Some people fall into a pattern that derails them long before any habit does. These folks claim the wins and hand the failures to the external. The line is clear: success proves their strength; flops belongs to the universe. How does this perspective manifest in weight loss?
Triumph stays inside – Loss gets outsourced
Someone loses a lot of weight, gets praised, calls it proof of discipline. When the regain starts, instead of asking what slipped, they blame stress, work, family, timing — anything that keeps responsibility at arm’s length. The details move around, but the pattern stays put.
I’m watching this unfold right now in someone who once dropped more than 200 pounds and is climbing back toward where he started after regaining more than 100.
When the scale moved down, he credited discipline and whatever tactic he was using that week. As it moves up, he keeps blaming stress, schedules, other people, the environment. He still uses the COVID pandemic as his go-to excuse, long after it officially ended in May 2023.
Success lived inside him. Failure lived everywhere else.
Laying your own trap
If the outside world caused the slip, then there’s nothing to examine… nothing for him to fix. It’s a tidy shield, but it stops any real progress. It’s guarding the ego at any cost. Admitting a setback would mean admitting cracks in control. He’s unwilling to stand in that discomfort.
Unfortunately, this mindset steals agency. You can’t adjust what you refuse to own. The pattern feels safe, but it traps him in the same cycle. Real change requires taking responsibility when it stings, not just when it flatters.
People rebuild their health every day by owning their choices. It’s not luck or circumstance that separates them — it’s the willingness to face the hard parts head-on. Until he can do that, his regain story will repeat itself — not because the world failed him, but because he refused to claim the only part he can actually change.
You’re in control
A recurring theme in this blog — indeed, the foundation of its editorial focus — is control. Nutrition is one area of your life you can manage. The same goes for fitness, discipline and self-improvement.
Surrendering control to outside forces comes at a steep cost. You can’t build consistency while insisting the downturns weren’t yours. Growth demands a level of honesty that can feel harsh. People who actually change don’t wait for the perfect conditions. They face the missteps, absorb them, adjust and move on.
He was in control when he lost that weight. His actions were deliberate, determined, disciplined.
I hope he can reassert control over his life, as he did before, instead of blaming COVID for every setback. He once commanded his path, but now he lets the pandemic steer his struggles. I’ve predicted — and watched — that as long as he does, the regain will persist.
If you’re wondering why he’s regained the weight… probably a few reasons. And while COVID may have been a contributor (hell, we all gained a few pounds), the main reason he’s regaining the weight is because he’s not doing what he did to lose it. No judgment. Obviously, it’s incredibly difficult to maintain weight loss over time. This is true for anyone. If it were easy, we wouldn’t see the popularity of GLP-1 drugs.
Moral of the story
Emotional maturity requires taking the bad with the good — the gains and the setbacks. This applies to every area of life, including health and fitness. That’s how we start fixing what’s broken.
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