Last night, I attended the Shift with Tory event in New York as a media guest. During the live event Good Morning America contributor Tory Johnson shared about her popular new book The Shift: How I Finally Lost Weight and Discovered a Happier Life.
The first thing that I thought when Tory took the stage was “Wow! She lost a lot of weight.” Over the course of her talk – which was vulnerable, humorous and inspiring – it was obvious that “shifting” is about so much more than weight though. My final “shift” takeaway ended up being about business, but the principles are the same! Since my friend (who attended the event with me but was too busy listening to jot down the points for herself) asked for my notes, I’m sharing Part I below.
The early years…
Tory likened being “fat forever” is like living in a prison/being in shackles. Her first food memory was of having a McDonald’s Happy Meal and coke when she was 7 – in celebration of learning that she was going to become a big sister. She was 20 pounds overweight by the time that she was in second grade. In her mind, food was connected with comfort. Since both of her parents worked outside of the home, she began cooking at a young age. Boxed carbs (Hamburger Helper, Rice a Roni and Scalloped Potatoes) were a constant part of her “menus”.
“Gaining or expecting” was Tory’s first food shame memory. Her dentist said that to her mom (three years after her mom gave birth to her little brother). There were many others. Tory was picked last on teams because she was slow and fat. She forged notes to get out of gym – starting a history of being deceitful and finding ways to hide. She recalled how a freshman college roommate described her as “quite large” in a note to her parents that Tory had read without her roommate being aware. (“Ouch!” Fortunately, they went on to become friends.)
All wasn’t doom and gloom in Tory’s life though. She was doing great career-wise and married a wonderful guy (Peter) who consistently let her know that she was more than a number on a scale. He was supportive and went along with her on the various diets that she tried (including the David Kirsch Wellness Co. http://davidkirschwellness.com/ plan that worked really well. “Too well” – Tory said. Her husband started getting compliments instead of her, so she got mad and quit the diet. (Funny!)
The blame game…
Tory admitted to blaming anyone and anything as reasons for not losing weight. She made a great point about how we can use the blame game in every area of her life. She then shared a conversation that “broke the shackles”/helped her to be free from playing the blame game…
She had been working at Good Morning America as a contributor and doing well. Tory rationalized to herself that “hard work and being articulate trumps being fat”. Meanwhile Peter had encouraged her not to worry about something (her weight) that no one was mentioning anyway. That worked well enough…until someone did mention Tory’s weight in a roundabout, kind way on December 20, 2011. Tory’s friends calls it her “Knocked Up” moment. If you look at the clip below, you will see why:
In any event, Barbara Fedida (Senior Vice President for Talent and Business at ABC News) was the woman who initiated the conversation that changed Tory’s life. She simply told Tory that her clothes didn’t do her justice and that she wanted to send her to a stylist. While that is what was said, what Tory heard/took away from that conversation was that she needed to lose weight or she would lose her job. That conversation was the point when Tory decided to finally do something about her weight. In Part II, I will share the steps that Tory Johnson took in order to make a lasting shift in her weight loss. Stay tuned…
(I will share Part II: The Four Steps in another post.)