7 Powerful Mindset Shifts for Weight Loss (Bible Lesson)

Health
Mindset Shifts for Weight Loss

You’ll never do what it takes to lose weight if you don’t have the right mindset. 

You could know all the steps you need to take to reach your goals–you still won’t do it. 

Why is that? Even Paul in the Bible has this thought from Romans 7:15: 

“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.”

He goes on to talk about the war that is waging in his mind. 

We can take lessons from science experiments, record breakers, survivors of tragic events, the paralyzed who walk again, and to scriptures that can help guide us on how to win this war in our minds.

Here are 7 mindset shifts for weight loss that can help you reach your goals.

1. Get Uncomfortable

The first of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to get uncomfortable enough to make a change.

Be more uncomfortable with your current weight than you are about the discomfort that comes with changing your habits and routines. 

Let’s talk about the discomfort of sickness.

When you’re sick, all you want is to get better. All your dreams and ambitions go out the door and you’d give almost anything to just feel better again. 

So when I read this story about Jesus at the pool of Bethesda, I was a little confused.

Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed.

One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” 

The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.”

John 5:2-7

A little context–the Pool of Bethesda was known to heal people. That is why the blind, lame, and paralyzed hung around there. They would wait for the pool to get stirred up and then whoever got in first would come out healed. 

But why did Jesus ask him if he wanted to be healed? It seems like such an obvious answer to me. Of course he does! He’s been waiting by this pool for years. 

It seems obvious, but some people don’t want to change.

If healed, the man will be required to be a new person. He can’t lay around at this pool all day anymore–something he has been doing for 38 years. It’s hard to break routines and habits after 38 years–even if they aren’t good for us.

This was not just a question about if he wanted to feel better. It was an invitation to a better life. Something drastically different than what his last nearly 4 decades have been.

Notice the man’s response: “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.”

He didn’t answer the question. He gave a reason (or perhaps an excuse) for why he hasn’t made it into the pool yet to be healed. 

While it does seem like he had a valid reason–he was concentrating on the wrong things. 

He was focusing on his current situation when he could have been focused on the answer to his healing that was right in front of him–Jesus. He was being offered help, but all the man could talk about was his past circumstances.

Don’t worry, the man gets healed. Let’s read the next verse:

Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.”  And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.

John 5:8

Notice how Jesus told the man to get up, take his bed, and walk. He didn’t just heal him and leave him at the pool. He told him to move his bed because he didn’t need to sleep at the pool anymore. 

He told him to walk because now he’s healed and he can. The man was now required to live a different life than what he had known for such a long time. Jesus never leaves people the same after He meets them. 

So how does this relate to weight loss? 

It may seem obvious that you want the extra weight gone, but just like the man–you will be required to live differently. You can’t live and act the same way an overweight person does. Just like this man cannot continue to live like a sick person once he is healed.

There have been times when I can’t answer this question correctly myself. I want to lose weight, and I know what is required to do it—but I don’t want to give up the conveniences of grabbing fast food vs cooking and preparing meals or the comfort of sitting all day vs working out and being sore.

If you don’t want to give up what you have, you can’t get what you want. 

You can’t do the same thing and expect different results. According to Einstein, that’s the definition of insanity. 

mindset shifts for weight loss

So you have to decide—do you want to continue living the way you currently live, or do you want to make a change to have something better?

Just like the man had to decide if he wanted to continue his life with his bed by the pool or if he wanted to get up and walk.

Please note that I am not diminishing the miracle that Jesus performed here. For some people, losing weight they’ve had for years will be a miracle for them.

2. Identity Shift

The second of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to let go of the person you are to become the person you want to be. You need an identity shift.

I watched a short clip of Leila Hormozi where she talks about relationships. She asks–what kind of woman do you have to be to attract the man you want? 

Click here to watch the video.

Without putting words in her mouth, I think the point is that if you want to attract a high quality man, you need to be a high quality woman. 

You need to be the type of woman who a high quality man is attracted to. 

Let’s apply this logic to weight loss. If what you want is weight loss–are you the type of person who is moving towards that goal?

The results will come if you change your habits, mindset, routines, etc to match your goals.

Reverse engineer what a fit person does to have their results, and then do that.

They workout, they eat nutritious food and cook it themselves. They likely track their results in the gym and are mindful of anything they consume.

You can also look at what they don’t do. They don’t make excuses, they don’t drink sodas, they don’t eat fast food. 

It might take some trial and error. Just like you have to go on a couple bad dates to find the right guy, you may have to try a couple bad diets or workouts until you find the right one.

You can tweak what you are doing and make adjustments until you find a routine that works for you and a sustainable diet. 

But if during your trial and error you give up and say this must not work because you had a bad experience during your first attempt–you’re never going to get to your goal.

There are examples of identity changes in the Bible as well. Nearly every famous Bible story is about someone stepping into a new identity. Let’s look at Abraham’s story.

Abraham’s name was originally Abram. But in Genesis 17:4-5 God changes it to Abraham:

“Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations…”

The story of Abraham is deep and there are so many lessons here. But the identity change that Abraham went through required a lot of effort on his part. 

He had to move away from his hometown (Genesis 12). I believe he had to do this to get away from the people he grew up with who knew him in his old identity. 

If he stays in his hometown where they all know him as childless in his old age, it’s going to be much more difficult for him to believe in the promises of God. 

This should also serve as a lesson for us. If we want to lose weight, but we keep hanging around people who eat junk food with us or who don’t prioritize movement–it’s going to be harder for us to stay on track. 

I’m not suggesting you dump your friends, but maybe add new friends to your life who share the same habits and hobbies you want to adopt. 

Maybe you can even convince an old friend to go with you. Abraham invited his nephew (Lot) to go with him on his journey to a new land. 

Just like Abraham stepped into his identity because he wanted the promises of God more than he wanted to remain the same–you have to decide you want the end result (weight loss) more than you want to be the same.

Step into the healthy person God is calling you to be.

3. Fix Your Lack of Belief

The third of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to believe your weight loss goals are possible.

Ever wonder how some people heal after being told they will be paralyzed for the rest of their lives? It’s because they didn’t accept this as their reality.

That doesn’t mean that they weren’t experiencing real-life difficulty. They just didn’t accept that as their fate for the rest of their lives. They were determined to be healed.

Jesus asked this man if he wanted to be healed at the Pool of Bethesda because if he didn’t want it—Jesus couldn’t help him.

When Jesus visits his hometown He was unable to perform miracles because they didn’t have faith (Matthew 13:53-58). 

They watched Jesus grow up as a child and couldn’t wrap their minds around Him being able to perform miracles and being the son of God. 

So Jesus couldn’t help them.

They decided for themselves that Jesus couldn’t help them, so God himself couldn’t help them.

Some people will say that this isn’t about Jesus’s ability to perform miracles, but that Jesus was simply withholding his ability because of their lack of faith.

I’m not so sure about this. It’s not that I am limiting God’s ability here–I just think He limits Himself. Relationships can’t be one sided, and God lets us have a say in our relationship with Him.

I think Peter walking on water illustrates this. Jesus walks on water and Peter comes out and walks on water with Him–until Peter focuses on the wind and unbelief sets in. He starts to fall in and calls out for Jesus to help him.

Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him, saying to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” – Matthew 14:31

Was this Jesus withholding his ability? Or was it a lack in Peter’s faith? 

I don’t think there is any evidence in scripture that suggests Jesus first allowed Peter to walk on water but then decided to withhold His power from him. 

And Jesus himself attributes Peter falling into the water as Peter’s doubt and lack of faith.

Jesus did his part. He wants to help us, but we have to believe it is possible first.

So have you already decided for yourself that weight loss isn’t possible for you? No one can help you if you have already decided this. Not even the best trainer or coach in the world. 

mindset shifts for weight loss

4. Make the Decision

The fourth of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to make a decision. 

The Latin root of the word decide comes from the words de (meaning off) and caedere (meaning cut). So the word decide means to “cut off” other options. 

This is much different than making a choice. You could change your choice at any moment. But if you decide, you have cut off other options for yourself. 

We talked about the paralyzed who walk again in the section on belief, but they also are able to do this because they made the decision that they will walk again. They not only believed it was possible, they decided to make it happen.

Similar to someone paralyzed beating these impossible odds, let’s look at people who survived tragic events. 

There is a documentary on Paramount called Make It Out Alive. It is about people who managed to survive disasters despite their circumstances. 

@talia_likeitis on instagram used this documentary as a teaching moment for her homeschooled children. Check out her video here. 

She points out similarities in the different stories. These are the things they all have in common:

  1. They DECIDED that they weren’t going to die here. This also means they believed it was possible to survive.
  2. They looked for a different solution. They did not follow directions that didn’t make sense. They took a chance on a different route.
  3. They listened to their “gut instincts” on what to do. They had an inner voice telling them what to do–which I believe is the Holy Spirit or God. And they listened. 

God is always with us and speaking with us. If we can be tuned into hearing Him and be obedient—things will turn out better than we imagine.

A biblical example of surviving impossible odds comes from Daniel 3. The story is about three men–Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego–who refuse to bow down and worship a golden statue of the King. 

When the king finds out, he gives them another chance to bow down. If they refuse the king will sentence them to burn in a fiery furnace.

The three refuse and say:

“…Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

Daniel 3:17-18

The king is furious and has the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual. It is so hot that the flames end the life of the army men who took Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to the furnace. 

The three fall into the furnace while they are bound. But the king sees four people unbound walking around in the furnace:

“But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.”

The king told the three men to come out of the furnace. Daniel 3:27-30 says:

“The hair of their heads was not singed, their cloaks were not harmed, and no smell of fire had come upon them. 

Nebuchadnezzar answered and said, “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants, who trusted in him, and set aside the king’s command, and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God.

Therefore I make a decree: Any people, nation, or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb, and their houses laid in ruins, for there is no other god who is able to rescue in this way.” 

Then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the province of Babylon.”

There are so many lessons from this story. But here are my takeaways as it relates to the points about the Make It Out Alive documentary:

  1. They decided that survival was an option. If they accepted that they were going to die—God couldn’t help them. They already accepted death as the only option.
  2. They didn’t accept their physical reality. They were open to a different solution of God being able to save them no matter how bad their circumstances were. 
  3. They listened to their “gut instincts” (which I believe was a message from God) that told them even if they refused to bow that God could save them. They spoke this out loud, which showed their faith.

Their obedience also had a greater effect than just saving them a painful death. It allowed God a chance to demonstrate what He is capable of. And that there are no other gods like Him. 

So the people who survive the impossible or heal after being paralyzed are able to do it for the same reasons. They don’t let their circumstances dictate their outcome.

Logic tells us that these 3 should have died, that the paralyzed will never walk again, that you can’t survive the impossible.

Don’t shut off any possibilities for yourself. The people from Jesus’s hometown were face to face with God, and God still couldn’t help them. But these 3 from the Old Testament (before Jesus came to earth) believed even when they could not see.

What do you believe that is hindering your progress? What have you decided for yourself that is holding you back from accomplishing your goals?

Have you decided weight loss won’t happen for you? Have you decided to blame genetics? Have you decided that you can’t overcome your setbacks?

Let go of those beliefs. Stop looking at your circumstances. Look at the possibilities.

5. Expectations

The fifth of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to change your expectations.

I heard this story recently about a hotdog stand (I wish I could remember the source):

There was a man who owned a hotdog stand. He had tons of customers and was always selling out. Business was booming. 

His son graduated from college with a business degree and started to work with him at the hotdog stand.

His son asks his father if he has heard about the great recession. His dad hasn’t heard about this, but he wants to hear all about it. 

The son tells him that the economy is terrible and they must prepare for losses. Knowing how educated his son is–the father agrees to all of his son’s suggestions. 

They end up going out of business and have to close the hotdog stand within a few months.

How wild is it that the father was so successful until his expectations changed?

Some may argue that maybe it really was because of the economy. But then how do other companies come out better after a recession? 

I think this story beautifully illustrates the power of your expectations. 

There is a section in the Bible in the book of James titled Faith without Works is Dead.

In the story of the hotdog stand, the father had faith and action working together. And he was successful.

When he learned of the state of the economy, his expectations changed and he no longer had faith that what he was doing would continue to work for him. He had works with no faith.

So to relate this back to our original goal of weight loss–what if you are trying a new diet or exercise routine and it’s working great. But then you read an article that tells you how bad it is for you.

All of a sudden what was working great stops working for you. But really, what caused this? Was the article correct? Why wasn’t it correct for the months prior when it was working great for you though…?

Maybe it was just your expectation that changed. When you do something you have to expect it to work–or it never will.

Your attitudes affect everything. Have you ever met someone who is always negative and when they are around they bring everyone else down? Don’t be the person bringing your own results down due to negative expectations. 

Let’s also consider the farmers. They would never plant seeds if they weren’t expecting a harvest. It would be a waste of time. 

In the same way, we have to expect that we will succeed in our weight loss efforts. If we don’t think our efforts will yield results, it would be a waste of time. 

1 Corinthians 9:10-11 says this: 

Yes, this was written for us, because whoever plows and threshes should be able to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest. If we have sown spiritual seed among you, is it too much if we reap a material harvest from you? 

Proverbs 14:14 also stresses the importance of having faith (or expectation):

The faithless will be fully repaid for their ways, 

and the good rewarded for theirs.

There is a story in the Bible about a woman who has a bleeding issue for 12 years. She has spent all of her money on doctors trying to find a solution. 

But she hears about Jesus–a man who is healing the sick– and she knows that if she can just touch him that she will be healed. 

Let’s read the story from Mark 5:27-35:

She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment. For she said, “If I touch even his garments, I will be made well.” And immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. 

And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, “Who touched my garments?” 

And his disciples said to him, “You see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, ‘Who touched me?’” And he looked around to see who had done it.

But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told him the whole truth. 

And he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”

“Your faith has made you well.”

In this story, the woman demonstrates faith and works that we talked about in James. She had faith that Jesus could heal her, so she went out to find Him.

She didn’t just sit around having this faith with no action behind it. But her faith is what drove her to the action. If she didn’t believe Jesus could heal her, she wouldn’t have taken action.

If she didn’t have this faith and expectation, she wouldn’t have been healed. Just like the people from Jesus’s hometown who didn’t believe. 

If you really want your mind blown on the power of your expectations, read the book You Are the Placebo by Dr. Joe Dispenza. I’m still trying to grasp everything I read from that book over a year later.

Placebos appear to be real medical treatment, but it isn’t. It can be a sugar pill, saline injection, fake surgery, etc. and has no therapeutic benefit. But many people who get a placebo end up healing. 

This book “shares numerous documented cases of those who reversed cancer, heart disease, depression, crippling arthritis, and even the tremors of Parkinson’s disease by believing in a placebo.” (from the book description on Amazon)

The opposite is shared as well–someone misdiagnosed with a fatal illness ends up dying only to find out in the autopsy that the doctors were wrong and there was nothing wrong with the patient. But the person expected they were going to die–so they did. 

So please, consider your expectations very seriously. You can change your life for better or worse depending on what you expect to happen. 

While I understand Dr. Joe Dispenza is considered “new age,” there is no reason to discount these stories. They happened regardless of his religious beliefs. 

As a Christian I believe we have an advantage to hearing these stories and understanding the spiritual world on a deeper level. I know who to give credit to–God created our bodies to be able to heal. We just need to expect it. 

6. Stop Negative Talk

The sixth of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to stop allowing negativity. 

Words matter. Not just the words you say to others, but how you talk to yourself. Also, how you allow others to speak to you. 

You have to prioritize being around others who speak life into you. Proverbs 18:21 says:

Death and life are in the power of the tongue,

and those who love it will eat its fruits.

You may not be able to control what everyone around you is saying, but you can choose to reject what they say.

For example, if someone tries to tell you that “you’re going to get sick” by going outside in the cold (or in any scenario). You have to reject that and say, “No, I am not.” If you accept it as the truth–you can actually get sick.

For those who want to argue “but science”–let me stop you here. 

If cold weather causes sickness then anyone living in a cold climate should be sick all year. And everyone doing cold plunges would have constant colds. But we know this isn’t the case.

The same goes for when a doctor gives you bad news. You don’t have to accept it. I heard a story about a pastor who did a stress test and the monitor kept falling off his skin.

The doctor came in and told him his results were irregular, looked bad, and he may need surgery, etc. The pastor stopped him and asked if maybe it was because the monitors kept falling off that the test appeared to be abnormal.

Doctors should be so careful before they speak death over a patient like this. After more tests, the pastor found out he had the heart of a young man. There was nothing wrong with him.

But what if he had accepted that he had a bad heart and needed surgery? He would have been stressed and it likely could have turned into real heart problems.

We know that stress can cause us to be physically ill and can even cause heart attacks. So we have to be so careful of what we allow ourselves to accept even if it comes from someone trustworthy. 

This is also similar to the misdiagnosis story in the book You Are The Placebo that we talked about in the expectations section. 

The Bible also instructs us to take every thought captive. 2 Corinthians 10:5 says:

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

This means if a negative thought comes to our mind, we have to reject it. For example, if you have the thought that you’ll never be able to lose weight–you have to reject that thought. 

Replace these thoughts with a positive thought. Tell yourself–no, if I keep taking action I will lose weight and reach my goal. If others can do it, so can I. 

Having negative thoughts is going to happen. But that doesn’t mean you have to accept them. 

Proverbs 4:23 says:

Put away from you crooked speech,

and put devious talk far from you.

Send those negative thoughts (from yourself and others) away! 

Did you know that there are science experiments that prove that negative talk does produce negative outcomes? 

If you talk negatively to a plant it will not grow as well as a plant that you speak to positively.

Here is a discussion about this experiment from Lewis Howes’ podcast, The School of Greatness:

I love the point of this discussion–if this is happening to plants, imagine what it is doing to people. It makes me want to compliment everyone I know!

So instead of beating yourself up about being overweight, start celebrating how far you’ve come. Or if you’re just starting, commend yourself for starting, for figuring out the next steps, for not continuing down the path that led you there. 

Here is another great verse from Philippians 4:8:

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 

You will get better weight loss results from speaking positively to yourself than you will with negative talk.

In Mark 11, Jesus curses a fig tree. He says, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.”

The next day, Peter notices the tree:

As they passed by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered away to its roots. And Peter remembered and said to him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed has withered.” 

And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. 

Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. 

And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.”

Look at the power in the words he spoke. I understand that Jesus is fully God and fully man. But He tells us we can do this too. 

This helped me to understand the placebo effect even more. Blessings and curses are real. This is why we have to be so careful about the words we speak.

Another verse that stuck out to me is when Jacob curses whoever stole Laban’s gods. Laban accuses Jacob of stealing them, and Jacob says, “Anyone with whom you find your gods shall not live.” (Genesis 31:32)

He did not know that his wife Rachel took them. And Rachel later dies giving birth to their son. 

We must reject any curses that come our way. We also need to accept the blessings. How often do we hear people reject a compliment? Don’t do that! Someone is trying to bless you.

7. Stop Being “Realistic”

The seventh of the mindset shifts for weight loss is that you need to stop being realistic or logical. 

That is the worst life advice: “Be realistic.” Realistic for who?

What if Steve Jobs listened to people who didn’t think it was realistic to have a computer in your pocket? Then we wouldn’t have smartphones.

What if the Wright brothers listened to people who thought flight was impossible. Then we wouldn’t have airplanes.

Dr. Benjamin Hardy is such a great resource on this topic. I believe I got this next idea from his book: 10x is Easier than 2x, but I have read so many of his books. (You should definitely check them out.)

But he talks about scientific experiments in fleas where they are placed in a glass jar. They will initially jump out easily if there’s no lid. However, when a lid is placed on the jar, the fleas learn to jump only as high as the lid allows. 

After just three days, even if the lid is removed, the fleas remain confined by an invisible mental barrier. And the next generation of fleas also inherits this mental limitation. 

This is called the Pygmalion effect, where individuals develop self-expectations based on the expectations set by their predecessors–so for us this means our parents, coaches, teachers, etc.

But if you take one of these fleas and place it in a larger jar with fleas that can jump much higher, the flea’s mirror neurons will activate, and it will start jumping higher as well. The mental barriers will break down, replaced by the new, higher expectations of its new environment.

Dr. Benjamin Hardy also wrote an article for Inc.com where he discusses this experiment. Click here to read the whole article. 

The flea experiment also helps us to explain what happened when Roger Bannister ran the first ever 4-minute mile. No one thought this was possible. But as soon as he did it, just 46 days later someone else did it too–John Landy.

Roger Bannister proved it was possible. And if it was possible for him, it would be possible for others. Within a year three runners broke the four-minute mile in a single race.

Over the last 50 years, more than a thousand runners have followed in their footsteps. They accomplished what was once considered, “impossible if not fatal.” 

So what is “realistic” for you? If you think it’s “impossible” to fast all day, then it probably is–for you. 

But did you know that a man fasted for an entire year? A whole year with no food. And he had no bad health markers from it. I talk about this in my post about the Objections to Fasting.

If you think it’s impossible to lose weight fast–it’ll probably take you longer. But I bet if you listen to stories about people who dropped weight fast it will open your eyes to what’s possible–just like Roger Bannister’s story did for so many others.

What does the Bible say about being realistic? 

In Matthew 17 the disciples are unable to cast a demon out of a boy, so Jesus heals him. When the disciples ask why they were unable to do it, Jesus tells them it is because of their lack of faith:

“For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.” Matthew 17:20

Who believes they can move mountains? I’m guessing not many do, but Jesus says you can. 

In Mark 9 we hear the same story from Mark’s point of view. There is a demon possessed boy and his father is desperately seeking help. He asks Jesus if he can do anything. Let’s read what happens:

“…If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”  And Jesus said to him, “‘If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes.” 

Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief!”

And when Jesus saw that a crowd came running together, he rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, “You mute and deaf spirit, I command you, come out of him and never enter him again.”

And after crying out and convulsing him terribly, it came out, and the boy was like a corpse, so that most of them said, “He is dead.” But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose. 

And when he had entered the house, his disciples asked him privately, “Why could we not cast it out?” And he said to them, “This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer (and fasting).”

I want to highlight when Jesus says. “Anything is possible for one who believes.” 

I also want to point out that Jesus says, “This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer (and fasting).” Why does He say this?

When we pray, we close our eyes so that we can block out our physical world and focus on the unseen. We are tuning into the spirit. This is the same thing that happens when we fast. We are able to be closer to the spirit world instead of our flesh.

The disciples were so focused on this crazy demon that was possessing the boy, causing convulsions and trying to throw him into fire and water to harm him–that they couldn’t focus on the unseen spirit world. They were too focused on the current circumstances. 

But Jesus was focused on things not of this world. He fasted 40 days in preparation for his healing ministry. He was not distracted by the crazy things happening around Him. So He could help him. 

Can you see yourself at your goal weight? If you can’t picture it, you should work on closing your eyes and imagining yourself with a healthy body. 

In the same way an architect needs to be able to see a vision of a building to be able to make the plans for it on paper before it can be built in real life–you need to be able to have a vision for your goal body, a plan, and then take action. 

The story of David and Goliath is another example. How realistic was it that a teenage boy would win against a giant? One that all the soldiers were hiding from. 

Even King Saul told David he couldn’t fight the giant. If David had believed what everyone else said, he never would have defeated the giant. 

So what is your Goliath? What’s the big thing standing in your way of reaching your weight loss goals? You can take them.

Summary

Most of the examples and stories I shared in each section could be interchangeable for another section. But that’s the point! Everything about our mindset is connected.

So let’s summarize what you need to do to get into the right mindset to lose weight:

  1. Get uncomfortable enough with your current weight and circumstances that you have to make a change. You will never make a move if you’re fine with where you are.
  2. Shift your identity. Become the type of person who would never be overweight. How do they spend their time? Start doing what they do. 
  3. Believe your weight loss goals are possible. Find stories about people who have lost the amount of weight you have lost so you know it’s possible.
  4. Make the decision to lose weight. Cut off any possibility of that not happening. Despite your genetics, your medical conditions, or any other circumstance–decide to overcome them. 
  5. Expect the best. What you expect to happen will. So expect success in your weight loss goals. If you expect your diet won’t work–it won’t. 
  6. Stop being negative. Just like a plant will grow better with positive talk, you will hit your goals faster and easier if you can be positive to yourself while striving for your goals. Beating yourself up and being negative will only hinder your progress. 
  7. Stop being “realistic.” You limit yourself by what you believe is logical and realistic. Set unrealistic goals. Make people think you’re delusional. Jump higher than the rest of the fleas in the jar.

My dad always told me, “You can do anything you set your mind to.” While I didn’t understand this fully growing up, it’s true. Even Jesus says so. As long as you are within God’s will, of course.

So what are you going to set your mind to? I hope this helps you reach your weight loss goals and anything else you pursue.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:2

Disclaimer: The information provided on this blog is for general informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition or any personal health concerns. Reliance on the information presented on this blog is at your own risk. The content is not intended to provide medical guidance or recommendations, and the author is not responsible for any actions or decisions made based on the information provided. It’s important to consult with a qualified healthcare professional for individualized medical guidance.

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