Hi, you are so welcome to this latest podcast episode and I am so excited to talk to you about breaking free from the weighing scales, five reasons to ditch the weighing scales and to stop weighing yourself. So I love this episode because if you're weighing yourself currently, if you're stuck in a cycle of weighing yourself frequently or you just weigh yourself by the end of the episode, my goal is to persuade you to never weigh yourself anymore.
In fact, I'm hoping that by the end of this episode, you're going to throw out the weighing scales in the rubbish bin before you do, you're going to jump on them a few times before for all the bad things that they represent. And you're gonna close the book, close this chapter in your life of weighing yourself.
And you're never going to let weighing the weighing scales darken your doorsteps anymore. I'm going to give you five reasons why not to weigh yourself. But I first want to give you a little bit of a background of my history with the weighing skills. I have always felt big and fat and I've always felt that I've never conformed to what correct or right is. And it's funny now like what is correct and right.
But I remember growing up as a kid and starting to read those magazines, I think around 12 13 and I remember so clearly looking at what the celebrities weighed and calculating it out that I was at least a third extra onto what they weighed. And I remember seeing like seven stone, £10 eight stone £3 and just thinking my God, I am going to have to get there. That must be what women should weigh. And do you remember them? Do you remember those magazines? They were absolutely so disgraceful and you know what?
They mightn't do the big circles in the magazines. Now, when I say magazines, it's also like the online articles, they might draw big circles and put their weight. But there is this big thing still around weight and celebrities. And, um, it just always made me feel really fat and then I got into a cycle of weighing myself the whole time because I thought that's what you did. That's what my mom did and did and does every week.
And I thought that's what you were supposed to do. I thought you were supposed to weigh yourself and of course, think that you were too heavy and diet and you were being good if the weighing scales was going down and you were being bad if the weighing scales was staying the same or going up and that was it. You did that for the rest of your life and that's what you did. And I just remember feeling so ashamed to go to the doctors. Has that ever happened to you?
You go to the doctors and you have to do that awful getting up on the weighing scales and no matter what your age, you feel like you're about five. I used to blush when I had to do this and like, look at them really panicky and almost apologize like, I'm sorry for the number you're about to see. Not even giving two notions to the fact that I might have been going through a healthy period. I might have been walking, working out, eating healthy. It was just, I am so embarrassed about the doctor about what he or she is about to see on the weighing scales.
I'm mortified and just waiting for them, waiting for them to comment, to say something and feeling like they had all the power, just that feeling that your power is taken away. And it just always felt, I always felt heavy, the weighing scales weighing myself. It always made me feel like I wasn't doing a good job. And then when I got older, like thirties, it wasn't so much about being ashamed of looking at magazines because I stopped looking at those magazines.
But it was a constant worry. Like, am I too heavy? What weight should I be? And never knowing the answers to that and always being very unsure of what I should weigh and how was I doing in the world of weight and weight gain and weight loss. And it led me down a road of just being obsessed with my food and being obsessed with everything to do with my weight.
I would just be so restrictive on, on, on the weekdays really uncontrolled out of control at the weekends, constantly feeling my clothes and weighing myself for changes. And it was just horrible and I realized now it was horrible because I don't do it anymore. I didn't realize it was horrible when I was doing it. I thought it was the norm. And in all my years coaching women now, especially the last 14 years, you can see the same, it's the same patterns. And one more thing before I get on to the five reasons that absolutely wrecks my head about the weighing scales and I see it in people who are doing so well.
All of the time that I have met clients in the past who have started my program started their action steps. They may have gone from a place where they were unhealthy for different reasons, gone through a tough period in their life. Just let things slip. They're really busy and things that happens to all of us and they start the program. They are just like they blow my mind like it nearly brings a tear to my eye. Seeing them start their first workout, letting me know they're getting their workout done, their walk, their water, updating me on their action steps like it kills me. It's amazing. I love it so much.
And in the first part of the program before they've gotten used to not weighing themselves, then sometimes coming to me and telling me that they haven't seen a shift on the scales. They haven't seen anything change yet on the scales and that they've mentioned that it led them to just go crazy with their food all weekend that they felt really disheartened.
They fell off the wagon and, you know, then we'd have a really lovely chat and they'd get back on track again and it, it's just that, that kills me. And that's why one of the reasons why I hate the weighing scales so much as women. We're so used to judging our progress on the weighing scales and the weight loss industry has just fueled this so much with all those weight loss clubs that focus so much on weight and congratulate you if you're a pound down.
And it just feels sometimes that the weight loss industry wants you to be so focused on your weight that they're that and that they want you to eat slimming foods and, and weight loss foods and diet foods to lose weight. But really those foods are really bad. So it's really hard to actually lose weight, which shows that they don't really care about you in the first place anyway.
And we all say stay so stuck in this cycle of weight and we can get so wrapped up, we can, we can, we can get so wrapped up our worth can be so wrapped up in our weight. Um, that, uh, it's, it's horrible and I'm telling you this now because I'm in this new path in my life.
I promise you, I don't weigh myself anymore. And I just want you to know if you're listening to this now and you're like, yeah, that was like me that I weighed myself for years. It's only when I, I, I started coaching clients about 16 years ago, I stopped weighing myself.
Well, no, that's about 13 years ago. I stopped weighing myself. And, uh, apart from when I go to the doctors and I have to be weighed, which just frustrates the life out of me. Um But I, I really do know that there's another way for you to measure and track your progress and for you to feel amazing in your clothes and for you to fit into the jean size you want to fit into without having to weigh yourself. So in this short podcast episode, here are the five reasons to ditch weighing yourself. So the first one is that weight is just one piece, one piece of your puzzle when it comes to your overhaul, overhaul overall health and body composition. So when you weigh yourself, the weighing scales doesn't provide any information about body fat percentage, muscle mass or your fitness levels.
So that reason alone is absolutely huge that when you are getting on the weighing scales, what you're reading is telling you nothing about your body composition. It's telling you nothing about your body fat percentage. So if it's telling you nothing about your body fat percentage, then why are you weighing yourself? So when you weigh yourself, it can lead to a completely inaccurate understanding of your progress, you're going by a number that is completely inaccurate to tell you about your body fat percentage. However, you keep jumping up and down on the weighing scales looking for progress, but it's not able to tell you your fitness progress, your lean muscle mass progress, your body fat percentage, you can't do any of that stuff. And just before just in case you're thinking.
Oh, well, what about those Tita machines? I worked in a gym when I first started out as a coach and that gym had a machine and they're rubbish. They're so inaccurate. Me and the other staff members used to test it out the whole time. They're really, really inaccurate and I wouldn't go near them. Um So number two, second reason to ditch the weighing scales is the body weight fluctuation. So the fluctuations in your body weight that happens really naturally throughout the day.
And these fluctuations happen because of factors such as water retention, food intake and bowel movements. So at any point of the day, you could be a completely different way to the way to the way you were the night before or the day before. So let's say, for example, your bowel movements aren't great over the weekend and you have had a lot of food that has, that has a lot of salt in it.
And you've got like lots of water attention. You could be up to £4 heavier than you were three days ago and it has nothing to do with you gaining fat like nothing. However, you've jumped on the weighing scales, seen a £4 weight gain and taken that to mean that you are gaining weight and you haven't, you haven't gained any weight, which makes me so sad thinking of the woman who is focused on her action steps. She's focused on getting healthy eating healthy drinking water, working out.
She jumps on the weighing scales and she thinks, oh my God, what am I doing wrong? I don't trust the food I'm eating anymore. I don't trust this. Maybe I need to diet. You know, that feeling. Maybe I need to, that horrible doughty feeling. What I want you to do right now is to think of a time in your life. I have done this so many times where you were on the right track, however, something made you question it.
So you changed what you were doing or you stopped it and in hindsight, you shouldn't have stopped. You wish you didn't. I could name at least 50 million things that I have done that with. I really work on that now. It's a huge weakness of mine to, to, to not have faith sometimes in my action steps that I know are going to get me where I want to be. But I just get a weak moment or I get some sort of data or results that makes me feel that I need to change something and I wish I hadn't.
And that's what happens to so many women with the weighing scales. So many just that, that alone, that 4lb weight gain, that 3lb weight gain that makes you think you're on the wrong track. Somebody has told you to like, eat healthy and not diet. So you think ok, great. You know what they're right. I'm gonna eat healthy. Dieting. No way. It's for losers. I'm out of here.
I want to enjoy my life and you're eating really well. You have a couple of days where you eat more salt than normal. You have water attention. Your bowel movements are different. The scales look like you've, you, you've gained weight and you think.
No, no, I shouldn't have listened to them. I shouldn't have started eating healthy and back to diet mode. Back to that circular loop. The loop of frustration and putting your worth on what you weigh. And the third reason to ditch weighing yourself is the emotional impact that it has on some of you.
Me included, I'm going to put myself in there too because weighing myself made me feel massive fat, overweight, heavy. Um I felt like I wasn't conforming. I felt, I felt like I wasn't the stereotype of a woman. I just thought that I was wrong. I thought that my physique was wrong, really horrible stuff. And those thoughts made me be really hard on myself when I looked at myself in the mirror which clouded my judgment on how I was actually doing. And it had a really negative impact on me now. And like for all the work that I've done on myself to love myself more, if you were to shove weighing scales in front of me now and make me stand on it, I can't tell you with all honesty that I wouldn't start feeling bad and all those horrible feelings wouldn't start coming up.
So if you're listening to this and you like me know that the weighing scales impact you negatively, then I really encourage you to ditch them if 0.1 and 0.2 are not enough. And if you're wondering, are they negatively impacting you? Let me ask you this question when you get up on the weighing scales and you weigh yourself most of the time. Do you think something negative?
Once the second you've weighed yourself? My second question to you is when you get on the weighing scales and they say a number that you're OK with, has it been weeks and weeks of restriction or a week of restriction? And if the answer is yes, then that's a problem and I encourage you to get rid of them.
The fourth reason I think you should ditch the weighing scales is that there are so many ways to celebrate your health other than the weighing scales. And when you get off the weighing scales and you start to look for other victories, you're going to feel like a legend. Things like increased energy levels, improved strength, being able to like pick up shopping bags easily or get up and down off a chair, easily noticing that your sleep is improving, fitting into your clothes really well, is amazing. Is there a nicer feeling than that? And you know what?
I have so many clients because they've ditched the weighing scales that like have ditched the weighing scales. They're lifting weights, they're building lean muscle and, you know, muscle weighs more than fat. So they've lost the fat, gained lean muscle. They've dropped a dress size so they've lost fat. However, they can't see it on the weighing scales. And if they had it kept the weighing scales up, they wouldn't have noticed their progress. That blows my mind. And you know what?
They might not even have had progress because the weighing scales might have demotivate, demotivated them so much to, to stop, to stop their healthy action steps because the weighing scales would just be saying the same number, week in week out, ah, blows my mind. So, remember that when it comes to your health looking at it from like a holistic positive way, looking at all these lovely other indicators that you're doing amazing is the only way get off those weighing scales.
Have I convinced you yet? I've given you four reasons and I'm a little bit worried that I haven't convinced you yet. So I just want to do a recap.
Number one, the weighing scales doesn't show you body fat percentage, lean muscle mass or anything to do with your fitness levels.
Number two, body weight naturally fluctuates throughout the day. So remember you can be up a few pounds and down a few pounds and it'll mean zero. In the meantime, you've started to be really harden yourself because you think you've gained weight and you haven't.
Number three, the emotional impact for some people, it triggers really negative feelings about themselves. Get off them.
Number four, non weighing scale victories, you forget about them when you're weighing yourself, when you stop weighing yourself, you look for the victories, you look for the other successes and wins and you measure yourself on your fitness, on your sleep, on your mood, on your energy, on your strength. And it's amazing.
One more reason to ditch the weighing scales that the weight, your weight alone doesn't differentiate between fat mass and muscle mass. And I've just touched on this a minute ago, but you could be losing fat and gaining muscle. So that is a positive change, right? You, you're losing weight, you're losing fat, we can't call it weight. We're losing fat, we're gaining lean muscle. Remember we lose lean muscle as we get older. Um, so our metabolism goes low.
So if you want to fit into your jeans, you have to do strength training to get your metabolism high. However, you've got to gain lean muscle for that lean muscle, trim muscle and lose fat. So the scales isn't going to, it's not going to seem like you've lost any fat, any weight. Let's call it weight.
The weighing scales isn't gonna, isn't gonna make you think that you've lost fat. But you have, you have because you've gained lean muscle mass and you've lost fat. But the weighing scales is just going to stay the same. So be super duper careful if you're lifting weights, I promise you. The last thing you need is to jump on a weighing scales.
They are going to make you feel so bad and like you're not progressing. However, if you go to Marks and Spencer's, I love the Marks and Spencer's clothes and you are a size 12, 14, 16, 18, 10, whatever, whatever your dress size is, whatever your jean size is, it makes you feel so good, you know it and I know you know it, we all know it and you go in there and you can buy any pair of jeans that you want, any pair of trousers that you want in your size because you are in great shape.
That's what counts. That's what matters. That's you having built lean muscle mass, you having a high metabolism, you having lost the fat off your body, trim stomach healthy, really lean. You get that when you get off the weighing scales because you don't have this blockage, this barrier to your, when your action steps, this thing that pulls you down and tells you that you're fat and ugly and horrible every day, you've gotten rid of that and you're only focused on the fact that you're strong and healthy and fit and you're an absolute legend living your Lego lifestyle.
So to wrap this up, this short little episode is if you focus on your sustainable habits, you're going to be healthy for the rest of your life. If you focus on getting rid of your unhealthy habits over time, it takes a while getting rid of your unhealthy habits and you focus on being healthy and you lift weights and you're like a legend in your amazing size, whatever jeans you feel so good, you feel amazing for me. It's a size 14 jeans. I feel amazing in them. So healthy, so good.
If you decide to weigh yourself and put and fixate on the numbers, you're going to stop yourself from getting where you want to be. Do you know that you're going to absolutely stop yourself from getting where you want to be, get rid of the weighing scales, ditch them, throw them in the garbage in the, in the rubbish because she says Emily's been walking around saying garbage. I keep telling Emily that is American, it's rubbish.
Throw them in the rubbish stamp on them first and say to yourself, ok, enough is enough. I'm not going to weigh myself anymore because Jessica said I'm only joking because I know now that they're not progress, they're not showing me my fat loss. So I'm gonna throw them away because they're not showing me any progress. And from today I'm going to go and I'm gonna find that pair of jeans that I know when I fit into them. I feel really good and I don't need anybody or a number to tell me that I'm healthy because I'm fitting really well into my clothes and I promise you it's an absolute life.
It's, it's a life changer. It's a game changer. You have no negative feedback coming into your brain tearing you down. And the lovely thing about that is you can start to focus on things that bring you up and you can start to work on your self image and speaking more kindly to yourself. And when you're passing the mirror, just looking at yourself, admiring, admiringly and thinking, oh, I love you so much.
Well done for working out well done for drinking your water today and well done for eating healthy. I hope you enjoyed this episode. I would love to get this podcast out to more people. If you know of a friend who would enjoy this podcast, please pass it on. Um And if you could leave a review, I would very much appreciate it. Thank you so much to those of you who have left a review already.
All my love and have a wonderful afternoon. I hope you enjoyed this podcast episode and you must let me know by getting in touch.