People lose fives times more weight when they imagine themselves thin, according to a September 2018 study reported in Science.
The technique called Functional Imagery Training (FIT) teaches people how to use their own mental imagery of why they might like to change, how it would look to them, how it would feel and how it might be achieved.
The study was by Dr. Linda Solbrig from the School of Psychology at the University of Plymouth in the UK in conjunction with Queensland University in Australia.
In the study, 141 participants were divided into either FIT or Motivation Interviewing (MI). MI is a technique that uses counselors to support people to develop and focus on their need for change and reasons for wanting to change. FIT takes the idea one step further, teaching people to use rich sensory imagination to develop their own imagery.
After six months, the people who used FIT lost 10 pounds as opposed to the MI group that lost one pound. After 12 months, the FIT group continued to lose weight, losing 14 pounds as opposed to the MI ground that lost just over a pound and a half.
The FIT technique assumes people agree that eating less and exercising more can help them lose weight. But it encourages them to think about their own life and imagine how a change in weight might feel.
One exercise to begin the process is imagining a lemon. People thought about seeing, touching and squeezing a lemon. They thought about juicing a lemon and how it would feel if some of the juice accidentally squirted in their eye. From those simple beginning imageries, people then were encouraged to use all their senses to ask how would losing weight look, sound, smell, feel?
One successful client went from 196 pounds to 170 pounds by incorporating personal motivations and imagery. Her mother died at age 60 and the client had now reached age 59. She thought of her daughter and how she wanted to live for her. She thought of how she wanted to see her graduate. She imagined the dress she might wear to the graduation and pictured how she might feel being healthier and slimmer.