Is your inner critic sabotaging your weight loss?

How many times a day does your inner chatter hit you with negative thoughts? It can be relentless, and those thoughts can feel real and convincing. Over time that negativity builds its own super-highway in your brain, turning those thoughts into ingrained beliefs.

Those developed beliefs are a roadblock to your personal growth and will erode your self-confidence. I used to believe I’d always be overweight because no diet ever worked for me. In my head, I’d written a story about my own limitations and inability to ever lose weight, so I was a failure. It felt like my body and genes dictated what weight I was supposed to be, leaving me powerless. Those beliefs followed me through my intermittent fasting journey into maintenance, and I had to battle them every time they came up. At the time, I didn’t know how to let them go but I knew I had work to do to truly live my best life.

In the past you may have attempted restrictive diets that left you feeling deprived or the success you expected never materialized. Now, when starting intermittent fasting, thoughts like “I’ll be starving later” or “This is too hard” surface. You find yourself making excuses for breaking your fast early or eating until you’re stuffed. This cycle reinforces the negative self-talk that fasting doesn’t work for you and you’ll never lose weight, especially if the weight doesn’t come off quickly.

We all want to feel our best, but that negative voice can be so very persistent. Our personal critic tells us everything we do wrong, that we’re not good enough, we’ll never be good enough, and it keeps us stuck like a mouse on a wheel. It’s ironic, because this voice is born from a need to protect us, but it ends up holding us back.

Listening to your inner critic is a habit you’ve built over a lifetime. It develops mental patterns which echo in your brain and strengthen with each repetition. Over time, this voice becomes a source of comfort – reliable, predictable, and always there. It may sound crazy, but the negativity you know can feel like a familiar safe haven. 

If you’re considering starting a new challenge, listening to that voice can be the path of least resistance. It rejects the opportunity for change. Even though you may not like what it’s saying, it’s easier to stick with it than face an unknown future.

You don’t have to do any mental work when that inner voice rules. In return, in settling for the status quo, your expectations of yourself are lowered, reinforcing self-defeating beliefs about what you can achieve. You become comfortable with believing you can’t lose weight, get your dream job, or find the relationship you’ve always wanted because you don’t believe you deserve better. This negativity keeps you trapped and stifles your dreams, leaving you unfulfilled despite your ambitions.

Without learning and using the tools to effectively deal with negative thoughts, they can sabotage any positive changes you want to make and leave you feeling powerless. They end up controlling you instead of you controlling them. It takes effort to challenge that voice and rewrite your story, but you have the power to do it.

The first step is not accepting what your inner critic is telling you. Take notes, then question the source of those thoughts. Are they based on reality, or old fears holding you back? Are they rooted in past experiences, or is your mind trying to shield you from something? Once you understand where they come from, you can challenge them, and then start replacing them with positive beliefs that support you.

As you work to rewire your mental patterns, you’ll see a positive shift in your mindset. It can start with your weight loss journey and lead to awakening your potential in all aspects of your life. Don’t let negativity win. Embrace the power of positive change and rewrite your story.