I hear those words nearly every day. Not just in clinical situations, but also in general conversation. People say, “wow, you really look great, how did you do it?” Then immediately thereafter, “I really wish I could lose weight.”
But this becomes a subtle but deeply important detail of languaging.
If you repeat to yourself as an affirmation or even hypnotic suggestion “I want to lose weight,” what happens? When you’re saying this all the time to yourself and in public, it basically is an affirmation of sorts anyway.
So the good news is, you unconscious will happily accept this.
The bad news is that the affirmation “I want to lose weight” will be true forever even should you never lose a single pound. You’ll always and forever “want” to lose weight. And your conscious mind and your unconscious mind will be in perfect congruence because both will “want” to lose weight.
See how clever your unconscious is. It will keep you in a condition of “want to lose weight” forever because that is exactly what you told it to do.
Maybe consider saying and doing something different. Maybe consider an affirmation that actually points to a real outcome instead of a want or a wish.
Something to think about. . . .