By using the tools of Self Coaching Scholars, I lost 32 lbs and have kept it off since December 2020. This has been a lifetime goal that I have never been able to reach until now. I am super happy with my new thin body and feel like this is the body I was always meant to have. In short, I feel like myself. I have a protocol that works for me. I don’t feel deprived. The reason for my success this time was shifting my thinking about my desire for food and what that was about.

I want to keep working further on shifting my relationship with food to view it as fuel for my body and not something to be used to celebrate, connect, buffer negative feelings, or reward myself. This is very hard to do. I have become aware of the over- significance of food in our culture in general and certainly in my social circle.

In listening to the weight loss and advanced weight loss recordings in Self-Coaching Scholars, I am confused about the “joy eat” or “exception eat.” I was reluctant to do this because it seems to go against the whole idea of food for fuel. However, because of the insistence on doing this, I have done it twice. Both times I enjoyed it but noticed that when it was over, I felt kind of empty emotionally. I really have no desire to do this and seriously wonder why the emphasis on it. I have even thought that maybe Brooke had to add this feature to placate people who don’t what to give up that relationship of over desire for certain foods.

Please help me understand the importance of the “exception eat.” Is it just unrealistic to think that I can truly get to a point of only viewing food as fuel and only eating what is the best fuel for my body. Thanks.