When I was a kid, my mom got me a Rubik’s cube.
I’d seen people solving them in 5 seconds on the show
“That’s Incredible”, and I was pretty good with puzzles...
So when I got it I was expecting to make short work of it.
I quickly found out it wasn’t as easy as I thought.
BUT… I was determined.
I'd work on it as soon as I woke up, when I got back from school, after dinner, all weekend.
I spent weeks trying to figure it out, but the furthest I could ever get was 2 sides done.
After a month of trying to solve it, I got so mad that I took a butter knife,
stuck it in between the cubes and pried the corner one out.
They all came out and I put them back in the right way.
I don’t recommend this because it made my Rubik’s cube all loosey goosey,
which caused doubts and suspicions when I told my family I'd finally solved it.
Now the interesting thing isn’t that I have unresolved anger issues with puzzles,
it’s the beliefs I created.
Before the cube I considered myself pretty good at puzzles.
After the cube I believed I wasn’t.
I’d seen people solve it in 5 seconds and I couldn’t figure it out after 5 weeks,
so naturally that must mean I’m not good at them.
From that point I didn’t bother with puzzles because I “knew" I wasn’t good at them.
Now fast forward 30 years into the future.
I’m watching YouTube and somehow I see this video of Justin Bieber
solving a Rubik’s cube in like 10 seconds.
Well, now I’m really confused. "How can this be?" I thought to myself.
I find my wife and go how can Justin Bieber do this in 10 seconds and I could never do it?
she goes…“You just need to follow the formula"
I'd never heard of any formula because there was no internet when I was a kid,
but it turns out there IS a formula.
So, I looked it up, followed the steps and solved the cube in 5 minutes.
One thing I noticed right away was the strategy (if you want to call it that)
I’d been using before would never have led to me solve the cube. EVER.
The actual solution was completely counter-intuitive to me and without
the formula it didn’t matter how hard I tried, how committed I was or
how patient I tried to be because I was using the wrong approach.
The final step in restoring my “puzzle self esteem” was something I read
in an interview with 14 year old Colin Burns, the fastest cube solver in North America.
(here’s a video of him solving it in 5 seconds)
He said “It’s almost impossible to figure out how to solve it on your own.
You need to follow and memorize the algorithms.“
This statement helped to completely wipe out a 30 year limiting belief.
I was no longer “bad at puzzles”, I just didn't realize was a formula.
So, what does this have to do with your weight?
If you’re relying on diets, you’re just like me and the Rubik’s cube.
You know you have to eat better and exercise,
but you don’t know HOW to get yourself to do it consistently.
So you experience the same thing I did with the cube. Frustration.
But it’s not your fault.
After helping people lose weight for over 15 years,
I’ve found most people have never been shown the formulas for…
- replacing bad cravings with healthy ones
- resolving emotional eating issues
- generating consistant motivation
- installing healthy habits into your life
- transforming how you think about yourself and food
and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
So be gentle with yourself and begin to question some
of the limiting beliefs you’ve accepted over the years…
…because some of them are not true.
to your health and happiness,
Jim Katsoulis