How Much Does Your Soul Weigh?: Diet-Free Solutions to Your Food, Weight, and Body Worries [Paperback]

Dorie McCubbrey (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 10, 2004

You hold in your hands a life-changing weight control revelation -- a holistic approach to help you overcome all eating and weight problems from anorexia to obesity. This innovative book will shed light on your unsuccessful attempts at dieting and help you begin to heal from the inside out, once and for all!

How many "miracle diets" have you tried? How many minutes and hours have you spent worrying about the numbers on the bathroom scale? How many times have you lost weight only to gain it back along with renewed disappointment and frustration? You've worried about how much your body weighs, but have you asked:

How Much Does Your Soul Weigh?

Dr. Doric McCubbrey, a weight-issues specialist whose practice boasts a 95 percent success rate, reveals that the weight of your soul may be preventing you from effecting the changes you want to see in your appearance and self-esteem. By starting Dr. Dorie's plan for "Intuitive Self-Care," you can begin to unburden your soul of all the "weighty attitudes" of the diet mentality -- rigid rules, negative self-talk, and unrealistic goals -- that lead to very real feelings of disappointment and hopelessness.

With empathy and insight, Dr. Doric explores and explains the importance of a soulful attitude toward your eating, exercise, and weight. You'll discover:

the "games" dieters play -- and why none of them works

the four archetypal weight problems and how to overcome them for good

the secrets of naturally thin people -- and how you can incorporate them into your life

a 30-day plan of therapeutic "recipes" designed especially to nourish your soul

Packed with stories from Dr. Dorie's own 15-year struggle with overeating, anorexia, and bulimia, and the experiences of her clients, How Much Does Your Soul Weigh? shows you how to generate the happiness, health, balance, and confidence that will put your weight worries to rest for good!

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

With the favored formula for getting and staying thin changing nearly as often as the weather, McCubbrey (Dr. Dorie’s Don’t Diet Book) presents a plan that puts souls before scales—and therefore, she maintains, offers readers a lasting solution to weight problems. The key is "Intuitive Self-Care," a program whose followers look inside themselves (instead of to experts) to discover their bodies’ unique needs for food and exercise. McCubbrey offers sensible reasons why the games dieters often play (e.g., the "fat gram game," in which fat becomes an evil to be eradicated, or the "trade-off game," in which the foods eaten depend on the exercise completed) don’t work, and speaks of her own struggles with anorexia and bulimia, as well as stoutness. By learning to feed her soul and love herself, she improved both her weight and life; in this warm-hearted volume full of client cases and personal anecdotes, she shows readers how to do the same. Strategies include focusing on solutions rather than problems and eliminating emotional attachments to food. While not every one of McCubbrey’s clients emerges a perfect size six, they have all, she says, found a comfortable weight, developed better eating habits and become healthier and happier. For readers tired of weight-loss rules and rhetoric, McCubbrey’s book might be a breath of fresh air.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Dorie McCubbrey, M.S.Ed., Ph.D. -- the "Don't Diet" Doctor -- is a licensed professional counselor who combines her doctorate in bioengineering with her master's degree in counseling to help people undo the damage that restrictive weight-loss methods often cause. A member of the National Speakers Association, she provides seminars, workshops, and keynote addresses to audiences across the country. She has developed numerous learning resources, including Dr. Dorie's "Don't Diet" Book, the fitness video Healthy Weight Workouts, motivational cassettes, and workbooks. She lives near Boulder, Colorado.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks (August 10, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060937912
• ISBN-13: 978-0060937911
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #920,059 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It will shake you up...It will wake you up!, February 13, 2003

By 

Ingrid M. Miller (Irvine, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: How Much Does Your Soul Weigh?: Diet-Free Solutions to Your Food, Weight, and Body Worries (Hardcover)

How much of your life have you thrown away on dieting, calorie charts, trying-always trying to be thin/good enough? Dr. Mcubbrey showed me how weight obesessed I was with striking examples that were dead-on. It made me cry.I bought this book when I realized that at 43, I was about to embark on my 33rd effort to lose the holiday pounds, get with the program and keep the weight off for good, this time. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Well, I am a perfect example. I am a lifetime dieter. I run marathons to keep in shape. Yet, my journals from High school through adulthood are filled with daily calorie counts. I have 2 sizes of clothes in my closet. When I am wearing the smaller size, I fret about how long it will last before I fail again. When I wear the large size, I fret about when the weight gain will stop, and when I will gather enough courage to lose the weight again. As the author would say, my soul was carrying a huge burden with this issue. The book contains no nutritional information or diet plans. It shows you how much your weight obesession has cost you emotionally. It challenges you to get out of the sickness by focusing inward, learning to trust your self, your soul, instead of being ping-ponged about by the media ideas of beauty.
There are daily exercises that help you refocus your thoughts. I have done most of them and look forward to the rest. I have read all the diets,done all the diets and now I am brave enough to focus on the inside rather than the outside. Read this book. It will shake you up and wake you up!

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Real Winner, June 15, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: How Much Does Your Soul Weigh?: Diet-Free Solutions to Your Food, Weight, and Body Worries (Hardcover)

I cannot say enough about this book. It changed my life. After years and years of Anorexic tendencies, as well as binge eating, and bouts of being overweight, I feel as though I have finally "got it". Being a therapist myself, I have come to recommend this book to many of my clients, who have come back to me, and said how much it impacted them as well. Dr. Dorie is awesome!
Instead of doing the same 'ole exercise routine at the gym all the time, I now ask myself, "what is my soul hungry for"? Running? Biking? Walking? Weight lifting? I don't weigh myself anymore, and it is the most freeing feeling. Read this book!

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Rewarding reading!, April 7, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: How Much Does Your Soul Weigh?: Diet-Free Solutions to Your Food, Weight, and Body Worries (Hardcover)

I got this book one day after Geneen Roth's "When Food is Love", disappointed by the latter's selfcentered and impossible to read (unless you are interested in the author) autobiographical style. McCubbrey's book is so different! It does contain elements of autobiography but only as illustration of certain problems. This is the kind of book that rely heavily on personal experience and is so much more valuable for that, but doesn't take advantage of the reader's attention to solve the author's own problems. McCubbrey talks about her childhood gracefully, without resorting to the all-purpose idea of "abuse" (in whatever guise). She doesn't blame anybody for her failures and in my eyes it makes her more trustworthy. Many of us come from loving families and the idea of "abuse" never really sounds right as an explanation for all the troubles in our grown-up lives.

Allergic as I am to all sort of motivational, "belive-in-yourself" blather, I was afraid that I will reject this book only because of its language. I was surprised how elegantly it was written! "Believe in yourself" is of course its main philosophy, but McCubbrey doesn't overwhelm you with the flow of motivational slogans. Even the stories about her parrot and a cat, which could sound corny in other hands, were beautifully and touchingly presented and illustrated her point brilliantly. There is so much substance to this book that one easily finds answers to some of the most troubling questions. There are also some "recipies" for success, little exercises that help you understand certain mechanisms of weight loss mentality. There are no diets, no restrictions, no fitness programs.
I don't know yet if McCubbrey's philosophy will work for me - it is too early to say, but her book was certainly wonderful to read, with lots of sound advice. I certainly will try to apply her wisdom to my everyday struggle with food and other issues and maybe report my progress sometime in another review.