DoctorOz: 7 Mindset Changes for Lasting Weight Loss

I hate not looking my best. I hate that I'm overweight. I need to lose 15 pounds. I hate being overweight. I'm going to give up desserts. When I'm thin, I feel better. More confident. Friends, forget all that noise out there, my goodness. Imagine that the key to losing the weight for good was just making one change. My next guest has spent three decades researching weight loss. He helped craft one of the most successful diet plans of all time. He's a trusted advisor to my good friend, Oprah Winfrey, and he says shifting one thing in your life can be the key to getting healthy and achieving your goals. What's that one thing? It's your mindset. Dr. Gary Foster has created a roadmap to start today. He's put it into a book called The Shift, Seven Powerful Mindset Changes for Lasting Weight Loss. Gary, my viewers have bookshelves after bookshelves full of weight loss books. Why does it make a difference to have a mindset change? This isn't a diet book. You'll find no sample menus, no recipes, no foods that you must always have or never have. And that's because after 30 years of helping people manage their weight, patient after patient, study after study, it became clear. While eating and activity were important, the thing that most distinguished people who were successful versus those who weren't is that they changed the way they thought, the way they thought about the journey and the thought about themselves. I tell you, I, after 13 years, realized that in the lives of people around me that I care about, but it's hard to do that. And that's why people stumble. And then they begin crutching on diet programs and weight loss programs, which are great to have, but they don't sometimes address the primary problem. So he's the chief scientific officer, I should say, at Weight Watchers, formerly known as Weight Watchers, now it's WW, congratulations. And you spend a lot of time shifting your thought process to cope with the people coming to you for help. And you've tried this and it's worked. Exactly right. And what I wanted to do with this book was to review the science on the topic so people knew this was credible and it's evidence-based. But importantly, end each chapter with how can you make your own shift, practical, actionable skills that can help make the journey easier and more sustainable? Well, let's start with the first shift. We usually think that you should take big steps for results, right? Well, let's shift it to, I should take small steps for big results. Explain this shift. This shift really says that small successes lead to big successes. Rather than waiting till sometime down the road, I'll be able to celebrate. You also say that we need longer term goals, obviously, and I have a little metaphor here. So I love looking at the stars at night. And the North Star, which for all of known history, has been where we sort of tried to go, the way we're navigating. But imagine this is what you want to accomplish. So for example, I want to be around for my kids or grandkids. Now, your short-term, smaller, more detailed goals, to your point, has to do more. For example, I'm going to eat 1300 calories a day, which by the way, probably going to mean some broccoli, at least for me. Or I'm going to walk a mile a day, right? And you can run if you want to, but it's got to have that distance. And you have another maybe tip that you have, which is to love yourself, right? At least treat yourself like your best friend. It's the minimum. So why are these small goals so critical to this big North Star goal? Because they fuel the journey. If you're always looking at, I can only feel good, I can only feel proud, I can only get any positive feedback, when I get to the North Star, the North Star is pretty far away. So if you can build small steps into the journey, it fuels success. Small, specific goals are fantastic to make it work. And you need tactics to get these goals in place. So you've got a habit loop that you've crafted for us to begin to use. And you guys probably haven't thought much about a habit loop, but Chrissy is going to walk us through how she has developed one. You probably don't even know you've done it yet, but we're going to get through this. So top of the list, you've got a habit that you want to have. And that's, for example, we just said you want to eat 1300 calories or walk a mile or love yourself. So what is your habit you want? My habit is I want to get outside at least three times a week and walk. During pandemic, I was doing great and I slacked. All right, Gary, fantastic. So here's a very specific goal that you want to do exercising three times a week. Now, what is something you would like to do? What is something that just brings you pleasure in and of itself that maybe you could pair with walking three times a week? I do enjoy my daughter doesn't live at home anymore. I do enjoy calling her and talking to her and hearing about her day and sharing my day. So if you wanted to do that, you could pair calling your daughter with this habit. And now you've taken something walking that's relatively neutral for most and made it actually a joyful event because you enjoy talking to your daughter. But there's just one more step to complete the habit. And that is how will you set yourself up? How will you cue yourself? How will you trigger yourself to make this happen? Is there anything a part of your routine that you could say when this happens, that'll be my cue to take the walk when I come home at the end of the day? That's actually when I'm looking to call her. So I guess I could come home right after work, change my clothes and grab my phone and head on out. Exactly. That's a perfect habit, Lou. Chrissy, this is actionable. It's actually makes sense in your day-to-day life. Absolutely. And it's something very doable and never thought about it this way, but it's definitely something I could work. I like the reward part. Yeah, exactly. You sweeten it up a little bit. Good luck with it, Chrissy. Thank you. All right. The next shift Gary wants us to be making is I want to be tough on myself to lose weight has to shift to I want to be kind to myself to lose weight. The question is, how do you do that? So we set up a grocery store aisle that has more than just food, right? It has descriptive words that we often use to feed ourselves, feed our brains anyway. Adrienne, a frequent guest of the show, and I've asked her to be honest about this. So go ahead and show me what you would put on your cart, the words that actually you might be saying to yourself. Let me be honest about this. I am. I'm going to be very honest. First one that I'm diving in for. Self-criticism. Self-criticism is huge, and I know I'm my own worst critic, but it's hard to control it. On a positive note, I will also say inquisitive. I'm extremely inquisitive. I'm ready to just jump and dive into things. I kind of like that aspect. I will also say caring. I am extremely caring, and I know it may sound a little generic, but I believe it's a gift to truly have compassion and care for someone else. I don't want to put it down, but I have to. Because you're procrastinating. Because I'm procrastinating, yes. Procrastinator. O-M-G. I am a huge procrastinator. So I look at these. So self-criticism, procrastination. These are negative things you say to yourself, but you have some positives here. So Gary Watkins, how does this work? Does it the right mix? People sometimes are much harsher on themselves. That's exactly right. Adrian, I think this is really balanced, and you're able to talk to yourself in a very compassionate, kind way and appreciating the things you bring to the table, the things that are important to you and the things that make you you. Many people, when they start a weight and wellness journey, think that the harsher they are to themselves, the nastier the things they say to themselves, the better they'll do, the more motivated they'll be. It's just not true. It robs you of motivation. So that's why practicing self-compassion is so important. Adrian, personally, I'd take the self-criticism out and put funny in there. I'm hilarious. Exactly. You are. But over time, I think that's the goal, right? As opposed to having four negatives, have a majority. You have to be honest with yourself. If you're a procrastinator, that's, you know, deal with it. But you should have more positives, negatives, because people love you. Oh, thank you. All right. When we come back, are you surrounded by the right people to support your healthy mindset shift? Or are toxic people weighing you down? The quiz to find out when we come back. We're back with Gary Foster. He's the chief scientific officer at the WW Weight Watchers with his new book, The Shift. He's showing us all how to shift our mindset to lose weight and reach our health goals once and for all. Explain mindset and why it's more important than the food you're eating and the exercise you're doing. And this is coming from someone who helped build Weight Watchers. It's really important to remember that what's in your head is just as important as what's on your plate. And the people who are most successful on the journey are those who have learned to think differently. Think differently about the journey. And importantly, think differently about themselves. All right. So Gary's got a quiz to determine if you're surrounded by a supportive person who will help you think the right way about yourself. Someone's going to help you make the shift. Or if you've got a toxic enabling person in your life that's actually holding you back. So Kimberly's here. She's going to take the quiz with me, right? Yes. I will take the quiz too, Kimberly. You can all do it. It's super simple, guys. I'm going to tally up true or false for each question. And you've got to tie up the points. So just keep track. Get a piece of paper if you've got one handy or just 24 questions. You can remember it. So question number one, Gary, is all about this partner issue. Is it easy to talk to my partner about weight? True or false? So if it's true, give yourself five points. If not, one. Okay. You got that one? I got that one. Next question. My partner is thin. Does it understand my weight loss problem? Is that true or false? True, one point. False, three points. Actually, you're going to get more points if it's not true. My partner's always there when I need a friend. Is that true or false? True, four points. False, one point. And finally, I could talk to my partner even if I was doing poorly. That's important. True is five points. False, one point. All right. So how are you going to score this? You add all those four numbers together, right? If your total score is seven or less, right, it's time to think about different friends. Let's just be clear about this. You cannot succeed if you don't have teammates. The closer you get to 15 out here, the better off you are. The closer you are of finding the perfect partner. And you'll know it. You'll feel better. They'll be cheering you on. So Gary, what do you do with that information? Well, you decide if you're below seven, you need to get a different partner. Don't use this person because they're going to undermine your efforts. If you're closer to 15, that's exactly right. And when you get that person, be really specific in your request. Specificity really matters when you're requesting support. And a lot of times these people don't even realize they're hurting you. That's exactly right. They're enabling you thinking they're showing you love, but your mom's giving you ice cream and you don't feel good. All right. What's your score? Well, my score was a 13. Oh, fantastic. You got someone really hot there. Hold on to that person. Definitely. It's my mom. She was overweight before and she lost a lot of weight. And I've seen that she can do it, then I can definitely do it. So she's a strong supporter. What's her name? LaJune. LaJune, I'm proud of you. She loves you. Stay with her. What's the biggest mind shift Kimberly and everyone out there can make right now? Just break it down for us. I think a very common one is all or none thinking. I'm a successor. I'm a failure. I'm on a diet. I'm off a diet. Foods are good or bad. That's one of the many unhelpful thinking styles. But I think the most important shift people can make is to start the journey with a fundamental sense of worth as you are right now. Don't believe the nonsense that your weight is your worth. Don't believe that you don't measure up, that you're not good enough. Self-compassion beats self-criticism every single time. I understand your success much better after today's show. Thanks for sharing it with the audience. Talk to LaJune. I'm proud of you. Thank you. Gary's new book, The Shift, is available now for a complete list of his seven mindset changes for lasting weight loss. You can head to our website, DrOz.com. It's all there.