To say that dieting rarely leads to sustainable weight loss isn't particularly controversial, scientific research shows that 90% of people who try to lose weight by dieting fail. Did you know that dieting is a multi-billion dollar industry, and that there are over 25,000 books on diets, many of which contain advice that clearly contradict each other. The saddest fact about dieting is that many people try and fail at many different diets, and in the end conclude that biology is against them, and resign themselves to being obese for the rest of their lives. The truth of the matter is very different, and has more to do with Biology than the type of diet.

If you fail to lose weight with a diet traditional philosophy would have you believe that you've either been on the wrong diet (too many/few meals, too much/little carbohydrates, etc.) or you lack the willpower to stick with your diet. However this is completely wrong, and is backed up by scientific research conducted by Ancel Keys in the 1950's and documented in his famous work 'The Biology of Human Starvation'. He discovered that reducing people's diet to a state of semi-starvation produced symptoms of irritability, loss of endurance, and obsessive behavior around food, including but not limited to lying, hoarding, and stealing.

Even more telling was that in the three month period after the semi-starvation was ended and people could once again eat whatever they wanted, the obsession with food continued. None of the subjects had regained their former physical capacity, and their daily caloric intake had increased to a level higher (at times up to 8 times higher) than before the study began.

What this research goes to show, is if you want to loose weight, starving yourself on the latest fad diet, it probably the worst and most ineffective way of achieving your weight loss goals. This is particularly true if your goals are long term. The scientific explanation for this is simply that by starving your body, by reducing your calorie intake, results in your bodies survival instinct kicking in. This results in the body storing fat in order to sustain its energy requirements, resulting in the absolute opposite of what you want.

The logical conclusion from this position is simply 'if what you are doing isn't working you need to try something else'

What 'something else' is will be determined by the underlying reasons for your obesity in the first place. Alongside dieting one of the biggest contributors to obesity is the pattern of emotional eating. Many people eat because they are bored, miserable, lonely or any manner of emotional reasons, none of which has anything to do with physical hunger. Putting food in your stomach will never feed your emotional hunger, and you'll never feel 'full', leading to the cycle of constant eating. This will guarantee your weight will bloat beyond control. The only way to combat this type of eating is to constantly ask yourself, are you genuinely hungry or do you simply want to change the way you feel. If you simply want to change the way you feel, eating is not the answer.

The final of the three big reasons for obesity is the development and practice of poor habits and attitudes towards food. Another way of expressing this is simply 'faulty programming' which has resulted in the development of unproductive habits, leading to poor choices in the way you eat. Fortunately this faulty programming can be easily changed and replaced with good productive habits which will fundamentally change your attitudes towards food, resulting in a passive move towards your weight loss goals.

One of the easiest and ways to achieve long lasting weight loss, is by appealing to your subconscious mind, and addressing the core issues that are the cause of your particular weight problem. How do you do this?My recommended method is through hypnosis. It is a proven, tried and tested method that consistently delivers results after results, which last longer than any diet will ever do.

John Perry is the author of this article and has successfully lost weight through hypnosis. He now shares his experience by providing a review of Hypnosis for weight loss at his site: http://www.weightlossbyhypnosis.com