The Big Secret

I’ve undergone an unusual bout of success lately in the ol’ weight loss department. This means that I now fall under Weight Loss Regulation Number 237, Section 6, Paragraph 2 which states that I am currently obligated by law to reveal my Secret to the masses. Paragraph 5 gives me a few options for doing so:

• Diet Book.
• Banner Ads.
• Infomercial.

In all cases, I am to define my “system” and sell you my “program” for “profit.” Fortunately for you, an amendment outlined in Section 9, Paragraph 4 provisions an escape clause where I may freely divulge this information via a blog post.

Unfortunately, I spilled the beans last week: there is no secret. We all knew that, of course. But sometimes it helps to just hear it once in a while. I’m not doing anything different now than I was before, other than my body decides when it’s time to be good and when it’s time to eat an entire box of Idahoan Instant Mashed Potatoes. (And I’m not even talking about preparing them. Nope. Just rip open the box, thrust a spoon into the flaky potato dust, and continue until you get to the free prize at the bottom.)

But… but… I’m succeeding. There has to be a secret to it, right? Well, let’s dig into that a little.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: people always do whatever they want to do at every single moment of every single day in their lives. The problem is that at any given moment people simultaneously want an uncountable number of distinct desires, many (if not most) of them at odds with one another. The brain is constantly evaluating these desires and translating them into electrical signals. Sometimes those signals keep you on the straight and narrow. Sometimes those signals send your spoon into the spud flakes.

If I knew the secret to influencing which way the signals go, then that would indeed be a Big Secret. And I’d be selling diet books, producing infomercials, and setting up banner ads on every single web site this side of Beijing. I’d make so much money, Warren Buffett would be asking me if I could spare a billion.

And, if you really think about it, if anyone had truly discovered The Big Secret, they’d be in that exact same position. Believe me, we definitely would have heard about it by now. So the only logical conclusion is that there is no Big Secret.

With that, you are now faced with two choices:

1. Use this information to throw up your arms, say, “What’s the point?!” and start preparing a pile of mashed potatoes. Or…
2. Sweep it under the rug, force yourself to eat right and exercise anyway, and succeed in spite of it all.

Me? I’m going with the latter. Expect the banner ads to start rolling out any day now.