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Weight Loss: Simple Science Until Our Emotions Intrude | | Big Think

Big Think | September 11, 2025



Weight Loss: Simple Science Until Our Emotions Intrude
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Fad diets are with us now, and will always be with us, says health and wellness expert Jillian Michaels. This despite the fact that weight loss is a simple science: eat less, exercise more.The complicating factor when it comes to health and weight loss, says Michaels, is our emotions.
We tend to eat for emotional reasons — either as a coping mechanism, or to maintain relationships with certain people. For this reasons, individuals who are overweight may have valid reasons for being overweight — reasons that are more important to them, at least temporarily, than being physically healthy.

What Michaels experienced on the set of “The Biggest Loser,” as the show’s trainer to its contestants, is that people often poorly understood why they wanted to be healthy in the first place. You can only know why you want to be healthy when you confront the pain and difficulty of routine exercise. Michaels calls this “finding your ‘why’.”

To find your “why,” she recommends setting an alarm every hour on the hour (during waking hours), and notice what you’re doing in that moment and how it makes you feel. The goal is to identify which activities are rewarding, and which are taking life, energy, and enjoyment from you.
Michael’s book is Yeah BABY! The Modern Mama’s Guide to Mastering Pregnancy, Having a Healthy Baby, and Bouncing Back Better Than Ever.
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JILLIAN MICHAELS :

Jillian Michaels is a fitness expert and wellness coach with over 20 years experience, and is a New York Times bestselling author of numerous books including Master Your Metabolism, Unlimited: How to Build an Exceptional Life, and her most recent The 6 Keys: Unlock Your Genetic Potential for Ageless Strength, Health, and Beauty. Jillian’s passion for fitness training originates from 17 years of martial arts practice in Muay Thai and Akarui-Do, in which she holds a black belt. Her first comprehensive 90-day weight loss system, Jillian Michaels Body Revolution, is available in retail stores across North America, and JILLIAN MICHAELS BODYSHRED, an intense group fitness class based on Jillian’s highly-effective 3-2-1 interval system, is taught worldwide.

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TRANSCRIPT :

Jillian Michaels: People always want to sell something when it comes to weight loss and health, right. So they reinvent the wheel for that reason. And I’m sure you’ve seen a variety of fad diets whether it’s oh, you know, right now we’re going vegan. Wait, no, we’re going paleo. Wait, no, it’s 30-30-40 equal portions of everything. Wait a second, we can do everything but eat beans. It just, it always goes on and on and on. And the reality is that weight loss, weight maintenance is simple science. It’s eat less, move more. Food that you consume has calories in it. Calories are units of energy. Energy that does not get burned, gets stored as fat. Fat is stored energy. And then obviously use common sense with your food choices. We all know not to eat things in our food that is not food. Fake fat, fake flavor, fake sugar and so on. So in reality if it is this simple being healthy why do so many struggle with it? And that’s because people utilize food for a variety of emotional reasons. Whether it’s a coping mechanism or whether it’s affording them a deeper connection with another individual in their lives. And that’s what we have to get to the bottom of. And I remember somebody once said to me people are fat because they want to be fat. And I remember going what an a-hole you are. And the more I thought about it the more I realized it was true. The more I began to work with people who were overweight the more I began to see what it meant to them.

And it could have been a connection with a parent. It could have been a connection to grieving the loss of somebody and feeling like if you stop eating like this you’ve moved on with your life and you’re no longer connected to them. It could be a sense of control. It could be a defense mechanism against being vulnerable and getting hurt in relationships. But that is one of the reasons that losing weight or getting healthy is so difficult because it requires us to give up something that has been providing comfort and a defense against hurt for a very long time. It’s not because people are weak or stupid or lazy or genetically fat.

Read the full transcript at https://bigthink.com/videos/jillian-michaels-on-weight-loss

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Written by Big Think

Comments

This post currently has 35 comments.

  17. @yousufhali783

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    I have been using this product for a month now and it is wonderful. Two cups a day is so easy to do. I have lost 5 pounds so far and I am very proud of it. Thank you weight loss green store tea for this wonderful product

  18. @avaapiana

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    "Eat less" oh so calorie restrict and then inevitably binge because your body is starved of glucose? 🙄 Jillian Michaels is full of shit. The people you should actually be listening to is actual SCIENTISTS who have the results like Dr. McDougall, Dr. Doug Lisle, and Dr. T Colin Campbell who have experience with healing people with a whole foods plant based diet for YEARS.

  19. @floatingcottoncandy

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    I had to watch this twice to be sure she was as naive, disingenuous and self-serving as she seemed at first blush.
    "people are fat because they want to be fat"
    Well, I'm sure that is true for some percentage of the population,
    and maybe for a greater percentage of those she interacts with, but
    painting with that broad a brush makes it clear she's more interested in
    selling books and her own brand than anything to do with reality.
    And that she so strongly identifies (and will publicly stand behind
    this statement)
    "getting healthy is so difficult because it requires us to give up something that has been providing comfort and a defense against hurt for a very long time."
    This tells us an awful more about HER issues than it does anything useful for the population.
    I also like how she dismisses genetics in an off-hand way.
    Ever notice how some dog breeds carry more body fat than others? Notice differences among races? Read anything at all about scientists activating and deactivating various genes and the incredible effects this can have on body weight? (or any number of other physical characteristics)
    How about the "The Biggest Loser" contestants who's metabolisms have been effectively damaged by the "advice and guidance" provided by this hack and her peers?
    Quoting scientificamerican.com reporting on a group or previous contestants "The group as a whole on average burned 2,607 calories per day at rest before the competition, which dropped to about 2,000 calories per day at the end. Six years later, calorie burning had slowed further to 1,900 per day, as reported in the journal Obesity, May 2."
    Typical of the era of Personality people will follow her because she's attractive confident and well-spoken…… but also incredibly dangerous, to say the least.
    But heh, maybe science is all wrong. Maybe the contestants so "want to be fat" and enjoy the emotional "comforts" and protection from being "hurt" (sniff, sniff) they simply willed their metabolisms drastically lower so they could eat a healthier menu with drastically fewer calories and still enjoy the pleasure of being overweight as the same time.

    I have been watching fewer and fewer Big Think over the last year as they've become nothing but a place for folks looking to plug whatever half-baked idea they're selling without scrutiny.

    Pathetic.

  20. @youratowel97

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    Wow, she is really a great speaker lol. How does a 19 year old who commute to school, so I live at home. My grandmother is my neighbor, and she takes tremendous pride in cooking for our family. What do I do about this? I'm not overweight (5'2" 125 lb) but I want to eat healthy and get toned. I also haven't been able to hit the gym in months. Between 32 hours of work a week, five college classes, and trying to find time with friends, I'm rather introverted so when I have "me time," I feel the need to spend it with my thoughts. Any advice? 🙂

  25. @IVIyWorld

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    Great video! Telling it as it is in regards to health is everything… I feel like the topic of health has become such a topic of debate and questions even though there isn't much to question it is pretty straight forward…

  29. @Enderfreaksgames

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    She makes it sound like having a reason that sounds important is more important than actually knowing how to diet in a proper healthy way, and of course the exercise itself.So what, I'm not allowed to lose weight until I make up some excuse to do it? I don't have some reason, I want to do it, because I want to do it. That's all there is to it. I don't have any social or familial motivations, I wasn't bullied into wanting it, I have no desires to get a girlfriend, and I'm not interested in living a long life. The only reason I could ever possibly come to is because I haven't done it before so why not try but that just boils down to the answer I already gave "because I want to" , then what? Do I just go home and not exercise because some TV "expert" decided my reason isn't good enough? Fuck that. telling someone they need a reason to want something is inherently stupid, all that serves to do for the people like me is stress them out thinking about it which is far more likely to make me not even feel like trying anymore. I'm doing it because I want to, when I want something I do it, that's the type of person I am. I don't need a deeper reason than that.

  30. @walterbruce3556

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    This is a fantastic way to lose weight and gain extra energy in the process! Those who say that they don't have enough energy to make it to the gym after a shift at work, should definitely check this out. weight loss green store tea is a great motivator and if you still can't go to the gym, well, this will still help you lose weight, just not as much, though.

  32. @YMS09D

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    Terrible choice of a speaker a side, this was an interesting watch, it did make me think a little deeper into why I want to lose weight. Though she would have kept some brownie points if she left out she was on 'Biggest Loser'. Seriously, read the Cracked article by one of the previous contestants, damn near torture.

  34. @ergosum5001

    September 11, 2025 at 3:15 am

    In truth all things are 'simple' in the face of science – even our emotions. It's fun how some people pick and choose what science applies to in order to support their agenda.

    For a person (blessed with a fit frame despite eating 2-3x what most would eat thanks to a superior inherited metabolism) who supports determinism, like me, this is about as hilarious as it gets. "Losing weight is simple science – just control the emotions that impede losing weight" as if emotions are ever in our actual full or partial control and are never dependent on various other factors.

    Want people to stop being obese? Don't let obese people procreate or don't let people with lazier tendencies in regards to that stuff procreate. That's the simple solution. Stop people from passing down terrible gene alleles or gene modifications in the first place. If people have better things to provide – like brilliant minds – but just aren't gods and goddesses – then fine, let them survive.

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