Program Yourself Thin Live 8-31-26

Hey everyone, and welcome to today's Program Yourself Thin podcast. Today we're talking about you eat what you see. And this is really important to understand. Don't question it. I promise you it's true. You eat what you see over time. I mean, at one point you might see something and say, I don't want to eat it, but over time it chips away at you. It affects you dramatically. And ironically, one of the easiest ways to manage your weight is kind of take a step back and instead of just focusing on the decision you're making in the moment, take a step back and set your environment up so that it's supporting you. Again, ultimately, you know, we got to make the right choices and a lot of it comes down to that. But a lot of the work we can do ahead of time to set ourselves up for success goes a long way. And so once you understand that what you're visually seeing regularly is going to impact what food you end up choosing to eat, and you can start to look at the environment that you're in, you can look at the environment you move through between being at home and being other places in your life. Think about what you are seeing visually. And it can start in your home, right? So that literally one of the first things you can do, you do this today, is you can make sure that you're not looking regularly at high-calorie foods that you're looking to minimize. And so we don't want a bag of chips, a bag of cookies, uh, you know, treats in our eyesight all the time because what it's doing is it's reinforcing The last time we ate it, the anticipation of eating it again, and it nudges us in that direction, sometimes powerfully, sometimes subtly, but it's always reinforcing the behavior. So one of the easiest ways to win with your weight is to look at your environment and start to remove the visual cues that can nudge you in that direction. And I use the word nudge very specifically here because most people hear this, ah, it doesn't matter what I see, I either eat it or I don't eat it. Yeah. No, no, you cannot think of it that way because so much of managing your weight is taking care of the little things ahead of time. Yes, of course, we're going to rely on willpower, making good decisions sometimes as well. But the more you start to focus the little subtle things that are nudging you in directions consistently, you start to set yourself up for long-term success. Okay. Because again, it's a nudging effect that you'll never really appreciate. And it's important that you kind of recognize it's there because that's how you start to see the things that you can change easily that nudge you in a different direction. So again, if we go back to the kitchen, if you clear the kitchen out so that you're not looking at these things, so it's not even throwing it away. It's putting in the pantry. It's putting in the cupboard. It's putting it out of sight. Again, this doesn't fix everything. I want to make that clear, but it foundationally starts nudging you in a different direction. Starts nudging you towards your goal weight. Because now you're not being visually cued. You open the fridge up and you make the healthier foods front and center so you see them. Um, in your kitchen, you put a bowl of fruit so you see it when you walk in the kitchen. And these things start to wear on you a bit, right? They can wear on you in the wrong way or the right way. Um, then we zoom out a little bit and, you know, you can even get to the point where, you know, we don't even bring the food into the house, right? Then you're really not gonna see it. Because when you don't see these foods, you know, at first you might feel a longing for them and a craving for them. But eventually what happens if you're not seeing these foods regularly, if they're not coming into your house, you're just not going to think about them. You know, it fades. And now you're on a much easier path to actually influence your eating. And then beyond that, literally, literally the ways you drive to different places in your life, right? If you You know, your favorite fast food places here, go a different way. Because even literally, even seeing the logos of your fast food place, your favorite places, is going to trigger you to start thinking about those foods. Now again, I just want to make clear, this is a subtle level. But what I have found studying people is it's the subtle levels done right that really bring us in a new direction in a way that feels sustainable and comfortable. And this is one of the easiest ways. If you'll take a step back, accept that visual things are going to trigger you in the wrong direction and start to fix them. Do it intentionally. And again, it works both ways. It's removing the unhealthy visual triggers and it's adding and increasing the healthy visual triggers in the ways that I just said. Put the healthy stuff in the, in the refrigerator so it's easy to see. Put the unhealthier stuff in the vegetable bins. You'll be amazed at how that plays with your mind. So again, experiment with this and see how it affects you because it affects literally everyone, but some people more. And if you're someone who's very strongly impacted by what you see visually and you fix this, it can just, it feels so much better, you know, because again, when we talk about food noise, there are many ways to reduce food noise. And this is just one more little one that again nudges us in that direction. And when we nudge ourselves in that direction and In a multitude of ways, that's how we set ourselves up for long-term success in a way that's sustainable. And that's what you're ultimately looking for. Now, if you want some other ways to kind of go about your weight, managing your weight in this way, click the link in my bio or go to programyourselfthin.com and go get the free hypnosis session I made for you. It's called The New Thin Me. It's designed to calm you down, relax you, and put lots of good ideas in your mind so that you come out of that session motivated, fired up, and finding yourself making better choices naturally. So again, Go to program yourself then, or click the link in my bio. If you're in Facebook land and you want to get that session, all you have to do is write the word mind, M-I-N-D, in the comments section, and it'll automatically send you a link to go get that. So if you have any questions, feel free to ask them. And yes, make sure you get that hypnosis session. It is a good one, and it's really kind of the starting point. a lot of people and program yourself then. So I give it away for free because it's powerful, but I also want people to be able to experience, um, kind of my take on hypnosis, uh, and see how it feels for them. You know, may or may not be the right fit, you know, but if it is, it can be life-changing, you know. So again, go, go get that session. So Debbie, Debbie says such a good idea. Yeah, the visual, the visual, um, concept of influencing your food decisions I think is very powerful, and I think a very, very important piece of it. And as I say, again, it's not the only piece. So I know sometimes people, oh yeah, I don't see it. I'm like, you know, and they just, they minimize it. Again, I'm not saying this does all the lifting for you, but what I'm saying is it contributes. And again, dieting teaches us to really just rely on willpower, the big thing we're going to do, the fight, you know. But what I've found more often than not that really leads to the success that you're looking for, which is long-term, weight management, living at your goal weight, is that it's more of a collection of small little subtle things that you put together more often than not. So yes, it is a good idea. Carolyn says, yep, crazy how things can trigger. Yeah, it's amazing. It's amazing how little things can trigger. I find it fascinating and I find it very encouraging and exciting. You know, again, I, this one, I keep kind of circling this, but what I'm trying to get at is this. That a lot of times the human brain doesn't really recognize how it works. And so yes, the environment is the environment you live in is probably the number one factor influencing your weight. If I had to pick one thing, I would say the environment that you live in is probably the number one thing, and that environment is lots and lots of things in it. You know, and one big piece of that is the visual. Things you're seeing. To put it a different way, because this will just prove the point of what I'm saying and how quickly it gets out of hand, is that if you think about how many times you're visually cued about— I'm just gonna use a real blanket term of unhealthy food, let's say junk food, fast food, processed food, right? Let's just keep a category and put it over there. How many times a day are you triggered to think about Junk food, fast food, processed food, you know. And now your brain says, I don't know, a couple times? No, because technically you're triggered every time you see a visual thing. So if you drive by a fast food restaurant and see their logo, that's a trigger, right? Because now all of a sudden you see a logo of one of your fast favorite fast food places, now your mind is thinking about the last time it ate your favorite meal at that place. Okay, so now let's imagine what happens when you walk into the convenience store. What do you think? It's like thousands of little triggers, right? Because each package— think about this, right? Every single package in that convenience store is designed by professionals with million-dollar budgets to create the most triggering, psychologically grabbing packaging for it. And now you walk into a convenience store and you're seeing thousands, literally thousands. You take it for granted because we're just surrounded by it. Never mind the grocery store. Grocery store is many thousands, and it's many thousands of things that again trigger you in a very compelling way. So, you know, a lot of people, as I was saying with humans, We're very, very much impacted by this, but simultaneously we tend to have brains that just don't believe that. Oh, it doesn't matter what I see. It doesn't matter what I see. It matters what I choose to do. Well, yeah, but what you choose to do is being heavily impacted by what you're seeing regularly, right? And if you're regularly being— if you're regularly thinking about your favorite food you had at your last place where that thought wasn't even there, now all of a sudden it's there. Well, what you choose to do, yes, is part of it, but what you're even considering was decided for you. And this is the reality we find ourselves in a lot in the modern world, is that we're constantly being triggered. And basically, put a different way, in a more aggressive way, we're constantly having ideas implanted into our mind, you know, certainly about food. So you weren't even thinking about that food, now you're, you're obsessed with it. How'd it happen? Well, one way it happens is visually. You see, you get the packaging of it. You know, or a commercial of it, or the logo of the place, or whatever. And all of a sudden, it's like a hypnotic—it's literally like a hypnotic—and that was where I'm blanking on my word here. It's a hypnotic post suggestion. So again, when you see that package, when you see that logo, when you see those colors, it's a hypnotic suggestion. Have you ever seen a hypnosis show? Right? The hypnotizer. Oh, you're gonna be Elvis. And every time I say Elvis, you're gonna. Talk like Elvis, right? You bring the person out and you say Elvis, and then, and it's like they talk like Elvis now. Well, every single packaging is doing the same thing. And so when we re-see it, it's not just this benign process. It's literally affecting us on a deeper level. And I think a lot of people overlook that, and it's important that they don't. What's up, Jane? Jane says, I had a friend over for dinner last night, and he asked me what I had in the house that was sweet. And I let him know that I don't keep sweets in my house at all anymore. I know if I have sweets like ice cream in my house, I'll crave them. Yeah, that's just true. That's exactly right. Now, I think so. Again, this is part of what I'm talking about as well. Now, this is a little bit beyond visual in a sense, and it's like literally, is it in the house or not? Because sometimes, you know, we can get a thing of ice cream, put in the freezer, not even look at it, but know it's there, you know. So this is another level of it, but it's related. And yeah, so, so listen, it may be hard not to buy your favorite sweets. From the store, but it's easier to not buy the sweets from the store than it is to not eat the sweets when they're in your house. Okay, it gets progressively harder. You know, if you think about, you know, you know, most people have kind of an unhealthy snacking habit. Let's just say, maybe it's sweets, maybe it's chips, maybe it's good. Doesn't doesn't matter what it is. But if you start to look at it again, and you'll notice kind of a common pattern I'm talking about is taking the thing we're obsessed with and kind of zooming out a bit and seeing the bigger picture. So if someone says, "Oh my God, I struggle with ice cream every night." Well, okay, you struggle with ice cream every night, but it's not just at night where the ice cream shows up. That's not the only place the struggle's showing up. If you zoom out, that situation only exists because you got it from the store and brought it home. You only got it from the store and brought it home because, you know, you heard about it somewhere, tried it somewhere, saw a coupon for it, whatever. So if you follow it backwards, how that even started, it gives you more options to influence it. And so, like I said, yes, again, it may If you think it's hard to not eat ice cream when it's in your freezer at 9 o'clock at night, it's easier. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's easier to not buy it when you're in the store. But a lot of people just get fixated on where the problem is. And if you can zoom out, there's usually easier places within that process to influence. So instead of focusing your energy on not eating at 9 o'clock at night, not getting the ice cream from the freezer, you're much better off focusing on not buying it when you're at the store. And starting to work on that, because if it's not in the store, or if it's not in your house at nine o'clock, your chances of not eating it now go way up. Now you could get in your car and go get it still, obviously, and you've probably done that sometimes. But statistically, you're gonna do it less. You know, so again, a lot of people get fixated on where the problem shows up, but a lot of times where the problem shows up is not where it was really created. And once you start to look at the bigger picture again, you find easier. There's easier ways almost every time. to influence things, you know, than what we choose. So yeah, I, I think it's a great strategy, Jane, for sure. Yeah. Says it's great hypnosis. That's the hypnosis session I give away for free. So again, if you're not in my world, uh, click the link in my bio. If you're TikToking, just click the picture of me there and then go over there. Uh, if you're on Facebook, you just write mind into the comments and it'll send it to you. Um, Carolyn says, after a while, like yourself, are you not triggered anymore? Um, yeah, I mean, I, I'm still triggered by things, so I want to be clear. And I'm triggered— see, this is the other thing that really kind of drives me wild. Uh, it makes me nuts about dieting. And I just think in general, people don't really— most people just never get the opportunity to really understand how their mind works in a genuine, helpful way. And so I certainly— I'll still get triggered sometimes. So I like Ben and Jerry's ice cream right now. I don't bring it into the house. If I'm gonna get Ben and Jerry's ice cream, I can basically go to the store and I'll get like a small thing and I'll eat that. That's what I do. But you know, whatever. Maybe I have a shit day. You know what I mean? Like stressful, frustrating day. All of a sudden, I'm more triggered. You know for food. So again, when like when someone thinks like oh am I not triggered anymore? I'm way less triggered than I used to be for sure. And yet I'm still triggerable and get triggered sometimes. And I think that's really really important. Because I think dieting kind of teaches you to aim at perfection and to expect it. So the idea that like once you lose the weight, oh, I'll never have to worry about this again. Well, yes you will. Yes you will. I mean, I deal with stuff all the time. I deal with less of it, but I still deal with it. And so, uh, I think that I, I say that in such specificity because I want you in your own mind to realize the goal here is not to just be perfect. It's not just to lose weight and never have to think about it again. It's to get to a place where managing your mindset, your lifestyle, your eating so that you can live at your goal weight gets easier. You know, you become— you get in the routine. And so now, yeah, it's easier for me. Why am I not triggerable? Well, because I'm not in situations and environments that trigger me. So for example, when I go to the grocery store, I don't— I don't buy ice cream anymore. I don't buy ice cream. So it's like I don't even— I'm not saying no to ice cream because it's not really part of my Routine when I go there now, and then when I go home, it's nine o'clock now. I'm hungry. I want something sweet. I'm not even thinking about ice cream because I don't think I even have any in the house. You know, and and so so you know what I'm saying? So so that makes it easier. Now does that mean that I won't just some some days just fuck it? I'm gonna go and I'm gonna get some. Yeah, I might do that. But again, I've got kind of all these. My environment is set up to support me making good choices. Can I go and make you know get the ice cream? Yes, I can, but it takes more steps. It's not the normal, so it's less there. There's less programming of it, and that makes it easier. And what that does is it sets me up to not have to just rely on willpower. That's the key thing, is that I'm now in the flow. I'm in the routine. Most of my automated behaviors keep me at my goal weight. So yes, I still am. I compare it to the way it feels is like brushing your teeth. So most humans, you know, most of you Have created a toothbrushing habit, you know, and so you brush your teeth whenever you do it. You learn to do that when you're a kid, and you probably have the same routine as an adult. And it's not that you're not aware of you're doing it and that you want to do it, but most of that behavior runs on autopilot, right? You wake up in the morning, next thing you're brushing your teeth. You're getting ready to go to bed, next thing you know you stand in front of the mirror brushing your teeth. You didn't really think about it, just did it. That's the sweet spot. That's what we're aiming at. And program yourself then. Because it's not enough to just white-knuckle yourself down in weight because that's an unsustainable process. We're never going to white-knuckle ourselves long. And it really has nothing to do with motivation or intention. It has to do with brain chemistry, brain— what would be the word? Brain structures. We're not built— our brains are not built to micromanage every food decision we make. Our executive functioning, our prefrontal cortex is the newest part of our brain evolutionarily. We are designed to conserve energy cognitively and to just do what we do on autopilot. So to all of a sudden go into a diet and micromanage every little food decision is a huge cognitive load for most people. And what it means is you're going to run out of steam. It's like going into a marathon race and, you know, saying, well, I want to win this thing because I want to sprint the whole thing. Sounds great on paper, but when you go to do it, you're going to find that you hit a wall of ability. You just— you run out of steam. Your body's not built to sprint. For miles, you see. And so the same way that your body's not built to sprint for miles, your brain's not built to diet for years. It's just it's it's a temporary thing that you're able to do for a little while until you run out of steam. Same thing as if you ran the marathon as a sprinter, you're going to run out of steam at some point, and there's no difference. But unfortunately, most dieters think it's their fault. You know, they're saying, "No, I I should just if I really was serious, I would sprint the whole marathon." If I really wanted it, then I would sprint the whole marathon. So there's something wrong with me. There's nothing wrong with you. What's wrong with you is that the approach you're, you're thinking is going to work is not. It's not. You know, it's the wrong approach for what you're looking to achieve. Um, Jane says, even thinking about places where there are certain tasty treats, like my Sunday farmer's market that has amazing cookies, and I got really focused on getting one of these cookies yesterday. It's become a habit now. Yeah, exactly. And listen, I mean, it's— yes. And, um, obviously things, things that are really good and things that are really bad tend to help create habits a lot quicker, right? There's just a lot more fuel and energy behind it. Um, but yeah, it can be that quick, you know. But once you start to be aware of that— I'm the same way. Like, like, if I, if I went to a farmer's market, all of a sudden I just— I got the best cookie I ever ate in my life. I'm very aware. Oh, you know, now I know That's, that's kind of in there. It forms quick. Your brain can do this again. And I say pain and pleasure because phobia is the same version, just a different direction. I mean, you could be fine with spiders and all of a sudden you're around a big scary spider, and now in an instant— you can be a 40-year-old person living 40 years of life fine with spiders. Now you see a spider in a certain way, it scares the shit out of you. Boom, phobia. You know, so again, these good and bad, um, associations can happen in a moment. And all of a sudden they're there. So yes, the good ones can happen too. And I'm aware of that. I'm aware of that and I manage it. So even if I stumble upon the best cookie ever or whatever, you know, I will intentionally say I'm not going to go there this week or I will, I'm going to do it. I'm going to change other things. But again, I think what starts the whole process off is being aware that that's even going on at any level. What's up, Pat? Pat says, at the grocery store, I don't go down the chip snack aisles. Yeah, that's a smart— that's, that's just smart. I don't either. Um, I do now sometimes. I don't even look at them, you know what I mean? That's the other thing too. It's very interesting. Um, because right now, currently, there are aisles in the grocery store that you don't even pay attention to. So it can turn into that, although it'll never quite be like that. But yeah, I think a first step is absolutely do not go down those aisles. Just skip them. That's the best thing, right? And then, then again, once you, you start to get better at this process, you can go down the aisle in a very kind of indifferent, calm, grounded way, and that's transformative too. But yeah, not going down the tempting aisles, I think, is very smart as an initial step. It's very smart. And, um, because I mean, you just instantly just wipe all that out. Now again, you might feel some craving to go down there and look and get something. I get it. But what I want you to do is sometimes comparing cravings can be really beneficial. Because think about the craving and pull to go down the aisle at the grocery store versus the craving and pull that happens at 9 o'clock at night when it's in the house, right? They're 2 different levels of craving. And so once you realize that, if you're really serious about your weight, yeah, avoiding the aisle at the grocery store is going to be an easier path, right? That's good. That's going to make things flow easier for you. Carolyn says, thanks, that was helpful to know. Yeah, good, good. I'm glad. Yeah, if you got any questions, feel free, feel free to ask them. Uh, Lois says, I try to go grocery shopping when I'm not hungry. When hungry, the visual cues are so much easier to forget the strategies to make good choices. Yeah, well, that's— yes, thank you, Lois. And again, that's another huge one as well. Um, and again, this is getting more into the concept of optimizing your grocery shopping, right? So part of what we talk about in Program Yourself Thin in terms of optimizing your grocery shopping Which is really kind of ground zero because that's where everything kind of starts from to some degree, you know, is how good are you at grocery shopping? Because if you go grocery shopping and bring a bunch of bullshit into your house, you know, you've set yourself up for failure already. So yes, going grocery shopping, getting good at that is really one of the first steps to succeeding with your weight. And, uh, that— yeah, going and going grocery shopping when you're not very hungry is a very smart strategy. So if you kind of— if you can get your grocery shopping down to a routine, going after you've eaten breakfast, lunch, or dinner is a very smart idea. Because when you go grocery shopping when you're not hungry, you make much more logical decisions, right? So again, it's common sense when you hear it, but sometimes we don't really think about it or take it seriously, you know. But again, the grocery shopping is really One of the most effective ways to change your eating, you know, especially if you eat at home a lot. So yeah, it's very powerful. But yeah, if anyone's got questions, feel free to ask. Any questions are welcome. Um, I do know, like I always say, this week here is kind of like, uh, this week here is kind of like the week between Christmas and New Year where people are kind of just in a holding pattern. And this year is weird though. Don't do it, okay? If you're here listening to this, if you're, if you're thinking about getting started with your weight Again, I strongly recommend you go check out Program Yourself Thin at this point. It has changed its model, so it is now a membership, and you can go join for a much lower price, you know, than it was to get the whole program before. But again, in Program Yourself Thin, you know, because a lot of people are waiting, okay, next Monday, okay, that's it, here comes, here comes the fall, here it comes, I'm gonna be serious, right, right after Labor Day, the day after, once the picnic's over, that's it, it's all business. Once the Labor Day picnic's over. I'm all business. Don't do that shit. That is such a bad habit dieters have. Always waiting, all or nothing, right? All or nothing. And it's like they're waiting for the perfect time. Don't do that. If you're serious about your weight, then you be serious about it now. You can be serious and not be all out with it, you know? But you're serious or you're not. Let me give you an example. If you're a parent, you're serious about it all the time. Sometimes you're a better parent than other times though, right? But you always take it serious. If you're in a serious relationship, you always take that relationship serious. Sometimes you show up better than other times, but you're always serious. But then it comes to your weight and, you know, you're all or nothing. There's wild, wild swings, right? We're either 100% doing everything perfect or you just not think about it at all. And Program Yourself then really looks to bridge that divide, and we do it By giving you alternatives, so yeah, maybe your eating is not great, but you can still listen to a hypnosis session. Maybe you pigged out on pizza last night, but you can still drink your water. You know, there's so many things you can still do even when you eat poorly that nudge you and get you set up for the next the next phase, the next act. And I think dieters don't think that way. And what happens is, you know, you're all in for two weeks, and then you're all out for three months. That math's never going to work. So you've got to stop doing that. And again, in Program Yourself, then we talk about being all or something as a solution to that. And all or something really builds around the idea that you are always going to be engaged, right? Sometimes you're engaged up here doing all, and sometimes you're just here just holding on, you know, focus on your water, eat an apple every day, or whatever it may be that you decide. But what happens is psychologically you always feel like you're in the game. It doesn't feel like this giant swing of all or nothing, which is very disorienting, by the way, very disorienting to your subconscious mind. So again, Program Yourself Then is literally built— I believe one of the only programs that exists you can't get behind in Program Yourself Then. There's no getting behind because every day is another day. You know, you miss 3 days of hypnosis sessions, guess what? Tomorrow morning the next session shows up. So there's no getting behind. And I try and reinforce that your mindset— that you need to have that mindset when it comes to your weight because you cannot be perfect. You've been deluded into believing that you can be perfect and that your weight loss really revolves around you being perfect. And it is one of the most toxic beliefs there is when it comes to your managing your weight because you can't be perfect. You just can't. Not for long. You can be perfect for a little while, I'll give you that, but you can't be perfect for long. You know, uh, Pat says, where's the master class today? Um, Pat, the master class is where it always is. So if you go into the Circle app, if you go into the Circle app, you should have got a link. Well, the link's right there. So go into Circle, say Monday class, go there, click that link, do it. Um, the other thing as well is that, um, is you should have got an email too. And if you didn't get the email, uh, send an email into uh, support@programyourselfthen.com or jim@programyourselfthen.com and let them know you didn't get the email today. She should have got a reminder email every Monday. She should get a reminder email with a link to the class. And if you go into Circle, it'll be there automatically. Okay, so go check that out and again, go get it. If you don't get— today is a good one. We're talking about paradigm shifts, so I can't wait. It's one of my favorite topics in the world. And, um, yeah, we'll be talking about that. Uh, Jane, you know what happened? You wrote remind and it sent you a link, I think, to go get the hypnosis session. Uh, Jane says, how do you How do you remind yourself to drink enough water? That's a great question, and I want to be crystal clear that my water habit was one of my hardest habits to install. So my water habit really took easily a year to really get it locked in, and I share that with you to give you a sense of like what the real timescale is with this. You know, the timescale is not that I'm just gonna— oh, now I'm just gonna start drinking water and now I just drink water. You know, water, I found there's a lot to it. I drink, I drink one, I'd say one and a half to 2 of these a day, every day, every day. Okay, I've been doing that for years. So how do I remind myself? Um, so this is, uh, how do you remind yourself? Well, the reading rehearsal technique's the main way I did it. Right, because I had to program it in. I wanted to drink water, but I didn't have that behavior pattern in my head, so I forgot, right? So I have to remind myself. So again, using the redo rehearsal technique, I think, is the most important piece of installing any habit, right? Because otherwise, think about this, right? If you— this is what most dieters do. Okay, you know what, I'm gonna start drinking more water. Okay, what's your plan? I'm just gonna start drinking more water. That's the worst plan in the world, right? It's like, oh, I'm gonna go, uh, I'm gonna go, uh, play. I'm gonna learn to play the piano. What's your plan? I'm just gonna learn it. Well, yeah, but when are you gonna practice? When are you gonna play? What are you gonna do? What are you gonna start with? Who's gonna learn from a teacher, a book, a course? What are you gonna do? I'm just gonna learn it. Holy shit, that's a terrible strategy. But that's how most people approach their water, right? And Jane, there's, there's actually What I would suggest, Jane, is go into the program and watch. Go to blueprints, lifestyle, water. I did a whole 20-minute, 30-minute lesson on how to install a water habit where I go into the the nuts and bolts details. And if I talk about them here, you'll think I'm crazy. But actually installing a habit requires you to understand the granular factors that go into having a habit. So yeah. Oh, you know what? I saw a podcast on how important water is. So I'm going to start drinking more water. No, you're not. If that's your strategy. That I want to drink more water and I'm going to do it. No, you're not, folks. When's the last time you said, I'm going to start doing something different and you just started doing it? It just does— your brain doesn't work that way, right? So again, the first step starts to— I want to start drinking more water. How can I get myself to remember? So what's your strategy? I have such a specific strategy that I fill this water bottle up at virtually the same time every day. And if it's not the same time, it's the same phase every day. So I've got— this water bottle is full every day around the same time. I drink the first probably third of it by the same time every day. I have expectations for how much water I'm going to drink at what time during the day. And I have different triggers and factors put in to make me do that. So I don't have to think about it anymore. I just do it automatically. So every day before I go to bed, I put my water, my empty water bottle in the same spot. And that triggers the next day's routine. So it's all based around triggers that I don't have to think about consciously. Again, let me bring it back to something you all can relate it to: brushing your teeth. How do you know when to brush your teeth? It's not because you have it in your schedule. You're not getting a reminder on your phone. You're not remembering to brush your teeth. You just do it. Well, how do you just do it? That's the part that gets really interesting. Well, I'll let you know. It's contextually based. So you wake up out of the bed and maybe go to the bathroom and then you brush your teeth. And you've done it so many times that now one just follows the other. Out of bed, bathroom, brush the teeth. Right now you might have a different routine. Doesn't matter. Whatever your routine is, notice it's the same routine every day. You are not changing up your toothbrushing habit every day. You're not some days brushing your teeth before dinner, some days after dinner, sometimes right after dinner, sometimes right before bed. Sometimes you wake up in the middle of the night and brush your teeth. That's not how you do it. There's a very rote, predictable pattern for how you brush your teeth. And this runs true for virtually all of your habitual behaviors. There's a very specific pattern there that's running like clockwork. This is really important to understand because this is the most powerful part of your brain. Is your subconscious mind and its ability to internalize habits so you do them automatically. But most people don't approach behavioral change with that part of their brain. They approach it with the prefrontal cortex part, their executive functioning, their willpower, which says, "I want to drink more water, so I'm just going to start drinking more water." Well, if you haven't been drinking water, why would you all of a sudden remember to drink water? You know, like you cannot leave important changes that you want to make in your life up to your prefrontal cortex. It's not up to the challenge. I always joke around like, imagine if you had to remember to breathe. We'd all be dead, probably. You know what I mean? Like, we get distracted so quickly onto the next thing. So to say, oh yeah, I want to start drinking more water and then leave it there, I would never do that. For me, and this is what I did, is when I said I want to drink more water and I start thinking about how can I get myself to drink more water, how can I structure my day, what strategies can I use to drink more water. And it's funny to me because I now have this bottle. This bottle alone was part of the strategy. Because what I first started with is what kind of like, what do they tell you if you want to drink more water? What's the first thing you think? Oh, Cash, probably drink 8 glasses of water a day, right? That just becomes a conventional wisdom. 8 glasses of water today. Yeah, let me know how many of you have been able to say, oh, I don't drink much water, yeah, I should start drinking 8 glasses of water, and then that, that next day from then on you drank 8 glasses of water. It's none of you, and it's none of us because our brains don't work that way. You know, if drinking eight glasses of water isn't part of your normal day-to-day routine, you're not going to remember to drink eight glasses of water. I mean, if you want a water retreat, you know what I mean? But short of that, you're not going to drink enough water. And most of you are probably finding just, oh, I want to drink more water. And then you drink more water for a couple days, and then you go back to your normal water routine, right? And then two months later, you hear something. Oh yeah, shit, right, right. I gotta get that water going. You drink it for a couple days, and then it goes back. So. Again, to me, understanding how the brain works is understanding that you can't just decide some new behavioral change and then expect that that's just how it's going to be from now on. That's not how your mind works. So instead, we need to program it in so that drinking the water just becomes something we automatically do, like brushing our teeth. And so again, Jane, we go, we go out, um, we— I go through that in complete detail. Go watch that training. It'll, it'll give you the thing. And by the way, Jane, If you watch that, the— you can go right to the blueprint and you can fill out that blueprint because again, it breaks down in detail how to add the water habit. But watch the training too, and in 20 minutes you'll have a complete routine, um, that will save you all the time that I wasted on it, you know, figuring it out. But yeah, Jane says, I start out well in the morning and in the end of the day with a bunch of water also. Not a great plan. Um, Yeah, that's not a great plan, um, because if you pound a bunch— I, I've been guilty of this, this is how I know, um, but I used to just, you know, drink a shit ton of water right before bed. You know what that means? It means you're gonna get up and go to the bathroom a bunch of times. So, um, water is interesting. If you chug a bunch of water, you're not gonna absorb as much and you're gonna pee a lot of it out. If you drink more slowly throughout the day, you're gonna absorb more of it and you're not gonna have to pee as much. And so how you drink the water matters too. Right. So yeah, you don't want to leave it to the end and just pound water, you know, an hour before bed unless you like getting up a lot. And so yeah, it's about kind of like— and so you're already in a good spot, Jane. So I say you got a good plan already because you are drinking water regularly. Now you just want to change the way you're doing it. I would suggest front-loading in the day more and through the day. You know, if you can do that, I think you'll find it's much more enjoyable. Um, Jack says, I haven't tracked for 2 weeks, I'm up 3 pounds, went from 120 to 123. Um, at 5'7, should I keep going untracked? Um, yeah, I mean, I wouldn't. I don't think 3 pounds in 2 weeks doesn't mean shit to me. I mean, again, in Program Yourself, then we talk about living in a goal weight range. I think if you're trying to pin your goal weight to a specific number, you're just setting yourself up for, for crazy town. You know, equivalently to me It'd be like if you wanted to keep your gas tank at the exact same level all the time. I mean, you could do it, but it's like, what's the point? And think about how stressful that would be. You'd be in the gas station every single day. It's just, it's unnecessary. What's the point? And so people do this with their weight that they think it's got to be an exact number. Me personally, I've got a 5-pound range. So as long as I'm in the 5-pound range, I'm at my goal weight because your body fluctuates. So 3 pounds in 2 weeks to me. Um, you know, what's been going on, you know. So I would look at what's been going on last 2 weeks. Well, the previous, you know, again, weight doesn't just show up the next day, right? We don't just eat a lot, oh, now put weight on, and I ate less, now I'm way less. It just doesn't work immediate. Weight loss and weight gain to some degree is unpredictable and inconsistent in the short term. So, um, yeah, my first, my first kind of change is that, um, Is that I would— I would— I would reflect on that. Now you say 5'7, so you're probably thinking like, oh, 3 pounds makes a big difference on my body. I bet it doesn't. And so if you look at what changed in your mind, what do you think changed in your eating and in your behavior that may have contributed to the weight going up a little bit? And I would expect something to pop up in your mind as, oh, maybe I've been snacking on this, I've been doing this, whatever. See if you can notice a pattern that may have contributed to that. And if there is one, now your focus becomes, okay, let me, let me dial it down. Um, you know, and you mentioned tracking, so you might be moving from tracking to not tracking. And so, you know, understand that that process is one, you know, where you're dialing it in. But I think it's well worth you dialing it in because most people do not want to track all the time. Tracking's tedious and boring and a big cognitive load. So most people are not going to track long-term. You know, And there's nothing wrong with that. You do not need to track long-term to manage your weight. Um, so yeah, should I go back to tracking? Um, I mean, you can always go back to tracking, but I would much rather get back to not needing tracking because you're going to quit tracking at some point anyways. So unless you just want to have results while you're tracking, I would get good at not tracking. And so being able to not track requires you to have the ability I just kind of referenced Which is that you start to have more awareness of your patterns. So for me, I've never tracked, but I also know if my weight starts going up, I have the awareness. I've really trained this in myself. Now, part of this is having structured eating. I have a very structured eating plan that I kind of— I hate saying eating plan because I know it's— it's— that word's tainted. But I have a way of eating. I have a routine of eating. Um, and I know if I divert from it, I, I'm aware of it. So if I see my weight go up, I've gotten really good at knowing like, okay, it's gone up because that, that those things have changed. So that's what you, Jack, need to develop, right, is the more intuitive awareness sense of what you've been doing and what may have led to the weight gain. Because that's the real factor that's going to dictate your ability to live at your goal weight, right? Because you know you can micromanage and track every single calorie and do it, but now the next phase is how do I track In a more intuitive way, you know. What's up, Lorena? Lorena says hi. Do you recommend to go to the gym in the morning, day, or evening? Why so? I don't really recommend going to the gym that much anyways. You know, if you want to lose weight, going to the gym, I don't believe, is a great strategy to do that. I've seen virtually no studies that associate going to the gym with weight loss. Ironically, working out with weight maintenance is associated. But so, yeah. So when's the best time to go to the gym? Whenever is best for you. There's going to be virtually no benefit you get physiologically from going morning, afternoon, or night that will trump going when it works best for you. You see what I mean? Like, there's no— what is the difference between going in the morning and at night physiologically? Now I know there's people out there that could, you know, write a book on the difference. Bullshit, bullshit. Unless you are like a competitive bodybuilder. If you're at that level, then read that book and follow that plan. But if you are a normal person who's just, you know, want to work out a little bit more because you think that's gonna help you lose weight, you're most likely better off taking that energy back and really dialing in your reading. And if you want to go to the gym, What works best for you with your schedule. And that's got to be an easy answer because I've never met someone who doesn't have a pretty strong opinion about which one works best for them— morning, evening, or day. We all have a pretty good clear idea of what we like, what works best for us. So I would build around that. There is no physiological benefit you're going to get out of any of those that's going to— that's going to be more important than which one works best for you and your schedule. And your preferences. Hope that makes sense. And that really goes back to such a core idea of program yourself thin, which is that we really build around um the ideas to build around you, you know. And I think diets have trained you not to even consider yourself and what you want, right? When it's a diet, you're like, okay, I'm just gonna you. I'm to take my my round peg and I'm trying to fit into a square hole. And when it doesn't fit, you just keep pushing harder. And so I said, wait a second, you know what? I, I know— oh, I read this, I listened to this podcast. It said you got to go to the gym first thing in the morning. I, I— you know what, I was doing a client call last week and we were talking about that. She goes, I don't know, she's like, I'm really struggling to get myself, um, to eat and then walk the first 10 minutes in the morning. I said, what? Why do you have to do that? She goes, well, because I'm, I'm postmenopausal and I heard I have to do this. No, you don't. You don't have to do that bullshit. Well, what the fuck? What are you gonna get? What benefit are you gonna get out of going for a walk the first 10 minutes that you're not gonna get going the first hour? That's gonna make any difference? You know? And it's just— we've got ourselves in that pattern because we're constantly— as a dieter, you're constantly just like listening to— there's a— Dan Kennedy was a marketer. He used to say people just walk around with their umbilical cords looking for someplace to plug it back in. And I hate to say it, dieters are especially anxious with weight loss because It's like I've worked with so many smart, intelligent people, but, but then it comes to their weight and they're just like turning into kids. And it's like they're not using their own brains. It's only because we haven't been taught to do it, right? The diet industry is then, you know, all the expert telling us what we should do. So you see some guy who's got, you know, an 8-pack and he says, yeah, it's because you gotta, you gotta go for a walk the first 5 minutes we wake up. Oh, I gotta go for a walk first 5 minutes. And he was, that's what I gotta do, you know. And it's like, it's crazy how much of that's impacting us where We don't really consider what's going to work for us. We just, oh, I read I have to do this. Relax, calm down, and really consider it. What the fuck? Who cares? You know, if you haven't worked out, if you worked out 10 times last year, it doesn't matter if you work out morning, day, night, middle of the night. It doesn't matter. You understand what I'm saying? Again, but this is part of that perfection idea that, well, if I'm going to do this, I'm gonna do it right, and I want everything to be absolutely perfect. You know, so no, fuck that. What would work best for you? That would be my first starting point, right? What's up, The Intelligent Gut? How's it going? Nice seeing you. Lorena says, I'd like to lose fat without kcal tracking, but it's so hard. Usually it makes weight gain. Um, yeah, I mean, it may make weight gain the way you do it now, folks. Again, please understand that when you first start doing something, you may not have a lot of skill at it. And so just because something's hard now doesn't mean it's going to be hard or impossible later. So, you know, again, um, you know, yeah, losing fat without kcal tracking, I don't know. It's, it's— I don't want to say it's easy, but it's not that hard either. What's it mean? How do you lose fat without tracking? Well, you consume less calories, you know, than you normally do. So how do you consume less calories than you normally do? Well, you got to have a sense of what you normally eat that's pretty accurate. And then you got to lower that. So it's again, you either put your energy into tracking, which is micromanaging the calories coming in, or you find ways to manage your calories that is more—I hate the word to use it. You use the word intuitive because then it goes into intuitive eating, which is its own thing, which is fine. But intuitive eating is not built for you to lose weight. By the way, I like intuitive eating stuff, but I'm focused on you managing your weight. So, um, I do think that finding a way that is intuitive for you to eat is really crucial. So I know I'm splitting hairs here because I'm not— I like intuitive eating, some of it. I don't love it because it's not really built for losing weight and changing your weight and your behaviors. Um, but I don't like— I don't like tracking really specifically. For some people it's great. So please understand that if you track everything and you're just killing it and you love it, Then I'm not talking to you. You should continue to do that. I'm talking to people that have tried tracking and find that they always burn out on it. That's the person I'm talking to, and that's most people. It's my experience. I probably have a biased idea because I get those people it's not working for. But, um, yeah, you absolutely can lose fat without tracking kcal. Now don't get me wrong either though. If you, if you track every single kcal, you're putting yourself on a path to be able to lose Fat faster, most likely, as long as you do it because it's a more specific, more difficult way. Same thing back to my marathon analogy: if you're running a marathon and you start and you're just going to sprint the whole thing, the first you know eighth of the race you're going to be way out ahead. But you can't just look at that part of the race because that's not the finish. And that's why I say to all you dieters: yeah, just because you can micromanage everything and do everything perfect for a couple weeks and lose a bunch of weight. Who gives a shit if you can't keep it up? Who gives a shit? The person who sprints the marathon and the first 8th of the thing, they're way ahead of them. They're just like, yeah, fuck, I'm winning, I'm winning, and then they collapse. I said, well, what's the— what's the glory in that? You couldn't finish the race because you had a shitty strategy. So who gives a shit if you start out in first? If you can't finish the race, what's the point? That's what I say to all you dieters. I don't give a shit if you can lose 5 pounds a week for 5 weeks and then you can't keep it up anymore, what's the point? That's even a recipe for, for disappointment. Yeah. Uh, what's up, Yasmin? Yasmin says, I haven't joined the membership yet, but can I do the master class? Uh, no, master class is for, uh, people in the program. Yeah, we do a master class every Monday I love my. I love teaching the master class. I literally every Monday I just kind of pick whatever I'm thinking about, you know, whatever I'm focused on. A lot of times it's inspired by coaching calls I do. But yeah, like I said, this week we'll talk about paradigm shifts—one of my favorite lessons in the world. So I can't wait to do that. But yeah, that's only that's only something I offer for people in the program. And it's sick too because again, yeah, obviously you get to go to the class and you can ask questions if you want. But Um, the replay is up the same day, and there's a whole notes— you get the whole notes and layout of it too, so you can scan through it as well. But it's a great way to, uh, to learn new concepts. I, I love that. It's one of my favorite parts because I always think, again, um, there's kind of foreground and background knowledge. And I think that I love teaching like tactics and techniques, things you can start using right now. But I think ultimately, at the end of the day, a lot of times what really changes us and transforms us Is kind of like the the background knowledge. I know I'm talking kind of weird with language here, but but it's kind of like the paradigms. You know, honestly, that's why we're talking about that today. But when you change the way you think about things, that's the biggest change I think you can create is kind of the background one. Yeah. Yeah, Carolyn says go out, grab your water bottle before you go out. Yeah, exactly. That's something I trained myself to do. I never, I never drank water growing up, so I didn't have any old habits I could just start using. I had to implement them. I just never drank a lot of water. And so getting myself to drink more water was a process, you know, and it was a process of little things. Like, honestly, like even now, right? So it's like at the end of the night, I will take— I'll be sitting with my water bottle, and when I'm done with it I'll take the water bottle and I'll put it over by the sink. If I don't do that, right, if I just leave the water bottle on the sofa, there's a really good chance that the next morning I won't see the water bottle like where it normally is, and I'll just completely forget about it until, you know, I'm somewhere else where I expected my water bottle. Oh shit. But, um, so again, kind of setting yourself up. We started this whole thing talking about visual triggers, right? Visual cues. Um, but noticing Kind of the subtle, the subtle cues is really the key, I think, to programming your mind, I'll say. So yes, getting the habit down of grabbing a water bottle before you go out is great. I'm like that now. I mean, you'll see if you see me out in the world, it's like a 95% chance I got this thing with me. It's like, like my banky at this point, you know? So that's not something I was born with. It's not something I grew up with. It's something I installed as an adult. And I think it's a fundamental component in peace. Um, you know, of what, uh, what's helping me, you know. Yeah, Carolyn says eat whole foods. Yes, Carolyn, exactly. Eating whole foods, I think, is the best strategy there is. And I think the, the purest strategy for not having to track your calories— they have done this study already. They studied people that were on a specific diet, um, were getting training, so they were getting educated, they were tracking things, they were working with people. Um, and then they had another group that they said, okay, just eat healthy, whole, natural foods. The healthy whole natural food group naturally ate 500 calories less a day without tracking anything. So this is part of what I mean as well when I when I use the word intuitive. I don't mean intuitive eating as we hear it in this culture, but eating intuitively in a sense, eating whole natural foods kind of activates a wisdom and a knowledge in your body that most people have never experienced, and it makes tracking every little single calorie. Um, usually pretty unnecessary, you know, because all of a sudden the food is working with you and your body and it supports and helps you to, um, manage it, manage the calorie balance, you know, which is what the weight all depends on. Yeah, says hydration helps digestion. When digestion works well, your metabolism balances. Yes, absolutely. Hydration's super crucial. Again, in Program Yourself Thin, we have the 8 habits that we work on installing In order of importance: sleep, hydration, relaxation, breathing, nourishment, movement, meditation, gratitude. So water is number 2 in my opinion, in terms of managing your weight. Um, I think it's really, really important. So, uh, yeah, it's well— well worth it. If it took a year to install a really solid water habit, to me, that'd be a year well spent. Um, I think it's that important because I think it just helps everything. You know, um, what's up, Bookworm? Bookworm says, hi Jim, will you still have your daily 12 PM sessions or will that change in September? Um, no, I will continue to do these, so this will always be the same. This will be the, um, the same thing I've been doing. I don't want to say always, I guess, I guess there's always, you know, things change, but, but no, I will be doing— I love doing the lives. Uh, I— it's one of my favorite things to do. I will be switching them up a little bit in the sense that on TikTok I am going to be doing like, um You can do a thing on TikTok where you do a live and you can have people get on and talk, so we can talk back and forth. So I'm going to do some of those and see how those goes. But yeah, I will continue to do this. I love doing these, and this is kind of my—I think of this as part of my mission because again, my mission is to help as many people as possible at their goal weight. And I see these lives in the podcast and the social media content I put out there as my way to do that, you know, to kind of give back and share. you know, these ideas with more people. Um, so hopefully it helps. So yeah, I will continue to do these. And again, this is also part of a podcast, um, so you can listen to it anytime as well. Which class— which program is this masterclass for on Mondays? Um, it's all the same thing now, Yasmin. So again, Program Yourself Then has been turned into a membership, um, and that's it. That's how you get in the program. Uh, way lower barrier of entry, but it gets you access to everything. So as soon as you join the program, um, you get instant access to the Monday calls. The Tuesday live Q&As, um, and you go through the first 8 weeks. The first 8 weeks is structured so you can do the core program, and then as soon as you graduate from the first 8 weeks, then what happens is every Sunday you get a, like, a short video lesson, and there's a hypnosis session that goes with it, a 10-minute one. You listen to that session repeatedly, and then every morning, um, during the weekday, you get a new 5-minute hypnosis session to listen to. Um, And you get a few other things as well. But, um, yeah, as soon as you join the program, the Monday classes are now, um, they're now working with it. So yeah. All right, Bookworm, look at that. Yeah, Bookworm says, thanks to your PYT program, I've lost 40 pounds, uh, 10 pounds to go. The PYT booklet has been fantastic. Yes, yes, um, it really is. Again, there's nothing like, uh, I, I think there's no program like this. And, um, it's fun. I've been doing it for a long time and I've seen a lot of testimonials and I love them. I love them all the time. Um, so nice job, Bookworm, keep it up, right? That's really great, great results. Yeah, the next 10 pounds, um, there you go, right? You're so close to it. What's up, Ames? How's it going? Uh, see, Yasmin says, yes, I agree, mindset needs to change and behavior change happens, but it's hard and consistency is the key. Yeah, consistency to me is the ultimate key, you know. Consistency is the most important thing, and really Program Yourself Then is built for that. And I, I don't think there's any program like this, you know. I think Most weight loss programs are sold as, you know, most especially hypnosis ones are certainly like, here's a couple sessions, just listen to them. That's not going to do it. Then you have a lot of programs that tell you, okay, do this, and then there's kind of accountability. But accountability is happening like once a week, like even Weight Watchers. You're going to go in once a week and weigh yourself. Great, but it's like, what about all the other six days? You know, what's the support there? And I've I found the biggest blank spot in my mind for people that want to change their weight. Is the consistent support of how to think differently. And I think most programs don't give you the tools you need to actually make that happen. Program yourself then. There's nothing like it. I've never seen a program like this. I've never seen a program where every single morning you get a new five-minute hypnosis session. And I built it that way because five minutes is doable, especially once you get in the habit of it. You really look forward to it. It's only five minutes, and that five minutes for a lot of people becomes the most important time of the day. Because hypnosis isn't just about what's going in your mind in terms of suggestions, it's also the experience of being relaxed and calm. Now it's both of them, okay? But every morning you're starting your day relaxed and calm, hearing all these good messages. And every session is built around a weight loss mantra so that I'm looking to install an idea into your mind, and I want you to think about it, you know, for, for the next few days at least. Um, it's kind of just rolling around back there. And you think about now, like, where are you getting good messaging from? Where are you getting consistent messages about how to live at your goal weight enjoyably, comfortably, easily? And I know the answer is nowhere and never. And so, you know, just that 5-minute hypnosis session in the morning is a game changer, and it's always different. That's another key point, because when you listen to the same hypnosis session over and over and over again, it becomes less powerful. It loses its effect because you just— it pulls you out of hypnosis when you know the session by heart. So I changed the session up again. We have a similar pattern we use, right? So it's a process because again, you have to think of hypnosis kind of like meditation. So it's like every time we do the hypnosis session, we're going through a similar process, but every time you're getting better at relaxing, at breathing, at centering yourself, turning your attention inwards, you get better at that. And so as you get better at that, you bring that ability into your life with you. And again, when you look at your decisions you make when you're calm, relaxed, and grounded versus when you're stressed and freaking out, there's a world of difference. You know, so that's just one piece of the program. You know, then there's obviously every week you get a 10-minute session to listen to at night, and that one is designed to be listened to repeatedly. Okay. And, um, you know, when you bookend your days with hypnosis like this, you really get a strong Um, kind of a cocoon effect, sort of, you know, where your subconscious mind kind of steeping in all these good ideas and it comes out in your behavior, you know. All right, everyone, we get out of here. Again, if you're not in my world, please click the link in my bio or go to programyourselfthin.com and go get the hypnosis session I give you. Uh, if you're on, uh, Facebook, go type in mind, M-I-N-D, and it'll send you the link to go get it automatically. Uh, if you like this, I'm here every Monday through Friday, usually around noon Eastern. Pop in, ask any questions you have. Love talking to you, helping you out best I can. If you can't make the live, it's also a podcast. Search any podcast platform, search Program Yourself, then it'll pop up and you can listen anytime you want. All right, everyone, have a super day and we'll talk soon. Bye.