Willpower or Won't-power: What works for weight loss?

Willpower is defined as "energetic determination." It's a state of mind born of a desire to improve or change something we do, and that can be a good thing. But it's all too easy to treat willpower like a magic spell - just believe that your state of mind is enough to make you change behaviors or resist temptation and "poof!" all desire to eat that bag of Fritos disappears. (We wish!)

We also tend to get the wrong idea about willpower, thinking it's the key to weight control and that if we don't have enough of it, we're doomed. Think about the last time you decided to cut back on junk food. Did you think that "energetic determination" (better known as willpower) would help you stay the course? When you failed, did you think "I just don't have enough willpower"? Actually, your willpower was never going to be enough in the first place; a different approach is needed. And here's why:

Studies testing the durability and dependability of willpower to change behaviors, to avoid temptations, or to tackle major projects have shown that willpower is a diminishing resource.

Through a number of tests in a variety of situations, researchers at Case Western Reserve University concluded that you cannot employ willpower for too long or for too many tasks because it does not remain constant, but in fact weakens with use. They showed that the strength of willpower diminishes in direct proportion to how much it is used and that the more an individual relies on willpower, the less available it becomes. Given these findings, it is easy to see why the ability to consistently say no is so short-lived.

Willpower also fails because it can't match up to the power of human memory. Human beings respond to all types of stimuli through the five senses. Think about the last time you heard a song that transported you back in time. You probably remembered the scene vividly, recalling when it was, where it was and who you were with. Your mind may have gone back twenty years or more and yet the memory was crystal clear, as were the feelings associated with it.

So what do you think happens when you see or smell one of your favorite foods? As with a song, you are besieged with stimuli that stir up your senses and your emotions, taking you back in time to when you last sunk your teeth into that gooey chocolate-chip cookie. (And didn't it taste goooood?)

When faced with the food you are so ardently trying to deny yourself, it's very hard to resist the temptation to indulge because memory overwhelms you. Willpower has some serious forces to battle with and if you rely on it for too long, it will weaken and eventually fail.

If you can't rely on willpower, what can you rely on to resist temptation? The answer is so evident, that you'll slap your forehead for not thinking of it! Here it is... drum-roll please... Limit what you allow to bombard your senses. Keep the tempting food out of your way, and you won't have to use up your willpower resisting it. That's it! Simple huh?

Whoever coined this phrase must have been trying to control their weight and must have discovered that willpower wasn't enough! "Out of sight, out of mind" is the golden rule for avoiding diet disaster foods. It means that if it's not in plain sight, if you can't see it or smell it, it won't bombard your senses and entice you into eating. Of course, you can't avoid every encounter with tempting foods; you can't clean out the pantries of the world! But you can control what is in your house, which is statistically the most likely environment for calorie-control slip-ups.

Our advice to you is to remove all "temptation" foods from the house right away - drop this page and do it now if you have to! Give that food to the neighbors, throw it in the trash, feed it to the cat - anything you can to get rid of it (except eating it of course).

Foods to keep out of sight and out of mind include:

• Trigger foods
• Any food that you know you can't limit to one serving
• Any snack or food that you eliminated when you last lost weight because you knew it was unhealthy and too high in calories
• Finger foods that are primarily carbohydrates and sugar
• Foods that you use to manage stress or uncomfortable emotions

If you are reluctant to get rid of certain foods because you may inconvenience the family, remember that unhealthy food is unhealthy for everybody. If you really believe that you are depriving other people in your house of cookies, candy, or junk food, they can always eat them away from the home.

If you are out and about and come face-to-face with an "out of sight, out of mind" food, then you may need to draw on some willpower to say "no". However, remember that saying "no" is just a good habit. And the more it becomes a habit, the less you need to rely on willpower.