We’ve talked at length about what causes weight gain—messed-up hormones, too much sugar in your diet, and sluggish organ systems—and what to do about every bit of this. But there’s something else working against you—your mind. If you think about being fat, worrying constantly about weight, then you are actively working against yourself! Your negative thoughts and feelings have created your weight problem and have made you unhappy with yourself. It’s time for you to break that cycle.
You can do that with “metaphysiques.” What is this? Metaphysiques is a powerful mind-body practice I’ve developed based on using quantum physics to positively influence your body. Without getting too technical about quantum physics, here’s how it works: Know that everything in the universe is made up of energy, including your thoughts and feelings, and that “like attracts like.” This means your thoughts and feelings are energy that attracts similar energy. So basically, as you think, so you attract.
What does this have to do with weight loss? Everything! Instead of focusing on being fat, you’ve got to focus on being fit. If you think healthy, it eventually becomes reality for you. I always push my clients to focus on how strong they’re getting, how well they’re sleeping, and how happy they’re feeling. Choosing to focus on thoughts that feel good, and are positive, is a sure way to create the body you want. The by-product is a beautiful, sexy body. Start thinking exactly how the people with hot, buffed bodies think! They see themselves as attractive, energetic, athletic, and in sync with their bodies. They draw to themselves the best of everything with their thoughts.
At the same time, do not hope, but assume you will lose weight. As in life, great things come to those who work for a goal and assume the outcome will be in their favor. All of these new thoughts and actions will create the thin thighs, the flat stomach, and the hot body you want. You’ll be sending out the right energy, and it’s energy that creates your new reality.
Long before I developed metaphysiques, I knew I had its power. A power that I practiced. I could change the way people acted around me. I could change the outcome of certain events. I could achieve anything I put my mind to. I understood at a very basic level that my thoughts—and the energy that emanated from those thoughts—could move mountains or start fires. I simply had to choose which to do.
Every one of you has that same power. You can do things you never thought you could do. You will create the body you want, starting with your personal dialogue about yourself. Thoughts and feelings turn into actions, and actions into reality. Remember, you are opening a new chapter in your life, one that is much more in control and energized. Let me show you how to change your life.
A lot of people I know want a better life, more money, a sexy body, or more power over their circumstances. But they don’t know how to get there. Why? Because their heads are filled with negative self-talk like fat, ugly, or failure. This inner self-loathing conversation is toxic and success-blocking. If you’re negative about yourself, you’ll attract failure. Example: If you think that you can’t ever lose weight, then you know what? You’re right. You won’t. The word can’t gets so stuck in your subconscious mind that your body believes and obeys it! You’ve trained your mind to believe you can’t, and now you’ve hit a roadblock to success. I don’t ever allow clients to say can’t or try. Don’t try, do!
Thoughts release neuropeptides—chemicals of emotion—that travel to cells whenever we think or speak. They affect the tension in your muscles, the rate of your heart, your ability to digest your food, your overall health, and more. Angry, bitter, or critical thoughts produce chemicals that depress your immune system, make you sick, and keep you fat. Thinking about something repetitively even alters cell assemblies—collections of brain cells that work together. We use cell assemblies to learn and remember things; they also drive goal-directed behavior. Negative thoughts, often a result of stress, can cause cell assemblies to work in a disorganized manner. We can’t recall things as well, and our thinking gets muddled, when we’re stressed out.
Thoughts are powerful and vital in creating the energy we put forth, including healing energy. Several years ago, my mother was diagnosed with lymphoma, a cancer of the lymphatic system. In addition to standard therapies, she decided to have Reiki treatment. Reiki is a healing system based on the idea that an unseen life force energy flows through us and is what causes us to be alive. This life force is responsive to thoughts and feelings.
The Reiki healer came to my mom’s house. She asked my mother to sit in a chair in front of a large window that just happened to be filled with about twenty houseplants. As part of the therapy, the healer imagined a blue, healing light into my mother’s body. The purpose of the light was to direct the bad energy out of Mom’s body and out the window. And so that’s how the therapy went, day after day. What happened within a few weeks was very interesting. Within a month, all the plants in that window died—and my mother went into remission. Healing happens when negative thoughts are exorcised.
I’m not saying you have to do Reiki to get thin or healthy. I’m saying thoughts have power, and you’ve got to harness that power by changing how you think. If you’re getting the same negative results in your life—like weight gain—then you’ve been consciously or unconsciously running negative tapes through your mind like:
I’m a fat pig, and no one is gonna want me.
It’s hard to lose weight.
I’ll never have a body I want.
That’s negative energy, and I guarantee it will repel positivity. Let’s face it: Life can be hell if you are walking around hating your body and being fat. How many times in your life have you said, “I hate my thighs! My butt’s too big! My tummy is fat!”? Watch it. Hating any body part makes it fatter. That’s the conclusion of a study I read years ago, and I have never forgotten it. Scary, isn’t it? Our thoughts can work powerfully for us, or against us. What we focus on expands. Hate your thighs, butt, and abs? Just watch them expand.
How do you get rid of this negativity? First, you have to make yourself aware of it. Much of the dialogue that goes on is so comfortable to us that we don’t know it’s happening. Second, try to catch yourself thinking negatively about yourself; then say your name out loud followed by stop. Third, rephrase your thinking—out loud—to be positive. For example, sometimes I might feel insecure about a photo shoot. A negative inner dialogue starts in my head. To combat those negative thoughts, I say out loud: “Jackie, stop. You did your best at that photo shoot and the pictures are going to be beautiful.”
See how this works? It’s like flipping a switch from a negative, insecure thought to a positive, empowering one. The more you practice this technique, the more your thoughts will change to positive ones automatically, and you won’t even have to use the technique anymore.
I also frequently say to myself: I’m on my way to changing my life and I’m proud that I’m motivated to change. I push negative thoughts away and instantly replace them with thoughts that are positive. You can do this yourself by coming up with upbeat mantras and repeating them often. For example:
I am getting healthier and more beautiful every day.
I love myself and deserve a healthy body.
I don’t need fat anymore. I am strong.
Changing my body will change my life.
Do something else: Use powerful, present-tense verbs to boost yourself to a new thought level. Eliminate weak phrases like, I’m trying to lose weight… I’m planning to exercise… I’m hoping to eat healthier. You’re not trying, planning, or hoping! You’re doing it. Say so—and you’ll subconsciously reinforce success.
Even body language counts. Before my clients even pick up a weight, I have them walk toward themselves in the mirror. I show them that just by looking forward, with their chest out and shoulders back, they actually look ten pounds lighter. Always carry yourself like you mean business and the world will take notice.
Thoughts and feelings have power; they can help or hurt you. Lose the negative thinking and negative emotions and you’ll lose the fat.
It’s really important to stop being wishy-washy about getting thin. Get specific about your fat-loss goals. You can’t hit a target you can’t see. You can’t go through life without goals and expect to get anywhere. You need direction.
Suppose you set out in a strange city to find a specific address, and you’re smart enough to have a GPS system. You’ll be able to move faster and more dependably from wherever you are to wherever you want to go. Well, you need a GPS system to get thin, too. Goals are your GPS.
Decide on your goals and write them down. The act of writing is visual—it helps you clearly envision each goal—and it’s kinesthetic, because you’re using your hand, wrist, and arm to write. Visual and kinesthetic actions program those goals into your subconscious mind. The process is like saving it to your hard drive. It becomes a permanent part of your mental operating system, moving you in the direction of your goals—and in time you’ll achieve them. When you have conscious goals for a thin, hot body, you’ll consciously choose to do anything that supports that intent, like eating better and exercising more.
Make sure your goals are realistic. Instead of saying, “I want to be thin by summer,” set goals you can realistically attain. I have noticed that when clients set goals that are athletic- and performance-based, meaning the goals are quantifiable, they are more likely to succeed. For example:
* Jog six times around your block four times a week.
* Eat clean for five days in a row.
* Increase your weight resistance by five to ten pounds in one month.
* Compete in one mini marathon this year.
When you write down your goals, your conscious mind will desire those goals, but your unconscious fears of failure and loss may cause you to doubt yourself. The solution is to make a list of every single thing that you could do to achieve the goal. When you do this, something happens to your doubts: They begin to dissipate. Simultaneously, your confidence and faith in the attainment of those goals increase.
So write down your own goals, and the steps you’ll take to achieve them. With each step toward your goal, you become more confident. At a certain point, you move from “positive thinking” to “positive knowing.” You absolutely know, deep inside, that you will attain your goals.
Train your mind to achieve your goals with visualization. I call this “motivational daydreaming.” Athletes do it all the time. A basketball player might visualize swishing a last-second jump shot, or a baseball player might visualize hitting a home run.
Personally, I have practiced visualization since I was a child. For example, I always knew I would someday speak in front of a large audience, because I fantasized about it for years. And guess what? Bravo gave me a TV show.
As a young adult, I had a recurring dream that I was living in a penthouse apartment overlooking the city at night. I assumed this meant that I would be rich someday, living in a luxurious penthouse suite—haha. Fast-forward twenty years: After being cheated out of my first gym business, I was desperately searching for office space to start a new gym. My Realtor was showing me space on the sixth floor of a medical building and asked if I wanted to see the view from up top. The elevator doors opened and there I was in the penthouse at night overlooking the city. I felt as if someone had grabbed my heart. My dream had been about SkySport, my gym. I knew this was a sign and I moved mountains, selling everything I had to make that dream a reality. SkySport brought me my TV show, and a wonderful career and life. The power of the unconscious mind, combined with hard work, turns dream into reality. Speaking positively to yourself will change your unconscious feelings about yourself, which will change what the universe brings you.
I’m sure you’ve also heard about patients using visualization to help heal their diseases—a broken bone being knit back together, for example, or a tumor shrinking down to nothing. These images work their way into the nervous system, the immune system, the organs, muscles, bones, and other tissues to enable healing. In a study conducted by researchers from the University of Texas School of Public Health and M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, forty-seven women who had just undergone treatment for breast cancer participated in six-week sessions of a support group and guided imagery (where they learned to imagine their immune cells overtaking cancer cells, for example). The results of the study suggested that the therapies boosted immune function in the women who participated in the imagery and support groups. The study was published in Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine. Thinking yourself well is a very powerful force for healing.
Visualize with your conscious mind and your thoughts will start to pervade your unconscious mind. When both the conscious and unconscious minds are shifted toward the positive, you will be unstoppable. You can use these powerful forces for weight loss, because you are what you think. To help yourself lose weight, see yourself getting healthier. Focus on health and a smaller size will come. That’s because the body doesn’t know the difference between what’s really happening and what your mind is telling it. To your mind, it’s as if you already have a great body. This internal image controls what you focus on, what you attract, and what you do. If you see yourself as a thin, hot, sexy person, then you’ll do things—like eating right and working out—in line with that image.
So dream it into being, like a movie in your head, and be detailed:
* Envision yourself at your dream weight, in a bikini, having child-like fun with friends by the pool.
* Visualize yourself confidently flirting or finding your inner sexiness with someone.
* Picture yourself in great shape, jogging on the beach in Rio.
* Imagine yourself exercising and loving it. This strengthens the mental connection between exercise and you. See yourself going through a whole set without getting tired, and feel the power flowing through your muscles. As you do this, think of positive words, such as strong, confident, and energetic. When you’re actually doing your workout, you’ll reexperience those feelings of confidence and strength.
Do your visualizations when you wake up in the morning, before you go to bed at night, or when you’re exercising. Workouts are life-enhancing meditation. My best, purest ideas of what I want to achieve have come when I’m in the middle of training. Your work-out is your positive connection to your body, energy, and mind.
Voice your goals and passions with as many people as possible. The more you talk about them, the more you imprint and program them into your subconscious mind. Talking the talk will lead to walking the walk.
Believe you already have the body of your dreams. You don’t have to have proof that you will get there. You simply need to believe it, and you’ll automatically take the right actions to get there.
Visualize, visualize, visualize—then be prepared to be amazed at how good you start to feel. You’ll be even more amazed by the results. Work on your head, and your body will follow.
Metaphysiques is more than simply wishing for what you want. You can’t sit around like a magnet, waiting to attract the things you want. Most people underachieve or fail because they never get going in the first place. And if they do get going, they allow themselves to slow down and stop, making it almost impossible for them to energize again. Don’t let this happen to you.
Keep this in mind: The last six letters in attraction are action. Successful people are intensely action-oriented. They move in the direction of their desires.
Action works best when surrounded by all of the other things I talked about above: changing your thoughts, setting goals, visualizing them daily, and affirming that you have that which you are working toward. Meta-physiques essentially means: Be, Do, Have. The “be” is being a positive person, with empowering thoughts, beliefs, and feelings. The “do” is visualizing, setting goals, and acting. The “have” is the outcome of being and doing. There is a connection among all three, and one without the other will stall your progress.
The “doing” part of metaphysiques also involves eating right and exercising hard. But you don’t have to force yourself to do this. You’ll do it with happiness and ease because you see yourself that way, guided by your desires, goals, and visualizations.
The actions of good nutrition and exercise create even more positive energy that you project to the world. You see, the foods you eat have a huge effect on how you feel mentally. When you put clean, energy-giving foods into your system, and exercise with intensity, your body produces positive body chemicals. These chemicals enable both the body and the mind to break free of rigid, negative patterns. They promote feelings of accomplishment and control and help break the vicious cycle of sluggishness and depression. They allow you to radiate high energy that attracts into your world anything you want—the ability to get thin, build self-esteem and self-respect, achieve success—anything.
I have used fitness, nutrition, and metaphysiques to change my energy and change my own life. Everything positive that has happened to me in my adult life is related to nutrition and exercise. I have achieved amazing things like fame, wealth, and love when regularly working out and eating well. Why? Energy! My energy and the way I carry myself in the world completely change because nutrition and exercise make powerful chemicals of well-being course through my system. Every interaction at work, on the streets, and in personal relationships is electric. So give your body what it needs and wants—and watch your weight change and watch your life change.
I can say this with conviction, too, because I’ve helped many people succeed over their weight challenges by changing the way they think and the way they act. Once my clients start applying metaphysiques, I see a newfound energy in them and on their faces. They’re eating and exercising because they want to do it, because they have now become passionate about themselves. When that happens, it’s not effort. They’ve set into motion a whole new life.
Instead of wasting time being angry or depressed that things aren’t going well, switch to a positive attitude and positive action and things will get better. If losing weight is a constant goal, step up to the plate and do something about it. Stop the excuses—which lead to more disappointments—and get things done.
Many years ago, I listened to motivational speaker Tony Robbins. He was very inspirational and taught metaphysical principles way before they were popular. I started using one of his principles and applied it to diet and exercise. It’s called the Pleasure Principle. Basically, he said that you should link everything in life to pleasure or pain because we are highly motivated by both. Most people think of a diet as miserable deprivation and avoid embarking on that painful journey. What if you looked at a diet as an exciting start to a new life? A way to nourish your body and make it beautiful? Most people look at a plate of cupcakes and think, Pleasure, pleasure, pleasure. I don’t. I look at them and visualize myself getting photographed in next to nothing and having feelings of insecurity. Yes, I work hard for this body, but I still have insecurities! So, unless it’s during a treat meal, I see junk food as causing great pain. Literally attach visions and feelings of pain or pleasure to everything. You will find that many of the things you once linked to pleasure (eating junk food or frequent drinking nights) are actually causing you a tremendous amount of pain, and the things you used to link to pain (workouts or eating healthy) will ultimately give you the greatest rewards.
You have powers you never dreamed of. And now you have all the tools to tap into them. What you are thinking, feeling, and doing now is creating your new life. Your confident mind and your strong body will open unimaginable doors. You are in control of what may happen today and tomorrow. Stop wishing that you had a hot, sexy body and fantastic life and start creating them!
Allow yourself to think about the good for yourself and tell yourself that you deserve to get what you want. Don’t settle for less. Celebrate who you are becoming and get excited for this new adventure. You have the power over your body and your life, so live it with passion.