Here's Why

Variety isn't just the spice of life, its also a weight loss secret. Ben Fletcher of the University of Hertfordshire has invented a "no diet" diet that doesn't involve having to worry about exercise or what you eat. The weight stays off, and you feel happier.

The secret is to act outside of your familiar comfort zone. For the structured first month, you pick a different option from fifteen pairs of contrasting behaviours such as lively or quiet, introvert or extrovert, proactive or reactive, and then behave that way during the day. This can be a challenge for extroverts to blend in, and for introverts to stand out from the crowd. Twice a week, they also had to choose an alternative to their usual behaviour, such as listening to a different radio station, or just reading a different newspaper.

After four months, the volunteers had lost five kilograms. Six months later, they'd kept the weight down, and reported less depression and anxiety.

The method is based on Fletcher's Framework for Internal Transformation. When you are forced to change your routine, you have to think harder about all your decisions. So despite the volunteers not being given any instructions about exercise or diet, they ended up making wiser decisions in those areas, without needing the willpower required to stick to a conventional weight-loss diet and exercise regime.

It suggests that regularly changing your behaviour in minor and even random ways, makes it easier and more natural for you to change your behaviour over a longer term to be healthier and happier.

FIT Science (via wayback machine)

"FIT Science is the result of nearly 20 years of original research by Professor Ben Fletcher and his colleagues at the University of Hertfordshire, England. It's a new psychology with real implications for us all.

We use FIT Science and its body of research evidence, to underpin our work with sales teams.

The Statements:

The basic principles of FIT Science are set out in the following statements. These are just some of the ideas that lie behind FIT theory, to give you a taster.

FIT People:

* know that a small thought can change the whole world
* behave appropriately in all situations, and do so comfortably
* accept personal accountability for their world irrespective of factors outside themselves
* differentiate between right and wrong, and do what is right
* control themselves, and therefore their future
* know why things happen
* live in the present, look to the future and forget the past
* shape their world
* are powerful, not 'personalities'
* will always succeed in the long run
* learn differently -they use deeper strategies to tackle problems
* are noticeable - they are preferred in interviews
* are happier, more satisfied, and less stressed
* cope better with difficult working environments
* experience deep emotions but are still able to evaluate with detachment - they are emotionally intelligent
* do not repeat the past - they make present conditions decide
* do not live a life of repetition and habit, but one of renewal and change
* are receptive to feedback from the world and from others
* are attentive to their work and family lives
* are independent thinkers, less prejudiced and more skilled socially

UnFIT People:

* are unhappy, unhealthy or unsuccessful - the same is true of UnFIT companies
* often behave inappropriately, and cannot change their behaviours
* allow fear to dominate decisions and actions
* are unaware - they go about their lives asleep, just letting it happen to them
* live lives out of balance
* look for direction instead of for FITness
* trap themselves in the past, without even knowing it
* don't interrogate events or learn from them
* cannot help but reveal themselves

FIT Theory

* FIT is an acronym that stands for Framework for Internal Transformation
* this framework has 2 main components: Behavioural Flexibility (BFlex) and FIT Integrity
* your (Inner) FITness can be measured, and developed using FIT EXERcises
* the key to happiness, personal success and increased effectiveness is higher levels of (Inner) FITness
* your 'personality' is a constrained box of predictable behaviour keeping you on auto pilot - a no growth zone
* your 'comfort zone' of behaviour is narrow, your 'discomfort zone' too wide - this needs to be reversed
* your effectiveness in the world, at home, in relationships and in work is determined by your (Inner) FITness
* tiny differences have a huge impact on outcomes - a small increase in (Inner) FITness will effect many things

Behavioural Flexibility

* wider BFlex means appropriate behaviour all the time - not being a prisoner of 'personality' and 'habits'
* wider BFlex means operating in your current 'discomfort zone' - this is where personal growth takes place
* wider BFlex means not repeating the past, behaving as you always do because of past experiences
* wider BFlex means making decisions appropriate to the prevailing circumstances - not habitually
* wider BFlex means living and acting in the present - jettison the past, it is of no use

FIT Integrity

At the heart of FIT Theory is FIT Integrity, and what we call the five Constancies. Our extensive research has shown that these are the measures that matter in any human decision-making process.

* Awareness - the degree to which you see clearly what's going on inside, and around you
* Fearlessness - acting without fear, facing the unknown just as you face the known
* Self-Responsibility - accepting personal accountability for your world
* Balance - achieving a healthy balance between the other four Constancies, and between work and home life too
* Morals/Ethics - differentiating right from wrong, and doing what is right

Our FITness assessment measures these five Constancies.

FIT people score consistently well in all five, with similar scores for each constancy - and the balance is important. If you have a high score for Fearlessness, but a low one for Self Responsibility, say, you may act recklessly.

Through simple practices, everyone can improve their Behavioural Flexibility and their FIT Integrity. Changes in these levels improve sales performance:

For more information, you may like to read Professor Fletcher's book (Inner) FITness and The FIT Corporation (ISBN 1-86152-644-X)"

If you take a broken pair of sunglasses, or break a really cheap pair, so that only one eye sees darkened light, then your brain can perform amazing and apparently unrelated tricks. Yes, I'm going to talk about optical illusions on radio. You can try these at home.

In 1922, German physicist Carl Pulfrich observed that when a pendulum is moving in a straight line backwards and forwards in front of you;if you don't fall asleep, that when you have one eye looking through a grey lens and the other eye clear, then the pendulum looks as if its moving in a big stretched circle. The two dimensional flat line of its path looks as if its moving in a three dimensional ellipse, going away from you and then towards you as it goes from left to right, or right to left, depending on which eye is looking through the dark lens. Pulfrich happened to try this because of an eye injury that caused a cataract in his eye. The theory is that the nerve cells in the visual cortex receiving the brighter image, actually process the image faster than the neurons processing the darker image. This separation in time causes a spatial illusion, because your brain integrates the two images as if they were slightly separated in space. So you get your view master stereoscopic 3-D effect, with only one image, and no messing around with polarized lenses or red/green glasses.

Flash forward to the 1990's and people realized that fun could be had with this illusion on TV, wherever there is side to side movement, such as sporting events, parades, and action movies, and of course, video games. When the movement stops, the 3-D illusion goes away. A special Doctor Who episode called "Dimensions In Time" was produced especially to exploit the Pulfrich 3-D effect, and featured a cross-over with the soap opera "East-enders". The BBC produced several 3-D TV shows to raise money for the "Children in Need" charity in 1993, selling the Pulfrich half-sunglasses.. In America, an episode of "Third Rock from the Sun" was made in 3-D, and an episode of "Married with Children". In fact, you don't even need a show with horizontal action, if you tune in to a dead channel and look at the TV "snow" while wearing the half sunglasses, then you will see the static of random dots boiling around in a big 3-D cylinder.

Old arcade games like R-type and Nemesis give a good 3-D illusion when viewed through Pulfrich half-sunglasses.

I took my Pulfrich half-sunglasses to a twenty-four hour science fiction movie festival in Melbourne many years ago, and had fun with the movies going into three dimensions whenever there was horizontal action. Then I had the surprize of seeing a movie where it STAYED in 3-D for the whole movie, even in the scenes without camera movement or horizontal action. I realized that the movie had originally been filmed in stereo with two cameras for viewing in special cinemas with red/green stereo glasses or glasses with differently polarized lenses. The cinema I was in, was only showing the view from one camera, through one projector. With the half lenses on, somehow my brain was producing a stereographic three dimensional illusion. I passed the glasses around the group of twenty friends, and they all saw the same illusion; it wasn't just me. Since that time I've tested the effect on other movies originally filmed with two cameras, and then only shown on one projector, and it works for them. It seemed to be more effective in a theatre than for the same film shown on TV. My friend Matthew dubbed it the "Woolf-Pulfrich effect" in my honour. Since that time, I haven't found any references to any prior claims. When I asked computer scientists who research screen optical illusions at the University of Technology, Sydney about just how and why the "Woolf-Pulfrich effect" works, they just refused to believe me.

Try it yourself with Alfred Hitchcock's "Dial M for Murder" which was originally shot in 3-D but is usually screened in two-dee, and be a real scientist! But beware if your emotional point of view changes during the experiment. If you find yourself feeling anxious or depressed, then take off the half-sunglasses and change the lens to the other side, and you'll feel better.

In a bizarre twist, Harvard Psychiatrist Dr Fredric Schiffer, is using half-sunglasses, as a form of diagnosis and treatment for some types of anxiety and depression disorders. Some patients have their anxiety and depression intensified when one lens is dark, and lifted when the other view is darkened instead. It seems that one half of their brain has an optimistic view, and the other has a more dismal view. He's found that patients who respond to the half-sunglasses are good candidates for Transcranial Magnetic stimulation, a treatment that stimulates the healthy hemisphere of the brain with super-strong electro-magnets. Sixty per cent of depressed patients felt better when their right eye saw the brighter image, causing their left brain to be stimulated. It wasn't reported if they enjoyed any 3-D effect under magnetic stimulation.

Poor Man's 3D Video

Doctor Who in 3-D

nV News - 3D Imagery - 3D Glasses

The Pulfrich Illusion

The Pulfrich Effect: Discussions & Text Explanations

Pulfrich Glasses - 3-D Glasses Named After Astronomer Carl Pulfrich

Stereoscopy


Can Taped Goggles Heal Emotional Disorders?

Dual-brain psychology: therapy for both of your brains

Depression Research Supports Dual-Brain Theory