Our personalities influence everything about us — including how we manage our weight and health. Dr. Robert Kushner, MD, a professor of medicine at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, shared a message with the self-critics, fast pacers, food lovers, exercise strugglers and all or nothing doers’ out there at the 4th Annual Your Weight Matters National Convention in 2015 — that there’s a weight management strategy out there just for you.
What is a personalities and patterns approach to weight management?
Personality determines the specific patterns of how one thinks and functions socially, emotionally and behaviorally. In other words, how you tackle your weight is greatly influenced by how you operate in this world.
After working for 20 years, I started hearing patterns that were coming at me as I hear the history from a patient, Dr. Kushner shared. Regularly in his practice, he would hear statements from patients such as:
“All day I’m fine and in control of my diet, but when I get home, the witching hour begins, and I snack all night long,”
“I work out on the weekend and I’m really doing well but I’m kind of all or nothing when it comes to that. I’m either exercising or I’m not exercising.”
“I know what I need to do, but I can’t seem to prioritize my personal health above everything else that’s coming at me, whether it’s my spouse, my mother, my father, my children my work and so forth.”
Upon hearing these things, Dr. Kushner was impressed by the way personality has the ability to influence how one handles their weight, he says, and he noticed that it was a common factor in helping someone on their path the improved weight management. In an effort to help his patients identify the personality traits that are affecting their weight management goals, he created a six factor trait questionnaire to help patients quickly prioritize the areas of concern that they need to address to become healthier.
Learn more about his method (which is currently in development for a new book he’s authoring) and about how your personality can affect your weight management goals in the video below from the 4th Annual Your Weight Matters National Convention in 2015:
Want to get more of this great education in an in-person setting that you can trust? Join the Obesity Action Coalition at our 5th Annual Your Weight Matters National Convention on August 25-28, 2016 in Washington, DC, and get the RIGHT information about weight and health!
