Living in the era of the world wide web, we now have access to hundreds, maybe even thousands of weight loss strategies, hints, and tips. Some are useful, but as you may have found, most are not. Today I am going to share with one one of the most powerful that I have discovered. From reading this blog, hopefully you will have realized that diet and exercise DO NOT WORK for weight loss(in the long run!). Instead you need to learn how your brain works, and in today’s strategy, I have a great example for you.

One of the most powerful and yet underused weight loss maintenance strategies is “clothes management”. Strange I know,  but if you learn how to use your clothes to your advantage, you can maintain your weight loss quite effectively.

To demonstrate the risk of wearing loosely fitting clothes let me refer you to an amusing and eye-opening example. During a survey of prison inmates, it was discovered that those with an average sentence of six months, mysteriously would end up gaining 20-25 “prison pounds” during the course of their stay. This is very surprising, as the food being served is not of very high quality, and the inmates have access to exercise facilities.

The true reason for the weight gain was unveiled when the prison mates were questioned. Not one of the inmates blamed the weight gain on food, exercise machines, or even emotional reason’s. Instead they explained how the baggy orange jumpsuit that they had to wear for six months was the result of their weight gain. Because the overalls were so loose-fitting, most of them failed to realize that they had progressively gained weight, which is quite easy to do if you are not paying attention. It was not until they were released and had to try and squeeze back into their old clothes that they all realized that they had gained so much weight!

To understand this better, lets take a look at what Brian Wansink call’s “Signal Clothes”. Wansink proposes that losing weight, for example 20 pounds, is an abstract concept. But being able to fit into your favorite jeans is not at all abstract. To dieters, such clothes are called “signal clothes”.

To illustrate this point Wansink conducted a survey of 322 people and he asked them what were the top 8 signals that they used to know when they had lost weight. Here are the results:

  • “When my jeans feel comfortable again.”
  • “When I have to start wearing a belt.”
  • “When I suck in my stomach, and I can see some definition, like a four-pack.”
  • “When my belt notch moves back to where it used to be.”
  • “When I don’t get tired walking up two flights of stairs to my office.”
  • “When I can see my cheeckbones.”
  • “When I don’t have to inhale to button my pants.”
  • “When my friends or colleagues ask me if I’ve lose weight.”

Fascinating. Out of the top 8 signals that people use to know when they have lose weight, 4 (yes half!!) are related to the clothes that they wear! Do you think that this has ramifications for weight loss? Or, more importantly weight maintenance, the most important stage for a weight loss campaign? The answer of course is a resounding, YES!! In tomorrow’s post I am going to explain exactly why and how using signal clothes is one of the most powerful weight loss and weight management strategies known to man…See you then!