Session 23: Maintaining Motivation

This chapter (Session 23) discusses how to maintain long-term motivation for weight control by focusing on the importance of values to motivate behavior, even if short-term reward of weight control behaviors is decreasing (e.g., weight loss is slowing, self-monitoring is becoming tiresome). Clients are encouraged to view the hard work of weight control as working toward their values and to use the skill of willingness to continue to engage in healthy behaviors, even when it is difficult uncomfortable to do so.

Session 14: Review of Dietary Principles, Mindless Eating (Part 1), and Portion Sizes

In addition to reviewing key dietary principles, this chapter (Session 14) introduces the behavior of mindless eating and discusses examples of occasions when clients often eat mindlessly. This chapter also introduces methods of understanding and controlling portion sizes.

Session 12: Introduction to Defusion and Urge Surfing

This chapter presents Session 12. The focus of this session is defusion (a psychological skill to gain distance from one’s internal experiences, such as thoughts and emotions, in order to view them as momentary experiences rather than absolute truths) and urge surfing (“riding the wave” of uncomfortable thoughts, feelings, and urges by noticing and monitoring the negative internal state without giving in to the urge to engage in unhealthy behavior) as strategies to promote acceptance and facilitate healthy weight control behaviors.

Session 7: Willingness (Part 2) and Values

This chapter (Session 7) presents additional information on willingness in the context of weight control and includes an exercise to help clients practice willingness by engaging in a behavior even when the client is simultaneously thinking that he or she cannot engage in that behavior. This chapter also introduces the concept of values, which are the most important ideas, principles, and domains in one’s life and which drive behavior. Various valued domains are discussed, and clients are asked to begin to identify their personal values.

Session 19: Committed Action

This chapter presents Session 19, which is focused on the concept of committed action (maintaining behavior despite the ease or difficulty of the behavior) and strategies to engage in committed action, including an activity in which clients “stand and commit” to their desired weight control behaviors.

Session 15: Mindless Eating (Part 2) and Mindful Decision-Making

This chapter (Session 15) discusses the dangers of mindless eating, which include a lack of awareness of the amount of food being consumed and a lack of conscious decision-making. The difference between mindless and mindful eating decisions is emphasized, and strategies to maximize mindful, deliberate decision-making are presented, such as the slowing down and interrupting of automatic decision-making processes and using up or down values voting.

Session 13: Strategies to Help Defuse and Increase Willingness

This chapter (Session 13) presents strategies on promoting defusion and increasing willingness to engage in weight control behaviors, even when doing so results in decreased pleasure or discomfort. Some of the strategies to promote defusion include using the metaphor of “leaves on a stream,” uncoupling internal experiences from behaviors, replacing “but” with “and,” and using the “just do it” approach.

Session 9: Restaurant Eating; Handling Weekends and Special Occasions

This chapter (Session 9) provides strategies on navigating restaurant eating and weekends and special occasions without abandoning weight control goals. Specific strategies such as planning ahead, choosing food items wisely, setting goals, and seeking support from friends and family are discussed.

Session 8: Forming Good Habits and Flexibility

This chapter presents Session 8, which focuses on gaining values clarity by exploring clients’ values in greater depth and identifying ways that values connect to eating, physical activity, and health. Strategies for forming good habits are presented, such as performing a behavior immediately after a specific cue (e.g., walking immediately after eating dinner). Strategies for breaking bad habits are also discussed in the context of the psychological skill of “flexibility.”

Session 5: Control What You Can, Accept What You Can’t; The Home Food Environment

This chapter presents Session 5, which concerns helping clients separate the various aspects of weight control into those that are controllable, such as one’s personal food environment and one’s behaviors, and those that are not controllable, such as internal thoughts and feelings, urges and cravings, the general food environment, and options to avoid physical activity. Clients are presented with the underlying rationale of the program of learning to modify the controllable aspects of one’s environment and learning to accept those aspects that are not controllable. Changing the type of food available in one’s home environment is discussed as one controllable aspect of weight control for clients to begin to practice.