A Review of Dr. Phils "Ultimate Weight Solution" Weight Loss Diet

I was a little surprised way back in 2003 when Dr. Phil published his weight loss diet book. Why would a psychologist and self-help Guru publish a book on weight loss and weight control when I had never heard him speak on the subject before?

Being the cynic I am, I reasoned that Dr. Phil, being at a new height of popularity with his Oprah spin-off show, had decided to follow the money and write on an extremely lucrative subject to take advantage of his fame and television show. Well sure enough, his weight loss diet book " The Ultimate Weight Solution" became a runaway bestseller and he began to use his show as a large scale infomercial to promote sales. Every week, on prime time television, he would use up the whole hour with his weight loss diet success stories.

Sales of "The Ultimate Weight Solution" rose into the millions. He published more spin-off books on the same subject, one dealing with food charts and supplements and another by his son on weight loss for kids and teens. Of course he used his television show to promote all of them as well.

Powerful stuff! It worked like a charm and no doubt padded his bank account generously.

Dr. Phil has now moved on to other self-written book promotions on other very lucrative subjects such as relationships and love (Family First, Love Smart) getting him back a little closer to his former style (Life Strategies, Relationship Rescue, etc.) and he is shamelessly using his television show as an info-mercial.

Perhaps that is why I delayed buying the book until recently when the soft-cover version became available for only $6.95 at Costco.

Now that I have finished venting, what about the quality of his weight loss diet book?

The bottom line is that it is pretty good. There is nothing really new here but he says it all well with an emphasis on his strength at influencing behaviour.

Dr. Phil broke down his weight loss diet plan into "The 7 Keys to Permanent Weight Loss"

• Keys 1 & 2 deal with the mental and emotional aspects of making a positive lifestyle change. How do your thinking patterns affect the behaviour that got you overweight in the first place. How your emotional issues lead you to use food for other than required fuel.

  He provides charts and quizzes to help you track and recognize your behaviours and triggers, the idea being that you won't likely change if you don't understand the root causes of your over-eating and weight gain.

• Key 3 deals with getting control of your environment, making it more weight loss plan friendly. Basically he says to clean house and get rid of all the stuff in your cupboards and frig that you know are not good for you and stocking with healthy snacks and whole foods. Do Not go shopping on an empty stomach! Everyone, including me, tells you this stuff.<>P

• Next, in keys 4 and 5 he deals with habit control. Replacing your former, self-defeating habits with new self-confirming habits. I know a lot of people who do this who could benefit from this chapter in Dr. Phils weight loss plan.
  "Jennifer comes home from work, makes a bee-line to the refrigerator, cruises its contents, and samples bits and pieces of food as if they were selections on a smorgasbord. A meatball here, a slice of cheese there. What she doesn't realize is that this habitual snacking adds up to 300 additional calories a day--calories she doesn't count or even think about as she grazes on the goodies in her fridge. If she continues at that rate, she'll gain 25 extra pounds this year. She doesn't understand why it is so hard to lose weight."

• Key 6 deals with getting fit. Regular exercise and some beginner exercise plans are set out but he doesn't get into much detail on how to do it. He talk more about convincing yourself to exercise and how to stay motivated.

• The last key is Your Circle of Support. Finding friends and associating with people with similar beliefs who will encourage and even participate with you in your journey to self-control will be a huge help.

In spite of my tirade at the beginning of this review, Dr. Phils weight loss diet is a good read with lots of practical information and interesting real-life examples of what can be done. He deals extensively with life-style changes and how to make them but not nearly enough with exercise, but you can get the exercise information from your personal trainer!

For less money than hiring a personal trainer, you can get the essence of the Dr. Phil weight loss diet with an individualized exercise program created just for you. Why not try a free evaluation at Find your perfect diet with eDiets

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