I am constantly struck by the way that the modern world encourages us to pass the buck. We are programmed by society to find solutions outside of ourselves. For example, insurance, do we really care if we lose our mobile phone? Do we really care to make sure that we do not spill paint on the carpet? Do we really care if we lose our credit card? It’s all insurable these days.
Even in terms of health, we in the UK are lucky enough to have a national health service that we can hopefully rely on to look after us and make us better. When we get old, we can rely on the state to provide us with care. When we lose our jobs we can rely on our insurance to pay our mortgage, we can rely on the state to pay the rent, pay us an income.
When we get a cold, or even a headache, what is the first thing that we do? We reach for our medicine, our pills. This is the way that we are being programmed by society to pass the buck and it has profound implications for us.
Think of a time when you were successful in accomplishing some task. Think of a time when things were going really well for you and you were being successful. At that time were you relying on others, or were you making your own luck? I’ll bet that at that time you were feeling in control of your own destiny, making things happen for yourself and this is the secret of success.
Imagine a lovely summers day, you are sitting in a garden and doing some work on a laptop, it is all peaceful and the birds are tweeting away. You have two hours to write an article before it needs to be submitted to your boss. You are forming your thoughts and then someone next door flings open their French windows and plants a radio outside, it is blaring away with sports chit chat.
Now, what do you do? Do you get frustrated that you can’t hear yourself think? It’s a great excuse for not finishing your project isn’t it? Do you go inside and work in peace? Or do you embrace the moment, realise that you have the power to decide whether or not to be disturbed by the noise, get on with your work, finish the article and enjoy the great weather and fresh air?
Because of the way that we have been programmed most of us would either get frustrated or go inside and we would blame the interruption on someone else. If we didn’t finish the article in time, then we would have a great excuse. ‘It wasn’t my fault.’ This is not success and this is making excuses, it is looking for reasons for non success.
When I was putting together our Weight Loss programme, one focus that I wanted it to have was to enable people to take responsibility for their own success in losing weight, to empower them, to realise that the solution is always available inside themselves. This is what brings about permanent success.
If someone drives you to a destination, are you more or less likely to remember the way than if you figured out how to get there and drove yourself?
Paul McKenna’s weight loss programme title is typical of the negative programming that I am talking about. ‘I can make you slim.’ It is like saying ‘you don’t have to do anything, I can make you slim.’ What a great marketing ploy!
I am sure that McKenna’s programme has been successful for some, and it certainly has been for him! The trouble is that unless someone takes responsibility for their own success, they will inevitably be inviting failure into their lives. In this case, they may well lose weight initially, but then they will start finding excuses, reasons for failure, reasons outside of themselves for why they are now putting on weight. ‘It’s just that we have had people to stay with us and we’ve really pigged out all weekend.’ ‘I’m just going through a tough time at the moment, things are getting on top of me and I’ve stopped doing my exercises for a bit.’ ‘It has stopped working for me now, I’m putting on weight.’
It is not someone else that will make you slim, it is you that will take the actions necessary for you to lose weight. That it what our 21 day weight loss programme is all about, providing you with the tools to put yourself in control of your own destiny, to take responsibility for your own actions and to empower you to lose weight.
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