Good Luck To All!
I bet I read this phrase once every other day whilst moderating visitor feedback over at Real-Customer-Comments.com. And every single time I do, I shake my head. Here’s the context…
An intrepid visitor arrives at the site to read some existing comments on one product or another. Then, s/he shares his/her own. And, after outlining the details of his/her experience with the product, s/he ends with… “good luck to all.”
Now you might be right to suggest that I need to get out more. And that “good luck to all” is a simple, good-natured “salute” to others who are reading or posting their own feedback.
Maybe.
All I can think, however, is this…
If success on your weight loss plan has anything to do with being “lucky”, then you’re not going to do very well are you? At its most basic weight loss is very, very simple; caloric expenditure must exceed caloric intake.
Luck, I’m afraid, has absolutely nothing to do with it.
Logistics, on the other hand, rule.
But I guess “good logistics to all” doesn’t sound nearly as appealing.
March 31, 2010
Good Luck To All! – http://blog.ultimatefatburner.com/2010/0…
March 31, 2010
This idea that it is all about luck or the lack of it seems to, in some (but certainly not all) cases, reflect a problematic way of rationalizing poor health in a very convenient way. If it’s all about luck, it’s not really my doing that I got here in the first place. If it’s all about luck, it’s not really completely within my control and, by troubling extension, not really within my responsibility either. I can blame the genetics,the lack of time, the childhood, or whatever I want to. But unless I ultimately see the pursuit of health as something I have reason to be actively involved in, I will inevitably fall short if the task becomes too difficult.
March 31, 2010
LOL – well, if you go strictly by the numbers, the probability of long-term weight loss success is not very high. This is why the claim “diets don’t work” is one of the standard tropes of the Fat Acceptance movement. Thus, this is where the “luck” element seemingly comes in. Dieting seems a lot like gambling, since the odds are long against the success of any individual attempt.
And I think this is a good analogy, as the existence of successful professional gamblers demonstrates your point. While there’s still some element of luck involved (how the cards are dealt, whether or not the horse you bet on pulls up lame, etc.), a skillful pro knows how to tilt the odds of success in his/her favor. It takes study, patience, and a cool head to repeatedly walk away in the black, but they manage it, time and again.
Fat loss/fitness is the same: you just can’t throw yourself into it haphazardly, and assume you’ll be successful long-term. It ultimately takes study, patience and a cool head to prevail in the “battle of the bulge” – just like it does at the track or poker table. So “good luck” makes sense, from that perspective.
April 1, 2010
I don’t think “luck” has anything to do with it. I think if you feel you have to be “lucky” to loose weight, you have a problem.
If they are saying that a certain product worked for them so with “luck” it will work for you, that’s different. If they are saying just overall good luck at loosing weight, that’s bad.
I found out many years ago that dieting is very hard work. You need a plan and you need to have the determination to follow it. I never felt that “luck” had anything to do with it.