Physical intelligence: A third option for weight control

Next time you're walking through a shopping mall or down a crowded street, take a good look around. How many overweight people will you see! According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 64% of adults in the United States are overweight, and approximately 59 million people (one in three) are obese. A study by the Rand Corporation (a non-profit research organization advising the U.S. government) showed that between 1986 and 2000, the number of obese individuals (those who are 100 pounds overweight) tripled, reaching a total of 4 million. This alarming increase in weight has occurred despite 64% of American men and 78% of American women dieting or constantly monitoring their weight.

While this doesn't happen to everyone, how do most of us gain weight? If you're overweight and dieting isn't working, how can you become one of the slimmer, "petite" people?

Putting aside these disheartening statistics, many people, including a significant number of former overweight individuals, are still able to maintain a healthy weight without dieting. According to a Consumer Reports survey of 32,000 readers, 4,000 of them lost an average of 37 pounds through voluntary lifestyle changes and maintained this weight for five years or more. These lifestyle changes involved establishing new behaviors and beliefs essential for sustained weight management. Because these changes are less restrictive than traditional dieting, they are easier to adhere to long-term. This more effective approach can be described as "body intelligence."

Let's look at Cindy, a 33-year-old divorced social worker who currently weighs 110 pounds and is 5 feet 2 inches tall. But she wasn't always this slim. Cindy weighed 165 pounds when she got married at 20. After starting work, she joined a softball team, but her weight made her less agile. Three years later, she suffered a miscarriage and depression, causing her weight to balloon to 185 pounds. Cindy consulted a psychologist, struggled through her grief, and discovered why she had been eating so much. She kept a diet record but never dieted. Ten years later, I asked Cindy how she lost weight, and here's her answer:

I no longer worry about eating. It was difficult to control my eating at first because it was hard to find the cause of my weight gain, but after seeing my therapist keep a food diary, I identified the problems with my eating habits, which helped me break some of them. During therapy, I never dieted or made a list of foods I couldn't eat. Instead, when I ate, I asked myself, "What am I doing?" Then I found the reason I wanted to eat. Once I understood this, I was content with eating small amounts or not eating at all. Now, this way of thinking has become a habit; I'm not at war with food, and I eat when I'm hungry.

Cindy never participated in any weight loss programs or diets. She was neither anorexic nor had an overeating appetite. She enjoyed eating, especially Mexican food. After losing weight, she played softball more often and became more active in games, but she wasn't a sports fanatic.

So, was Cindy simply lucky enough to inherit the tendency to be thin? We have no way to precisely determine whether someone has a genetic predisposition to obesity. There are over 250 genes involved in weight control, but Cindy's father wasn't thin, and her mother and maternal grandmother were overweight, so it's impossible for her to have a slim gene. The best explanation for her ability to maintain a normal weight is that she has a set of good behaviors, habits, and beliefs-what could be called "body intelligence."

Marty, a 56-year-old married high school teacher, has a completely different life experience from Cindy, but they share the same physical intelligence. He's 6 feet tall and weighs 177 pounds, so he's neither thin nor fat, though he sometimes jokes about his beer belly: "If I only had six cans of food left to eat, I think I'd choose a six-can case of Budweiser."

Marty isn't a kitchen ascetic. He loves ice cream, and his favorite meal is bread with spaghetti topped with plenty of garlic sauce. He wasn't an athlete in school, and he's not particularly fond of sports now, and he's definitely not an addicted runner. He doesn't diet, and he's not a picky eater. Does he have good genes, or does he possess some secret talent for controlling his weight?

Marty's parents and brothers are all obese, indicating that he at least possesses some genes that predispose him to weight gain. If you ask him the secret to his success, he'll tell you there's no secret; he doesn't do anything unconventional, he simply focuses on his weight. Further questioning reveals that his focus on weight actually refers to certain unique practices, habits, and beliefs-in other words, his body possesses intelligence.