It is true! Wrong mindsets regarding your weight loss can affect your success. How? Our attitudes and beliefs shape how we view ourselves and the world. They guide the behaviors and actions we take daily. It is also true regarding your weight loss journey.

As you strive to lose and maintain weight, you will find that the right mindset will allow you to take the appropriate actions and establish behaviors that help you achieve your goals. Keep reading as I discuss potential wrong attitudes in the paragraphs below.

All-or-nothing thinking

It is when you believe you must achieve specific results in your desired timeline. It is the belief that your success must be 100 percent, and anything less than that means failure. For example, if you don’t lose 10 pounds in one month as anticipated, you may think the method has failed and does not work for you. However, understand that weight loss is a journey and a nuanced process. It is something that is going to take time.

You can try different strategies to find one that works for you. For the most part, you will need to stick with your plan for a long time to achieve your goal. Allow yourself to think and plan for a long term-journey, and do not allow this wrong mindset to affect your weight loss plan.

Think in terms of several months and years and not weeks. This way, you will be encouraged when things fail to happen in your expected timeline. It means you will accept the progress you see, regardless of how small, and continue to work towards your weight loss goals.

Failure to accept the challenges expected during your journey

If you feel that you are not achieving results as desired or expected, you may start to blame yourself. You may think that you need to work harder. As a result, your motivation may go down. Instead of giving up, understand that this challenge is expected in any weight loss journey. There will be times when you will see good results. However, there will also be times when you see little progress or none, and you must adjust your strategies and keep going.

Instead of blaming yourself, congratulate yourself for coming this far and think of ways to overcome challenges. You may need to adjust the strategies you are currently using. Promise yourself that you will not give up or stop everything.

Focusing on the negative aspect

This one is important to address among the wrong mindsets for weight loss. Instead of focusing on the positive aspect of your journey and progress, sometimes you may find yourself dwelling on mistakes and setbacks. I know few people who have been on a weight loss plan and going well for a couple of months, and then they hit a plateau. They get discouraged. They forget they have made significant progress and are on the right track. They slowly fall back into their old poor habits and regain all the weight. The right approach would have been to be patient, re-evaluate their strategy and keep working on their goals.

Should and must attitude

The journey to lose weight and live healthily needs to be personal. Let it be something you want to do for yourself, not because you feel pressured to lose weight. I’d like you to hear me out. If you make an important decision because you feel like you should do it, what motivates you? Probably fear, shame, or guilt. This approach might sound good initially and help you start. But, unfortunately, you will only sustain it briefly since your motivation was from negative emotions.

In addition, studies have shown that self-compassion is vital for sustainable weight-loss change. It means you will most likely sustain changes from an internal desire based on values to help you achieve your desired goal.

Comparing your journey to others

Now, you know that generally comparing anything about yourself to other people is not a good idea. Comparing your weight loss journey to someone else’s will not motivate you to work harder. Instead, it will show you all the areas you think you fall short of, magnify them, and make you feel discouraged. It will not highlight your strengths and positive things about you that help in your journey.

Focus on yourself. Know your strength and weaknesses. Use your strong qualities to help you push forward and let your weaknesses remind you of the things you want to overcome as distractions to your success.

You don’t feel like you can achieve your goals

It is common knowledge that how we feel usually affects how we think and vice versa. Feeling down emotionally might make you think negatively about your weight loss journey. Understand that feelings are temporary, they come and they go. Do not let your emotions affect your thoughts, actions, or inactions. Stay positive and make value-based decisions even when you don’t feel like it.

In the long run, you need the right attitude to succeed in your weight loss and maintenance journey. So, first, see if you relate to some of these wrong mindsets for weight loss discussed above. Then, please adopt perspectives that will support you on your journey.