Many people want to lose weight but, despite knowing all the things they’re doing wrong, still don’t change. What’s going on?

You may not know that only around 6% of the population consistently engage in the top five health behaviours. Or that only 8% of people follow through with their New Year’s resolutions, or that somewhere between 80 and 95 percent of people that lose weight gain it back.

Clearly, people want to change. They keep on trying to do what’s right.

Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey, the authors of Immunity to Change, explain a medical study which highlights how hard it is to make change. Heart doctors told their at-risk patients they would literally die if they did not make changes to their personal lives (diet, exercise, smoking) yet only one in seven was actually able to make the changes.

The other six surely wanted to live. The incentives for change could not be greater; they were literally facing death if they didn’t change.

Yet only one in seven succeeded.

Improving diet, engaging in exercise, are stopping smoking are hardly novel ideas when it comes to improving health, yet these people – despite overwhelming reasons to do so – still couldn’t make the necessary changes.

The question at the centre of this is How do we make change to do what’s necessary?

In their book, Kegan and Lahey distinguish between technical and adaptive challenges:

• A technical challenge has a straightforward solution. It usually just needs knowledge or information.
• An adaptive challenge is different, much more difficult to address, and can only be met by transforming your mindset and changing your behaviour.

People say things all the time like “I know what to do, I just don’t do it.”

If you’ve tried and failed to lose weight, it’s likely that you been addressing your adaptive challenge with technical solutions. Knowing what to do provides information (technical solution) but what’s needed is behaviour and habit change (adaptive solution).

Healthy Inspirations combines both the technical and adaptive solutions so that each member gets results. Weekly coaching that monitors choices and provides support and motivation makes all the difference. It helps you implement knowledge, and adapt your day-to-day choices to ensure that your behaviours support your goals of losing weight and improving health and fitness.

If you haven’t already found out how our programs are so effective, we’d love to have a chat and help you achieve the results you’ve dreamed of.