Noah Smith wrote about his weight loss journey, and came to an interesting conclusion: that for him, the issue was noticing whether or not he was full:
I started paying attention to how much I ate. If it was “time to eat”, but I wasn’t hungry, I wouldn’t eat anything. And when I did eat, as soon as I felt like I wasn’t hungry anymore, I would stop eating. …
I realized, as I was doing it, that the difference between losing weight and not losing weight was just attention.
When I didn’t pay attention, I didn’t lose weight, because I kept eating after the point where I was no longer hungry. When I paid attention, I was able to control when I stopped eating.
He goes on to say that willpower is a conceit (my word, not his), and that the typical approach—”you have to be tough enough to fight through constant hunger, and motivated enough to want weight loss even more than food”—is wrong.
I fundamentally agree with the first part of Smith’s argument: attention is important. My weight loss this year has been predicated entirely on knowing how much I’m eating (along multiple vectors) and stopping myself from eating too much. My daily food spreadsheet was a key part of my success.
But I disagree with the hand-waving about willpower. People who are overweight have been told for their entire lives to stop eating when they’re full, slow down between courses, wait twenty minutes before taking seconds, and so forth. Knowing that generally doesn’t do much, because a person needs the willpower to acknowledge and recognize those guardrails.
When it comes to weight loss, as with any aspect of personal well-being, motivation is attention’s partner. Last winter, I was scared and desperate; that gave me the motivation to create the spreadsheet, and the willpower to pay attention to everything I ate every day for five months to reach David-minus-forty. I don’t know that I succeed with just one of those factors. And I’d guess that’s true for most people trying to lose weight.
I’m happy for Noah Smith and his successful and relatively low-key strategy. Whatever works for you! Achieving a healthy weight goal is a win, regardless of the path one takes to get there.