Thursday, 20 November 2008

Slimming Centers - Are you being robbed?

Have any of you out there tried slimming centers? Well I guess this question is more for the ladies as most slimming centers don�t entertain men anyway. One of my colleagues just recently signed with one of the slimming centers in town, but I won�t mention who or which one. She paid RM 5K for 20 sessions�which will last you roughly about a month. RM 5K a month� that�s a lot of money if you ask me. Most people I know don�t even earn RM 5K a month and here is someone spending RM 5K a month on a slimming center.

Anyway, her spending habits are her own and none of my business. But here is the best part. The slimming center gave my colleague a list of things she must not do during this 20 session program. Are you ready for this?

No eating oily and fried foods (even the yellow mee in mamak mee is considered oily, so any kind of noodles is a no no)
No rice and other white starches like White bread etc.
Only 1 sweet drink a day. The rest of the time, drink only water
Meal portions should be: 60% vegetables, 30% lean protein and 10% Complex carbohydrates (or wholemeal)
Only 3 meals a day � No snacking or eating anything in between these 3 meals
Drink at least 6 glasses of water a day
No alcohol consumption

When she told me this, I could not help myself and burst out laughing. I told her she paid RM 5K for someone to tell her what she knows she should not be doing anyway. I mean honestly guys, all of us know what foods are good for us and what foods are bad for us right. The question of us succeeding and seeing results is only a matter of whether we have enough will power to see it through or not. The biggest reason people don�t see results in a diet is because they quit. But I will cover more of this in another post.

Here is another thing. If you did stick to the diet plan above for one whole month, whether you went for this so called slimming sessions or not, I guarantee you would have lost weight anyway. Here is an example to put things in persepctive and see how you are being robbed.

It�s like me selling you Vitamin C (but lying to you and telling you it is a NEW weight loss pill) and then tell you to follow the regiment above. To make it better, I will tell you that this NEW pill causes bad side effects if you eat any oily food with it. That is the scare factor that makes people want to follow it. On top of that, you just paid me RM 5K. Do you want to spend that much money, not see results and get sick after that? No way right? You do it for a month, take my Vitamin C everyday� and voila� you lose weight. You are motivated to stick with my program because of fear (of getting sick) and greed since you spent the money. You lose weight and feel happy, I feel happy coz I made some money. What was the secret? Of course I will tell you it�s the Vitamin C (ooops... i mean my NEW weight loss pill) and guess what� so will you.

This is exactly what these slimming centers are doing guys. Playing with your fears and desires to lose weight and robbing you of your money. I hope all of you have the sense to not be fooled like this. For me, the best and safest way to lose weight� watch what you eat and of course, exercise. There is no short cut to it. When I tell people that, they don�t like to hear it and think I am hiding something or not revealing the true secret� so as usual, I like to give the following analogy:

How did Student A do so well in SPM? What was his secret? He studied hard for it� duh!!

Look forward to hearing your comments and thoughts on this.

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