Psychological support
Sophie Reverdi
Coaching Program Coordinator of Smart and Light
COACHING, THE SUPPORT THROUGH TRANSFORMATION
Coaching is a supportive process that allows you to commit yourself for a long time to the path of change and helps you become aware of your own strengths, your values and your wealth.
It is designed to allow you to use the potential buried in you to progress towards a better moral, psychological and physical well-being. As coaches, our role is to convince you that your problems are circumstantial and that you can solve them.
A clarification requires to be made here: you live a problem but you are not the problem. This distinction is crucial. It is up to you, and only you, to overcome this problem in order to free your resources and your full potential. We cannot, as coaches, make you get rid of your overweight with a simple magic wand. We are not magicians. Our approach falls within the scope of a sustainable process which will certainly contribute in the reduction of your weight, but especially in helping you reclaim your body and your mind in a more global way. Our task is to guide you towards your own blossoming.
We will show you step by step how you can retrieve the infinite resources and the unsuspected strengths you possess and which you have not previously used in order to overcome the limiting behaviours you have adopted unconsciously in a mechanical way. You will then be able to put an end to negative attitudes that you have so far held against your own person and vis-à-vis an environment which at times tends to succumb to intolerance and disrespect of difference. Our objective is to support you - once you feel like it and you want it- to change the behaviours that you consider responsible for your overweight and the difficulties that you experience in general to solve your problems.
Likewise, we also aim to help you to identify precisely the behaviours that cause these blockages, even those that prevent you from being what you want to be, and at the same time, to give you as much as possible the choice to adopt new behaviours which may permanently anchor within you attitudes that might help you start again with invigorated strength and energy. You will manage to assume yourself for the rest of your life with the full power of your regained freedom.
We also aim to help you change some of your beliefs both about yourself and your environment – beliefs that had a negative impact physically and morally; beliefs that you do not endorse anymore but are unable to get rid of. By changing some of these beliefs, you can reconnect with values such as courage,rage to be victorious and to live, and to face yourself and, above all, be proud of what you are.
We will work with you to help you accept yourself as you are, physically and morally – which is a crucial step in the real change which you aspire to achieve - and to develop a sense of self-esteem and self-confidence.
Our work will complement what the other players of the Smart & Light team have already done and all what they made you have in terms of the physical and emotional well-being, the release of frustrations, but also the nutritional freedom without restriction. The studied intervention of the team members, each in his specialty, has been designed in a systemic context in which the contribution of all members is not the simple sum of individual contributions, but more than this, it is synonymous with success of the path of change, an eagerly awaited release of a disease difficult to live with and to accept.
Feel Capable of support
There are moments in life where you feel invested in a particular force and mission that we feel able to complete successfully. Apart from the people I helped to lose weight, I have often been able to lend a helping hand to people who were going through extremely difficult times.
Since my childhood, I have always felt deep sorrow for the human suffering and injustices.
I have always been overwhelmed by the suffering of the children and the elderly or very sick people. Despite by lack of patience, I could spend hours holding their hands, talking to them, and trying to restore their courage; and I never felt relieved, but rather richer.
I also had the opportunity to go to Africa twice to help a friend who worked for charitable missions, and I realized that the human suffering knew no boundaries, and that each outstretched hand came to me with great love. After this experience, I became aware of my ability to empower the others, to help them whatever are their circumstances, to guide them, to accompany them towards a better place. I realized that I had that strength in me, and that I have to take advantage of it.
There are times when we take, and others when we give. I also think that we are all able to give time and love to people around us, but perhaps, like for many other things, we underestimate ourselves.
Sophie REVERDI
Personal development
The support Sophie Reverdi has given me, this priceless gift she offered in helping me to lose weight is what I wish I could offer in my turn today.
I pledge to provide you the best of myself with all my energy, and would constantly help you find solutions tailored to your personality. It seems to me that I have to provide you with as many suggestions as possible to guide you to "your" personal development.
There are so many ways, but there are also so many different personalities; we are not the same obese people, and we cannot see things the same way. Some of you will be more responsive to words and ideas, while others will resume contact with their bodies through the senses.
Some may find it easier to visualize themselves thin, and others will have more trouble believing in their strength. But ultimately, you will all manage to change. I want to focus on all these options we can offer you in our centres, or those you can do every day at home. These are methods that seem appropriate for this research, specifically in the rediscovery of the self.
Your Responsability
I think I can bring you, thanks to my past experiences and my research in this area, a key method and an essential one to the success of your weight loss.
The method is presented in the logbook, but you must first set your goals. I will explain it to you, but it is imperative that you get down to it.
This is the first step and the crucial one. My aim is to give you responsibilities throughout this process. Only when you feel invested in this mission of transformation that you will excel at it. My method is a shortcut "for all your years of misery." You must not hide anymore. It is not our pounds in excess that are responsible for everything; it is our responsibility for not knowing how to eat, for not loving ourselves enough, for not allowing ourselves to have a healthy and balanced life. It's us who are responsible for this earthly vehicle that we were entrusted with, a vehicle which requires proper maintenance, and much respect in order to work harmoniously. We are responsible for our health and we are responsible for our happiness ...
Awareness & taking actions
Theoretically speaking, there is in everyone of us a point of no return, a limit, connected to our survival instinct. There is one moment where we say: stop it, it is finished, I have hit the bottom, I'm exhausted; and even if at this time we do not know exactly how we will do it, we know at least what we will no longer do, what we will never accept again: not to accept the compromises anymore, but only opt for choices that are proven and agreed upon. This is the point of no return. Sometimes, depending on the situation, and how critical or dramatic it is, our brain will respond very quickly to save us for example from a sudden threat, a car, or fire. In such situations, there may be a time limit of several seconds between awareness and taking action.
But for some situations where the problem is more latent, or considered as more relative, the reaction of our brain is longer.
Just like when we rush suddenly towards the side of a road in order to avoid a car that was about to kill us, we should do the same thing with our addictions and all kinds of harmful behaviour. Yet, as a matter of fact, even if we know the dangers of these poisons or harmful behaviours, our brain does not automatically react to take immediate action.
This is the reason why we should send it the right messages, and this is why we must know what the good messages are. As for the desire to change, once we really know what we want, one single minute is necessary to bring about change. We can change everything in one minute. If we can save our life in a minute, then we can decide to change it in one minute.
The new program / the new operation
When we take a real decision, when we make a pact with ourselves, when we know what we don’t want anymore, and what we really want, then we gain power.
In the harmony of this decision, this irresolute desire to change, to overcome our limitations, or at least those that we had attributed to ourselves, a radiant energy will flow and nothing can stop us. So you discover that this explosive power is in you, there at your fingertips, and you probably had no idea to have such power.
Then, everything will be set up naturally because you realize that it is up to you to take over; that it has nothing to do with magic or miracles, and that it’s all about your potential to change. You will also understand that you have regained control of your life and your destiny. Passion, Assurance, determination, tolerance, self-satisfaction, gaiety, and vitality will be your new companions.
The healing
When we finish our journey through the desert, at the moment of healing, it is only then that we begin to know exactly what we managed to do to change the intrinsic course of our lives and the scope of this change.
It is then that we realize that, if we knew how to take such a decision, then take action, and continue in this path to obtain the profits, this simply means that we are the remedies of our own ills, that we are the guardians of our lives, that we can heal ourselves, transform ourselves into better beings, and that if we won on this battlefield, we will win many more victories. And this is also the moment that we begin to know what we can do for others in a concrete way.
It is because we keep saying to ourselves: but if I did it, if I managed to do it, if it was not so difficult, if it was not so insurmountable, if it worked, if I am alive, if this is indeed the reality, and if I'm still the same person, but cured, and freed, what can I do and what shall I do with this experience, with this journey? If I found the antidote, don’t I have to tell the whole world about it? Am I able not to share it?