My Dad was a health and phys ed teacher in the Pittsburgh Public schools. Many of his students mirrored his own upbringing in the projects; he was able to connect with them because he understood their language.

A favorite term from his students that became standard lexicon in our suburban home was “flipping the script”.  The script gets flipped when someone switches everything around in a story to reinvent it to their advantage. My Dad, a human version of Google, showed us several sources where the script gets flipped more than just on a middle school basketball court. Politicians probably invented script flipping. And the dieting industry, along with other health organizations funded by corporate food companies, took a page from their book.

While you are responsible for your wellness and weight-loss, the calories in-calories out model is a classic “flip the script” system failure.  The $60.9 billion dieting industry takes the story of successful weight-loss, which involves the challenges of conflicting nutrition information, the heartbreak of going off track and the successful triumph of emotions, into a scientifically archaic sound bite that generates reoccurring revenue.

Yesterday, the Philadelphia Inquirer featured myself and former client Karen Gomez, who four years after our work together, has kept off 60 pounds (and loves food again). The most important part of this article is that Karen states how she followed “scripted plans that failed her.”

Karen never failed. The story script did. 

In my upcoming Truce with Food program, you’ll learn the truthful version of the weight-loss story. The current story has less than a 5% success rate. Of the 5% of successful people who keep their weight loss off, the one common denominator they share isn’t the food or exercise plan but rather, they all made major life changes. In Truce, you’ll learn how to start flipping your own nutrition script of confusion, frustration and crazy cravings to one of clarity, inspiration and peace.

My hope with this program and my client work is that we can bridge the gap between the have’s and have not’s of the dieting world. Education, with soul and real-world experience, is the way to make that connection.