It’s Not Always About the Weight
People often ask me what I do and I want to say, “How much time do you have?” When I tell them I am a health coach, they either avoid my eyes (this is for another blog post), or say, “Oh – so you help people lose weight.”
“………Maybe.”
I’m thinking of the lovely client I met with yesterday. When we first met a few months back, she said, “I would like to lose some weight, move more, and get more energy and do things. I just used to have so much more energy. I just don’t want to do anything.”
“Energy.”
A health coach is not a counselor or a therapist. A health coach cannot prescribe or diagnose. What we can do is actively listen, ask powerful questions to help our clients understand what is going on. Effectively, the client is answering their own questions, as they should.
If clients are open to meditation, in any form, great! This particular client mentioned she used to meditate and missed it. She agreed meditating a few times per week would be doable for her. She also agreed getting out and walking a set distance a few times per week would feel good for her. She set her schedule and distance.
new person started to slowly emerge over the weeks. A light was starting to shine. She realized she felt better after a walk. The meditation was shedding insight for her and also had a welcome, calming effect.
Past interests and hobbies that she had were sounding not just interesting, but possible again. Together, we searched for possible outlets and she made the calls to get signed up for a few classes.
Ultimately, with subsequent sessions and continued meditation she realized years of unresolved grief were sapping her of desired energy and social connections she longed to make. She was able to realize enough was enough and it was time for her to take steps to deal with past sorrows.
As her health coach, I provide resources and support. She made the calls to support groups and the help she needs. She is buoyed by her burgeoning strength and the light and energy within her is growing stronger every week.
Our sessions may turn back to weight at some point. They may not. Optimal wellness has many pieces. Physical health/losing weight is just one piece. What I have found, is trying to address weight loss before addressing other pieces of health such as emotional or social issues, is just that, “trying”. It is not “doing”. One may lose weight initially. Is it sustainable though? So far I haven’t met a client who wants short term weight loss.who wants to lose weight just to have it come back?
Sustained behavior change. Sustained lifestyle changes. Sustained weight loss.
When clients are ready to truly focus on weight loss it is because other pieces of the wellness wheel have been addressed and the client feels in balance.
So, has this client lost weight? It turns out, with no surprise, it was not her first goal. She was feeling isolated and lacking energy and found her way to movement, meditation, creative classes, and a supportive group facing life’s similar circumstances. She is finding her energy, which is there, with her resilience. And she is doing the work to increase it each week. It’s not always about the weight.