As a Christian weight loss coach and personal trainer, one of the behavioural patterns I often come across in people that keep them overweight is the People Pleaser.
People pleasers are always apologizing; they are afraid of what other people would think; they feel that they’re not good enough; they say yes when they often want to say ‘no’ and then they feel bad when they say ‘no’; they excessively worry a lot; they often live to serve others; they often strive for perfection and they take what people saw about them very personally. Does this sound like you?
If so, hang tight because starting today you can begin to change this pattern.
It seems absurd that people pleasing can be tied to weight but over the years of working with people, here are some of the connections I’ve made and learned.
How people-pleasing makes and keeps you fat:
1. People pleasers put others first so they will eat something they don’t want to so they don’t offend their guests. I have clients who eat high fat and calorie loaded dinners their husbands cook every night but don’t want to offend them so they eat it.
2. At the root of people-pleasing is a fear of failure and fear of success. Fear of failure is rooted in feelings of inadequacy and fear of success is rooted in feelings of overwhelm and rejection. People pleasers can become so concerned with what people will think of them that they will subconsciously sabotage their weight loss goals for fear of judgement from themselves or from other people.
3. If you’ve spent most of your life being a people pleaser then you’ve become emotionally addicted to the need for people to validate you and when you don’t get it you will eat to stuff the feelings of emptiness you feel when you are not being validated or conversely, you will eat to seek the reward that you did not get externally. Subconsciously you feel that if no-one is going to make you feel better then you might as well make yourself feel better with food. The problem is that this addiction like all others are insatiable.
Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.~ Galatians 1:10
So now that you understand this, what do you do?
Our course 5 Steps to Christian Weight Loss give you a step-by-step plan to help you eradicate this behaviour pattern and help you finally release the weight.
Although its too much to go through in this article, here is a starting point to help you begin to change:
Step 1: Get to the Root
Through prayer ask God to show you what is at the root of your people pleasing. In the course we go through guided exercises to help you get there.
Step 2: Let Go
Although easier said than done, you will learn to:
- let go of your story
- let go of the people who want you to please them
- let go of your need to be liked
- let go of your need to be needed
- let go of your need for approval
- let go of the fears that keep you stuck
- let go of the unproductive language that you’ve been using to keep you stuck in your story
When you learn to let go, you will begin to attract affirming people, situations and events in your life that will begin to shape a new identity for you; an identity that is based on Christ and not on what man thinks.
Steps 3-5 of the program will give you the practical steps to take this from concept to reality.
P.S. Ready to overcome people pleasing so you can start releasing weight, God’s way? Check out our free video course at cathymorenzie.com. In it, you will discover the 5 steps to Christian Weight Loss.
Until Next Week,
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