Can You Lose Weight Online?
Once upon a time “self help” was thought to be a fairly “soft” or ineffective way of improving health or wellbeing, and most people believed that online weight loss programs couldn’t possibly match the success of the live diet meetings.
In fact modern research points to 2 very different reasons why it’s time to drop the doubt. Firstly studies show very clearly that diet meetings don’t work anyway, so measuring something against diet meetings is a waste of time! Even looking at the minority of people who stick to the diet and keep going to the meetings, less than 2% of them manage to keep the weight off for more than 12 months. For over 98%, the weight goes back on even faster than they lost it, plus extra, because the dieting has damaged their metabolic rate.
Secondly, studies also show very clearly that people DO get results from online help, and that those results are very similar to the effect of having your own personal therapist!
Of course people with serious issues like trauma or personality disorders will still require more intensive support, but for the overwhelming majority of people seeking help with weight loss, or smoking cessation, relationship problems, depression, anxiety, etc, online programs present the cheapest and best quality result that they can possibly get.
Remember for any support to be effective, it should foster self reliance, and although online programs take place in a cyber community, the person interacts as an individual and learns to be personally accountable.
Not all online weight loss programs are equal. Be careful to avoid charlatans (use Google to discover their background) and disproven methods like hypnosis, dieting or eating plans, or new-age hocus pocus. Choose only those programs with proven results, run by qualified health professionals.
Likewise be aware that not all conventional approaches to weight loss are worthwhile either! For example cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) is often regarded as highly-effective, and many studies claim that this is the case. But analysis of those studies shows that the conclusions are not valid, and that CBT is little better than placebo (sugar pills). So you do need to do your research.
Another consideration in choosing an online weight loss program is whether or not the site uses testimonials to try to convince you to purchase. Professional therapists do not use testimonials for 2 reasons. Firstly it’s unethical, being a serious breach of the client/therapist relationship, and secondly all the testimonials in the world in no way provide “truth”.
Why should you ignore testimonials? Because it’s very possible that there are thousands of unsatisfied clients for every one testimonial. When was the last time you saw a site publish letters of criticism?
Because of the evidence, we strongly encourage you to investigate a self-help, online weight loss program, but similarly encourage you to do your research to make sure the method’s proven, and that the support facilities are run by qualified professionals.
I hope now that you know that online programs do work, and you appreciate the importance of ensuring they are backed up by clinical research and staffed by trained professionals, that you might like to grab a couple of freebies that give you a solid taste of what that’s like. Check out 2 free books, “17 Solutions” and “Stop Wishing and Start GETTING!”, just 2 of the range of freebies available as a free member of TopLifeSolutions.com. Why is all this free? Because TopLifeSolutions.com is part of the Kind Communities Initiative, and it wants to get real, proven, valuable information to you, so that together we can make a difference to community health and happiness.