Why is weight loss so difficult? I decide to lose 20 pounds. I write down everything I eat and count every calorie or point. I track the calories burned during my workouts. I get weighed every week. And although I may follow this regimen, at some point I say heck with it and splurge because "I deserve it" and blow the progress I made. Why does this happen?

I believe this happens because tracking food, whether it is by WW Points or old fashioned calories, does not change me. All it can ever do it teach me to be aware of how much food is the appropriate amount. We do live in a country where we need to be taught that, since we are often served portions that are much larger than what is healthy for our bodies. But that's all food tracking does is teach and bring awareness. It is our responsibility to be aware of how much to eat and what to eat. That's the only way to make extraordinary choices. But tracking food is not the answer to a lifetime battle with being overweight.

The only way to end the battle is to get to the root. As I'm sure you know, the battle is exhausting. It feels obsessive, self-destructive, and often ends in feeling like a total failure. That's because we are determined to manage all the symptoms that are the result of what is at the root. Get to the root and the symptoms dissolve away. How can I find what the root of my battle with weight is? Be brave, look inward, and start asking yourself some tough questions. Don't let things get off track by looking outside yourself for the answer. It is all within you.

For me, I thought for a long time if I could drum up enough will power and self discipline, I could lose weight and quit smoking. I tried every program out there and spent a small fortune. It never worked. I always self-destructed rapidly and almost got to the place where it felt safer to never try again. I hated feeling like such a failure. Thankfully, I got to a very bad place in my life where I was giving up on everything when I found a grief support group. I felt like an idiot because it was for people who had just lost a loved one, but I went anyway. On my first visit when it came time to introduce myself, I could barely speak I was crying so hard. I said, "It has been 27 years since my dad died and 17 years since my mom died and I know I'm supposed to be over it but I m still in pain and don't know where else to go."

That was the beginning of a new path for me. I learned in that group that I had determined my worth and value to be less as a person because of my losses and my responses to those losses. I had been allowing them to define me. What I didn't realize is there is a place in my soul that is untouched by any circumstances, losses, or bad decisions. My true self.

When I allowed my losses to define me, I made decisions from a wounded, broken place in my heart. So when I wanted ice cream, it wasn't just an "ooh ice cream sounds yummy" thought. It was a compulsion to have ice cream or suffer in pain at that moment. The pain would start to creep in or a memory would be triggered, and it needed to be medicated, soothed, comforted right away. There was no resisting it.

Then there was the resulting self-hatred of course. Because I had convinced myself that happiness and being thin were one and the same and would never be mine to experience. What a lie!! My friends, wounds can be healed. Bad decisions can be forgiven. Your true self can be discovered at any age, in any circumstances. You just have to be brave enough to go searching for her.

It is still something I must remind myself of every day. Human transformation of any kind doesn't happen from the outside. It doesn't come from programs or points or the scale. It comes from knowing who you are and the peace that comes with that. It is truly a miracle. The most exciting thing about this is it is available to everyone. No exceptions. You have your true self within you, underneath the layers of your past. She is patiently waiting for you and I believe when you connect with her, your choices will no longer come from a place of separation or wounds or compulsion, but rather from love and peace and joy. Imagine that!

Now get moving.