Kicking-Off Weight Loss

Who could have seen this covid madness coming? Well...let's not get into that....suffice it to say, these are scary times....full of worry, stress, anxiety, too much togetherness...you get my drift. Many of us (including myself) resort to comforting ourselves with food. There is just something about the act of eating, and enjoying delicious food, that makes it all better. Or so we tell ourselves...until we wake up one morning and realize we've put on too much weight. And then it all comes crashing down, twice as hard....on our bodies, our souls, our egos, our self-esteem....it's bad when that happens, really bad.

But fret not. There is hope. Just in time to put off stress binging the dreaded CNN-Refrigerator combo, with the obligatory side order of Microwave and HotPockets. This might be a really good time to reign it all in, to do something FOR ourselves, to take on these scary times and vanquish that covid monster before it gets the better of us.

So let's talk about weight loss.

Losing weight is hard, it really is. I get it. I really do. I've been overweight my whole life. It turns out that a few years ago I found out that if I didn't lose the weight, I'd probably die an early death. That really sucked...that was a really bad day. Faced with the facts and a clear and predictive course towards my own demise, I resolved to shed the weight once and for all. I had to do something radical.

I had to make being healthy the single most important thing in my daily life.

I had to quit my job. I had to quit my hobbies. I had to stop doing everything I was doing, and start from scratch. I had to brainwash myself into a new way of thinking about life, the universe, and everything. I had abandon all my old habits, and behave new habits into being. After 50 years of living, and everything I had accomplished and worked for, I had to give it all up, to do this one thing: Get Healthy.

Now, for most people, losing some weight doesn't mean that. Weight loss, for most people, isn't actually that hard...but for me, it's the hardest thing in the world, and it requires my absolute undivided attention and concentration. I have to focus on it full time. Maybe you're like me, maybe you have wrestled with your weight all of your life, maybe you've even given up and thrown in the towel....like I did. Weight loss is a bitch. Trust me, I know. I've spent a lifetime working at it, and only recently have I figured out how to do it.

It turns out, much to my own surprise, that weight loss is part uncommon sense knowledge and part skill. My mentor, Spencer Cahill, used to say, "What everybody thinks is common sense, is actually uncommon sense knowledge." If I had a dollar for every time people have told me that losing weight is all common sense, I would be richer than Jeff Bezos. Seriously. I cringe when people say that now. And you won't hear it from me. And once you acquire the knowledge, putting it to work and applying it is a behavior...which, like all behaviors, can be learned and improved....in short, they can be turned into a skill. And once you have the skills, the combination of knowledge and skills can de-mystify weight loss and make it all work for you, instead of against you.

What I have discovered and learned is NOT common sense. It is really deeply buried knowledge, stuff that nobody tells you. It's not knowledge that's readily available, but it is out there if you go looking for it. Unless you have a degree in Nutrition, or Physical Sports and Metabolic Training of sorts, or unless you studied Metabolic Medicine, you are not likely to know these things. Probably because there are people making a ridiculous amount of money off desperate overweight people like you and me. So don't feel bad and worry not....I will share. All shall be revealed.

So, to kick off this blog and this website, in these scary covid times of Corona-viral culinary conun-doldrums, I will start with a blog series on Weight Loss - what it actually is, how to do it in the short run, and how to manage it in the long run. Even if you're not in it for the weight loss, but rather just weight management --- you'll want to read on. Because that's what's front and center in my life. And maybe it is for you, too. What follows is the culmination of my experience, what I've learned, and my passions for food and cooking, for people, and for getting healthy and enjoying life.

So...here we go....and remember, in life as in food....Flavor Is Free!

Chris.

Click here to start on Part 1: The Magic Number