It has always been fascinating to me how business, finance, and weight loss parallel each other.
Take a personal bank account for example. If you add more to it than you take out of it, your account will grow bigger and bigger.
The same thing applies to your body. If you put in more through eating than you put out through activity, it will grow bigger and bigger. This is a simple fact, isn’t it?
what about work? If a business owner does not monitor his business on a daily basis and take action when necessary, his business is likely to fail.
The same applies to a weight loss program.
If it is not monitored on a daily basis and action taken when necessary, it will fail. Most businesses fail. So do most weight loss programs. This is also a simple fact.
I have been an industrial engineer all my life and years ago I read a book on manufacturing by Dr. Eliyahu M. Goldratt, an Israeli physicist, titled “Theory of Constraints.”
The basic idea in the theory of constraints is that every real system, such as a for-profit organization, must have at least one constraint.
If that were not true, the system would produce an infinite amount of whatever it sought. In the case of the for-profit organization, it will be unlimited profits.
Since the constraint is a factor that limits the system from getting more of what it seeks, the business manager who wants more profits must manage the constraint.
There really is no choice in this matter. Either you manage the restrictions or they manage you. Constraints will determine the output of the system whether or not they are acknowledged and managed.
There can be many limitations in a business, but I have found in my engineering career that there are usually basic ones.
All limitations must be managed but by concentrating the greatest amount of attention on the initial ones, whatever is being strived for will be improved. Perfection is never achieved but improvement can be achieved.
It is an ongoing battle.
Does the theory of limitations apply to weight loss? definitely! If there were no restrictions on losing weight, none of us would be fat.
Dieters can achieve improvement by focusing on their primary limitation such as a business manager, although all limitations must be managed.
It is an ongoing battle.
So what is the main drawback to losing weight? I think it is universal for all dieters. The Pogo cartoon character, created by Walt Kelly, was the best. “We have met the enemy and he is ours.”
Yes. The main obstacle to losing weight is between our ears.
We would rather sit on the couch and indulge in the pleasures of the moment than strive for what we would like to have in the future.
As far as weight loss is concerned, we might as well be looking for unicorns or looking for pots of gold at the end of rainbows. We will likely find them like losing weight.
Good information about losing weight is plentiful but to lose weight you have to be proactive. Knowledge is not enough. You have to work on this basic limitation. You have to get off that couch and do something.