had been successful to a certain degree, you know, just as far as successful in life. I had a beautiful husband, I had a beautiful child,, you know, I had, you know, I was starting to do the work that I'm doing here with you, you know? I was in a good place. There was so much good going on in my life and yet there was a part of me that just felt like I was up against something and that there was this big void and, and I just couldn't place it. And I really thought about it a lot and I really started to see how much of that ghost was this, this really harsh, you know, inner critic that we always talk about, that self abusive relationship.

Rita Black: So now I'm going and you know, it's my 40th reunion. We're all a little older. We aren't worried about how we look so much anymore. I don't think, I think we're all like really grateful. We're still here. Sadly some of our classmates have passed on from accidents, from cancer, it's really sad. So, I'm grateful to be going back and just seeing people because they're still alive and we're still here on this planet. We can still value and cherish each other. But what I really wanted to dive into is this: how we never measure up to our expectations, how we are never enough and this, you know, I realized that we really, it's almost, as I was thinking about it this week and about going home and about that trauma, it's almost a trauma, like almost a PTSD that I had from that time in my life that was just not only external circumstances, but really this internal life that where I was so vicious with myself and then that carried on through my twenties and into my early thirties before I began my own shift. Yeah. So when we struggle with weight, we abuse ourselves and we keep ourselves from really knowing that we are not enough. I mean, we, that it keeping ourselves from really knowing that we are enough right now, for those of you who've worked for me, you know, I have a saying, which is, love yourself down the scale. And why is that so important? Well, you know, I see so many people struggling with their weight and we really become very vulnerable when we wanna lose the weight in order to love ourselves, puts this in a vulnerable position to wanna lose weight as quickly as possible. So we glom onto these horrible diets or unsustainable diets just in the name of, well, I'll love myself when I'm get these 10 pounds off and I can't fill these roll of fat or 20 pounds off or 30 pounds off, and then, then maybe then I will be good enough and be fit enough and be okay enough to love myself. But we all know really deep down that the work we need to do with loving ourselves begins now. How many people I've seen release 20 pounds, 30 pounds, 40 pounds get to their ideal weight and because they weren't doing this work of really being with themselves and communicating with themselves in a more powerful way, then they get to their ideal weight and it's not enough. And they either feel disappointed like, oh, I was supposed to turn into a butterfly and then they just start gaining weight or they try to lose more weight because they feel like, well, I'm not thin enough. And if I lose more weight, then I'll absolutely, then, then I'll be able to love myself five pounds less. Right?

Rita Black: I also think that there's that inner critic part of us that really believes that if our inner critic led up on us, didn't abuse us, didn't tell us we were lazy. Didn't tell us you better lose some of this weight or, you know, stop eating that sugar part, I believe, really, really thinks that if we let up on ourselves, that we would be this, we would just go off on an eating rampage, that we would be uncontrollable, I really believe our inner critic. This part of us that is so vicious, so controlling, that really makes us feel like we aren't enough, is really acting vicious, not out of the joy and pleasure of being vicious, but really out of a deep fear, a deep fear that somehow, because we don't measure up, because we are this uncontrollable beast, that that is not only not okay, but that we will absolutely be shunned from the cave, you know. Our, in our cavemen primitive mind that we will be, we will be excommunicated or, you know, sent off to be outside the village because we are not enough and we are not okay and if anybody really knew how not okay we were, you know, that would just be unforgivable. And we would definitely be taken outside the village. I forget what the word for that is right now, but I'm gonna love myself enough to be okay with the fact that that word is escaping my tip of my tongue. I'll come up with it in a moment, but it is that word for taking somebody outside and shipping them away. I know you know it, so I'm not gonna worry about it.

Rita Black: So when we struggle with our weight, we develop this inner critic. Like I said, very vicious, more vicious than we would be with any other person or dare be with any other person in our life, even our worst enemy. We criticize our behavior. We criticize our body. We criticize our lives and how we live it. I've been doing a lot of work this month, I'm sorry, not this month, but last month, in the month of August, with my monthly mastery group, we, it was basically the theme of the month was love yourself down the scale. So we did a lot of work on loving our bodies and loving ourselves. And what really was very surprising is, I worked with such an amazing group of people and very generous with each other in the group, but what they say coming out of their mouths about how they feel about themselves. They're all working on themselves beautifully, but you know how we feel about our bodies, how we feel about our body parts, we really looked at our body parts. It was just unbelievable how negative and down on ourselves that we can be. It's just, it's resonating so strongly with me. One, because of the, the reunion, but two, because of coming out of this month. So we did that, a body love challenge, and it was really interesting because we all had to work on different parts of our bodies. I chose my neck crepe because I'm getting crepey skin and other people chose, I didn't even know the things called arm wings. You know, I know what these things look like under your arms, but I didn't know they were called wings. I thought that was really kind of interesting, you know. Some people chose their belly, some people chose their butts, but we had to really embrace that body part. And I'm gonna get into a little exercise that you can use too, that will really shift your relationship with any particular body part that you struggle with. But yeah, our critic really goes at it, you know, and just add it over and over and over again and that it becomes a negative pattern thought loop and self-criticism loop. And again, it feels like we are trapped in this room with this very, very vicious and critical person, very abusive. How did we get so critical? So we are born into a world of very high expectations of who you need to be in order to be loved. Don't, we have our families expectations. A lot of families have expectations of what we should look like, what we should act like, what we should, you know, how smart we should be, how productive we should be. We have our parents' fears, you know. I mentioned some of my mother's fears, I think, you know, because she was obese. She didn't want me to be obese, you know, and again, it came from a place of absolute love, but her fear manifested itself in ways that made me feel smaller and not enough, I can't blame her, but I, you know, I can just see how many people are impacted from their parents' opinions.

Rita Black: And, you know, then the media, right. I grew up in the seventies and the eighties, which were really skinny decades, you know, the aesthetic was really thin and not, you could never be too thin, right? Never too thin, never too rich. That was the same. I think the aesthetic has changed, but we compare ourselves still. I can't tell you how many clients I've had, who look back at pictures of themselves when they were a girl, maybe in the seventies and the sixties, and they see themselves, and they say to me, I can't believe how beautiful I was, but I thought I was a fat pig. And I look back and I see, I wasn't fat at all. Maybe I wasn't super skinny like my friends, but I wasn't, there was nothing that was fat or chunky, but I felt like an elephant in the room. And I can relate because I felt absolutely the same. But, and at the time, we were steeped in this media culture of ultra thin women, the fashion world, the clothes don't fit, or they make us look and feel dumpy, especially now that they have some fashions that actually are embracing or the fashion world is embracing bigger sizes and curvy women, which is amazing. But you know, a lot of us didn't grow up in that time. We grew up in the world of lLane Bryant, of the world of, you know, having to not even shop in a normal store and having to go to big plus size stores and that shame and humiliation, you know. I remember looking for dresses for dances and I couldn't get into any of the teenage girl clothes that my friends were looking at. I had to go into the women's section where things were a lot more dumpy, especially in the seventies and the eighties. Well, it was the seventies. Yeah. Yeah. The eighties was college and that was hard enough, but yeah, the seventies was tough. So we really develop and then we have jobs. We have friends. So, you know, we get this limiting belief, view, from many, many places. And then we develop this very critical lens with, through which we see ourselves. And it's really driven by this fear, this fear that we are not enough, this fear that are going to be ostracized from our lives, our communities, our friends, if we're going to be rejected.

Rita Black: And so this part of us develops in a way to protect us, to make us live up to these standards and to conform and be good. But these high expectations in these false standards create this very abusive relationship that we have with ourselves and it's almost like there's a part of us that shuts down after a while. We have this big evidence folder of things that we do wrong, you know. I do this exercise with clients sometimes I say to them, what's, you know, what's in that evidence folder that you're not enough and they'll start to list all these things and I'll say, okay, well, let's look at that other evidence folder of you are enough. And they're like, I can't really think of anything, but yes, in that evidence folder is you're a failure. And we bring that with us every time to every situation we go into, every diet we go on, we go into our weight loss attempts with I'm not good enough. I can't be controlled. I can't be restricted. So because we believe that on a subconscious level, any attempt at really releasing weight or getting healthier, some, a lot of times, is a disintegrated because we have this deep underlying belief and so we give up on ourselves really easily, you know, hoping will be perfect. One day. I think that's the illusion of the critic is that I'm going to work harder at making you conform. I'm gonna make you work harder at the gym. I'm gonna make you eat less food, no sugar for you. No, no white foods for you. No, no nothing for you. No food for you. Water only horrible drinks, horrible boxed food. You must conform and you must lose weight and you must be loved this weight, a cruel, cruel voice. And it's a repeated cognitive loop over and over and over again, not very creative, the way we talked to about to ourselves in this way. And we put ourselves in clothes that cut off our circulation. Now we put ourselves in these tight, tight, I remember my mother, oh my gosh. Now we have spanks. But which I think are a little kinder, but they're still really tight. Or we wear these tight pants. Then the tight waistband cuts into us. I remember cutting off my circulation, almost wearing pants. I fit into this jeans, lying on the back of bed, you know, so that my stomach wasn't as big and zipping them up and then standing up and then spending the whole night in discomfort. But my mom would get, had these girdles man. These were, you know, 1960s girdles that she just would heave herself into. And it was so uncomfortable for her to be in. I remember her taking them off and having these deep welts in her skin. And I know she hated herself so much for it. She would just yell at herself in the kitchen.

Rita Black: So how do we begin to break this? How do we start to separate ourselves out from this voice? Because the problem is that we believe this voice, right? This voice isn't oh, I'm listening to my inner critic. This voice is the water we swim in. This is our reality. This is the way, this is what we hear. And the only thing we hear, so in a weird way, it's like we're in an abusive relationship and we're stuck in this almost like an abusive relationship with a partner cycle. So the first step to separate ourselves out and start to get some power back from this is to get conscious. Be conscious about how you abuse yourself, the pain, the good news is that the way you abuse yourself, isn't incredibly creative. Like I said, it's kind of boring. It's you abuse yourself kind of in laughable the same ways you always abuse yourself. When I started to get conscious to the way I abused myself, I was shocked at how, you know, I would just say the same thing over and over again. And I started to laugh at it. You know. I was kind of like, that's all you got, you know? It's mean! It's really mean! But it's not very creative. Oh, you you're fat. You're lazy. You're never going to get this. You're never going to lose all the weight. You're eating that. You blew it. You know, that's what, that's all you got. You're gonna give it. So, but separate your start to just observe it. The restrictions, the way you wanna restrict yourself, no sugar for you. No coffee for you. You're going to, you know, you're going to pull it together on Monday.

Rita Black: So two start to become aware of the relationship with yourself that you do want. What would that look like? You know, when people are in abusive relationships, these are the first two steps they say, get conscious of how that other person is abusing you. And then they say, start to create an idea of how you would like to be treated. What kind of relationship do you want to be in? Well, the same applies to us. What relationship do we wanna be with ourselves? Now? I remember when I first started doing this work with myself, I remember, remember I said, if I could change one thing, it would be the way I speak to myself when I first wake up in the morning, because that was the worst time of day for me. Oh boy. I would wake up after, you know, binging and just be like, oh you did it last night. Why did you do it? You were doing good. And then you were just like, you're like, you went to town, you over ate and I could feel the food in my belly, I would just, you're never, ever going to work this out. That was my fear. It was just going to keep going for the rest of my life. And that voice, that negative loop would really make me feel like I was almost, I had like ropes around me. I felt such a prisoner of this situation. So for me, my vision was to wake up into loving thoughts of myself and loving thoughts of my life. So what I started to do was to be grateful in the morning. So that's what I did. I would write out a gratitude list and I would just have it by the bed. And I would just read it over. When I woke up in the morning, started speaking to myself in a critical fashion. I would get out my gratitude list. I'm grateful for my husband. I'm grateful for my, where I live. I'm grateful that I have a roof over my head. I am grateful that I have a body that I'm alive. I'm grateful for my parents. You know. I would just have a list of things that I was grateful for. And then I would write about things that I was, I was going to be grateful for in the future. Like, you know, I'm grateful that I stayed focused, that I moved my body lovingly every day. And those gratitudes, those future gratitudes really were helpful for me to start to get my mind wrapped around what I wanted to do in a really positive way. And interestingly enough, I was speaking about this with my, my group and I'm starting to have them do it is, I just had them start writing out their gratitude list and then recording that it's very helpful.

Rita Black: It's a wonderful way. And this is what I do in the morning now. And I listen to it and I always wake up into some positive vibes. Some, you know, I always wake up, I should say I was self hypnosis. It's, you know, I record where, grateful for where I am and grateful for where I'm going. So that is something I really envisioned myself. And then I started to work through that for myself. You see what I'm saying? So where is it that you, what is that relationship with yourself? Now? I attacked one area, my worst area. And I started from there, and I worked out into my life, but I want you to start to create a vision of the relationship with yourself that you want. We, so know what we don't want, but we rarely think about what is it you want. What is the relationship with yourself that you want? Okay. And you can have that relationship now, by the way, not waiting until you're thin. I think that's the mistake most people make as they think, oh, I'm gonna wait until I'm thin. And then that relationship will just naturally come well on it. Ain't it will not come naturally. You have to really cultivate, create in your mind, and then start to work towards it.

Rita Black: Now, number three, you want to make that decision to stop to say, look, I am fed up. I am mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore. Those of you who remember that movie, I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take this anymore. I'm not gonna listen to this inner critic anymore. I am not going to, I'm going to leave this house of abuse. And I want you to recognize this is a recovery journey. It really is. And you need a new house to go to. You need a house of self-compassion. So, you know, in the shift, one of the things that we do and you can do this right now, Is you can create what I call your shift space, and it's a place in your mind. And this is what I would call your health house of self-compassion. You can imagine this is just a beautiful place of your own design and choosing. Maybe you can just go ahead and take a nice deep breath in and close your eyes if, unless you're driving a car and just take a moment and think about a really beautiful, relaxing place in nature. Maybe it's a country meadow with beautiful wild flowers, or maybe it's a beach with the waves lapping gently on the shore, warm breezes, caressing your skin, or maybe it's, uh, a mountain Alpine mountain, or a mountain hike, maybe under trees and it's shady, or maybe it's a tropical forest with a little lagoon on the edge. Maybe it's a beautiful room of your own design and choosing whatever it is. You're creating this place where you come to seek refuge and to create a shift in your life. And now stay here with me for a moment. And I'd like you to imagine seeing yourself in that shift place. And I'd like you to step outside of yourself and observe yourself in that shift place. Maybe imagine you're just relaxing there in a hammock or laying on the beach. And you are observing yourself as a loving companion. I want you to think about the friends or family that you love, that you, the way that you speak with them, the way that you want the best for them. I just want you to, to observe yourself and see yourself in the same way you would, one of your children or your best friends, or even an animal companion, just the the tenderness and the love and the compassion that you have for that other person. And in fact, I'd like you in this shift place to tenderly, just touch your own cheek, just reach down and imagine you're just touching the cheeks, just so tenderly, like, wow, I really appreciate you and love you.

Rita Black: And as you're going, as you're doing that, I want you to think of yourself as now the guardian and the advocate for yourself. So it's almost like you're both, you and I call it the coach, but you can call it the compassionate guide, whatever you feels, right, right now, the nurturing parent and touch your cheek in this shift place. And I'd like you to whisper to that. You, I am gonna take care of you. You are good enough. You are worthy. You have a right to take up space in this world. You are on your journey of being healthy and happy. And go ahead and say anything else to this you that you would like to let them know that they're okay, just as they are just anything loving you wanna say to yourself, go ahead and say it now. Good. Now, once you create this inner space of refuge, your shift place, you maybe can look at your abuser with some compassion to understand that your inner critic comes from fear and comes from kind of being grossly misinformed. Your inner critic took all of this information from the outside world and internalized it and is really acting out of protection, but just has it all wrong. You may not be able to forgive, but this allows you some space in this relationship with this abuser to kind of heal. Here's something else. And it's really, really radical. And you don't have to do this if you don't want to, but this is kind of crazy. And it's kind of cool. I didn't make this up, but get this. And this is something that you can do with yourself, but I'd like you to try this on: is to sit down with a piece of paper and be your inner critic and have your inner critic, apologize to you, but write it out because this really gets you in your body, this in your body. So you could say things like, I apologize for calling you fat and undisciplined. Imagine how radical that is to have this aspect of you, apologize to you. And to really go through that process. I am sorry I called you lazy. You work very hard at improving. I'm so sorry I didn't respect you. Do you see how powerful that can be? Try that on and see what you think.

Rita Black: Okay. Now, number five, just become aware of that. Now that you're becoming aware of that critical loop, that was another step. I want you to start to self advocate, to start to break it up and just say, stop. I don't say that anymore. Like for instance, if that critical part of you said you blew it, you ate that junk food, this is my favorite. And maybe you've heard me say this before, I'm gonna say it again, use the term. I am moving in the direction of moving the direction is a wonderful term to use for your subconscious mind, because it's not an affirmation. It's not like saying I'm eating healthy, but I'm moving in the direction of eating healthy. That opens up your subconscious mind. Because if you're not quite there yet, your mind, your subconscious mind, isn't gonna buy it. But if you're saying I'm moving in the direction, it can buy that. So it will take that on. But sometimes I really love that idea of stop. I don't say that anymore. I say, I am moving in the direction of making healthier choices or stop. I don't say that anymore. Stop is a great word. You don't have to be mean about it. You're just saying stop. We don't do that. Stop, stop. I don't say that anymore. It's making a cognitive. What you're doing is really, it's like a little, you can take a breath when you're saying it too. It's like a little mini. It's like a karate chop. You're in making an incision in that old loop. So it's almost like you're cutting through that loop and you're cutting right through it by saying stop and time kind of stops. And your brain kind of stops when you say that stop. I don't say that anymore. I say I'm moving in the direction of making healthier choices. Stop. I don't say that anymore. I'm moving in the direction of taking care of stress in ways other than food. So you're stopping and you're refocusing on where you are going.

Rita Black: Okay. Six, let's talk about our body language. So I want, I want you to start advocating for your body as well and pick one part part this week, pick a part right now, what's the part of your body that makes you feel the worst cringe? The most that you would hide it? For me, it used to be my thighs only, you know, when we did our body love in our monthly master group, it was my neck crepe and I can't believe how many other women in our group felt the same about their neck crepe. So last year we worked on it and I worked on my bunions, which I have. So, you know, there's always a part we can work on. There's never, we never run out parts. And I always feel better about that part. It's such a loving thing to do. So just pick up body part and start to touch it every day, lovingly. And I want you to rename that body part. You know, my thighs were fat, chunky, disgusting. So I came up with some better words. Now I didn't say my thighs were thin cuz they weren't. And then I didn't say my thighs were, you know, gorgeous, but it has to be a word that gives your body part respect, but also something that you can really embrace wholeheartedly with all of yourself. So what did I, so my body part, my crepey neck, I said that it was, I said it was witty and I said it was wise. And I said it was sensuous. So here are some words that you might use and you can please feel free. People are very creative when they start thinking about this long, strong shapely, vibrant, lovely, pretty sexy, presidential, royal, spiritual goddess like, whimsical, proud, witty, generous, statuesque, modern, toned, ripe, sensuous, handsome, bodacious, voluptuous, olympic, wise. So see what you can come up with for your body parts and just have fun.

Rita Black: And seven, start to observe all that you do that is powerful and put that in your evidence folder that you are capable. And enough, for instance, I went for a walk today, even when I didn't want to, we're very quick to point out. We were talking about this in my group, we're so quick to point out what we didn't do. Right. And when we do something right, we're very quick to move on from it and minimize it. Like it didn't matter. Right. Our brain will just, oh yeah, I did that. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's forget about that. Let's move on. Let's not working now. Right? So we want to hold on to what we did. We wanna hold on to what we're doing. We want to even hold on to those moments where we feel good. We wanna put them in that evidence folder. That life is good. We're enough that we do positive and healthy things. I can assure you right now, probably 60 to 80% of what you're doing is powerful and positive, you're just not seeing it. So wake up to all those powerful things you are doing on a daily basis and put them in that evidence folder. The more you call attention to them, the more you will see them. And the more you will start to see more that you do. I swear. So please do start doing that. I stopped after a couple of bites of dessert and I noticed it was enough. Put that in your evidence folder.

Rita Black: All right. So now I'm gonna wrestle my papers because I've got some notes here and I'm going to just review really quickly what you want to do to start to break up this relationship and start to have a more powerful relationship. So number one, just get conscious and observe how you abuse yourself and the restrictions, the negative loops. Then two, you wanna start to become aware of the relationship you do want to have. Three and make the decision to stop this whole thing that fed up, and then four, start to cultivate that shift place, that beautiful, relaxing place, that inner refuge, you can go to take a breath and enter in there when you're feeling anxious, stressed, and need some self love and really tune into that, that inner guide, that inner coach that can touch your face and have compassion for you. That can be your own best advocate. Have that inner critic, write an apology to you. What the hell, why the hell not! Come on? Life is short. Get that apology out of that inner critic before it's too late. Five, become aware and hear the critical loop of your negative self speak and stop it stop. I don't say that anymore, and advocate, be your own best lawyer. Get in there and, or be your own best friend. Stop that bully on the playground in its tracks. We don't say that anymore. We say this and then tune into that body part that you wanna have some love for and start give it a new name and observe all that you do. That is powerful, healthy. All that you do do in your day. There's so much that you do that is wonderful and powerful. Put it in that evidence folder, please, that you are enough and take a nice deep breath in and bring that all within you.

Rita Black: And I hope that this episode served you. All right, so please, please, on the 28th, I hope you will join me for how to break through the weight struggle cycle so you can lose weight consistently and permanently. I would love to see you there. We are going to do some hypnosis and really dive into those three main mind shifts that you can make to really get going on your journey of weight mastery. Thank you again, have an amazing week.

Rita Black: And remember that the key and probably the only key to unlocking the door, the weight struggle is inside you. So keep listening and find it and I will wave you all high from Seattle Washington Roosevelt high school class of 1982. And I will see you next week.

Rita Black: Do you wanna dive deeper into the mindset of long-term weight release, head on over to www.shiftweight mastery.com. That's www shift weight mastery.com where you'll find numerous tools and resources to help you unlock your mind for permanent weight release tips, strategies, and more, and be sure to check the show notes, to learn more about my book From Fat to Thinking, Unlock Your Mind for Permanent Weight Loss.