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This website represents my endeavor to add something to the conversation by changing the conversation.  This project is not about how to pick the best diet book, or the best diet plan, or the best app to use to chart calories.  If you are looking for that, you've come to the wrong place.  Rather, this site is about recognizing that there is a lived, personal, and shared experience in dieting.  Moreover, it is about understanding that, though there are commonalities, every aspect of each person's lived experience is unique to them.  For those people who struggle with prolonged or chronic weight issues, the phenomenology of dieting is embedded in one's identity and one's relationship with all others in the world.

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I know this, as I am a psychotherapist.  In my twenty-five plus years of practice as a clinical social worker, I've been listening intently as people strive to find deeper understanding of the meaning in their life experiences as they share and explore their life stories.  My job is to help people make sense of their complex behaviors, thoughts, and feelings as well as to guide them in learning how to identify and avoid obstacles that have sabotaged them in the past.  What I've learned over time is that there are no simple answers or easy fixes when it comes to changing how we live and interact in the world.

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I am constantly reminded of, and marvel at, the uniqueness of the individuals, couples, and families that I see in my consulting room.  Despite my recognition of the singularity inherent in the narrative of each client, I have noted patterns in my clients' spoken conversations when the topic of clinical discussion involves weight related issues or food.  This is regardless of whether the presenting problem is weight or food specific, or some other clinical issue in which weight or food plays a secondary or even tertiary role.

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As a way of describing what I mean by the "experience of dieting," I offer the following example.  Invariably, my clients invoke the word willpower, and the way it is referenced points to their perception that it is a critical something that we have, or don’t have, or have too little of.  My clients speak about willpower in a manner that indicates that their success or failure to comply with mandated food restrictions hinges not only on the presence, but also the strength, of their willpower.  Furthermore, when they do not succeed in following food plans, they blame their lack of willpower as the culprit.  In these instances, I hear negative self-evaluative statements reflecting discontent with weight, feelings of inadequacy, and often shame due to a perceived lack of personal control.  Somehow willpower has become a character trait, and the absence thereof strikes to the core of personhood.

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I am intrigued by the word.   Willpower.  Why is this word laden with significant meaning to so many people I see professionally, as well as to others outside the therapeutic consulting room?  It is a compound word, consisting of the words will and power.  If I have the will to do anything, I have a desire.  When I will myself to do something, I have an intention to accomplish it.  Will is also a verb as well as a noun.  “I will do something” refers to something that is not happening now but will in the future.  Power is a word that connotes energy, a force that results in movement from one direction to another.  Will by itself has nothing to do with movement or energy.  I desire.  I want.  In its purity, it is a human emotion that may lead to motivation to move towards action.  Or, it may  remain inactive or perhaps even stagnant.  I desire, but remain simply in a state of potentially perpetual desire.  We desire many things that we never achieve or even attempt.

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When we are able to move from simple desire to action, the power that drives that action may derive from either an internal source, from the self, or it may be externally derived, from others or the environment.  In the case of having the desire to lose weight or to restrict foods as a result of some medical condition, the force that is required is NOT to do something, such as reaching for the nearest candy bar.  Or, action is selective.  Eat this rather than than this.  It is, therefore, not enough to just have the simple will or desire to lose weight.  It moves beyond simple will to include motivation and commitment to select food choices.  If positive energy moves us towards doing something, then negative energy holds us in place, restricts, and impedes us. When will and negative energy are joined and activated, the result is won’t power as opposed to willpower, although the phrase won’t power doesn’t exist in the lexicon.

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If all of this is as complex as it sounds, then why is the word willpower thrown around in a way that makes it sound simple and concrete?  Do the assumptions and simplification of willpower create a belief and an illusion that it is the master key that unlocks a challenging, multifaceted weight loss puzzle whose parts derive from psychology, neuroscience, biology, genetics, and the environment?  In their conversations, my clients indicate that no matter the difficulties or issues associated with these other variables, willpower should and must overcome these challenges, with statements such as, “If I want it badly enough, my willpower should be strong, never waver, and carry me to success.”

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As I strive to meaningfully change the conversation, this project asks us to think deeply about this word, willpower, and the dieting experience.