The Four Day Win is not only a great diet book, but a great read! Martha Beck, who after a Ph.D. from
Harvard became a well-known life coach and columnist for O, The Oprah Magazine, has produced an absorbing
and entertaining book that will help everyone who has ever felt fat, learn to understand their dieting ups and
downs. It may even change them for the better. That’s her goal, anyway, and her "retrain your brain"/zen of
weight control/mindfulness cognitive therapy/re-programming techniques seem ideally suited to helping at least
some of us heal our over-worked brains and overweight bodies.
The subtitle: End Your Diet War and Achieve Thinner Peace sets the irreverent tone that keeps readers
laughing. With the play on thinner/inner peace Beck hits the tell-tale gauge on the button right from the first
step on the scale. Our weight problems are all in our heads and all we have to do is change our minds.
With psychologically astute suggestions, Beck keeps us laughing as we pursue the answers to this problem we all
take soooooooooooo seriously. Filled with short case histories, the book has a multiplicity of varied selections
to suit every intellectual and non-intellectual type.
Both comedic and intelligent, Beck is a spellbinding author on a normally unappetizing subject. Bingeing and
dieting are compared to "one long, hideous visit to the Spanish Inquisition." We learn how to stop warring against
our inner "Commander", who forbids our favorite food, and the "Resistor", whose cravings are our downfall. We learn
to avoid "Famine Brain," to go from "Fathead to Open Mind," and to "Beware the Permanently Helpless Dalmatian
Reptile." We learn how to "SIN", or "Substitute Inedible Nourishment", for fattening addictions. We learn to
befriend our "Body Whisperer" and win over our subconscious mind, and we learn to build a positive relationship
with the "Watcher", our best friend and happiest inner self.
The central idea around which Beck’s plan revolves explodes the idea that willpower is essential to weight-loss
and proposes instead a series of "4-day wins" that can succeed with any weight-loss program. Substitute a good
habit for a bad habit, Beck advises, stick to it for just 4 days, and it will start to feel right, maybe even start
to feel in accord with your own higher power. It’s the 4 days at a time (rather than 1 day) approach!
If the "eat less, move more" philosophy has failed you before, read this surprisingly entertaining self-help
book and learn how The Four Day Win can End Your Diet War and Achieve Thinner Peace, offering an
equanimity that will serve you for a lifetime, not just until you regain those missing 20 pounds.