7 Best Healthy Weight Loss Books

I’m spending some time sorting through my archives trying to clean up posts in need of a facelift.

As soon as I saw this post for 7 Best Healthy Weight Loss Books, I felt compelled to share it again for those of you who may have missed it or forgotten about it.

I’ve read dozens and dozens of diet and weight loss books through the decades. Most are long forgotten. A waste of time and money for a variety of reasons:  Too extreme. Too complicated. Unrealistic. Unsustainable.

If you could achieve lasting weight loss just by reading a book, I would have achieved happy, healthy and slim status back in my 20s. While books are great resources, reading isn’t enough. You eventually have to actually TAKE ACTION.

I consider these seven  the best healthy weight loss books because they all helped me get to where I am today. Within their pages were nuggets of wisdom that motivated me to TAKE ACTION. They helped me change the way I looked at something. Got me to try a new approach. Or develop new skills and habits.

And from these actions, my relationships with food and with myself were transformed.

Goodness knows, I’m far from perfect and still a work in progress. That’s why these books remain on my shelves. When I’m feeling stuck or struggling I’ll pick one of them up for a shot of motivation.
 

Seven Best Healthy Weight Loss Books

These best healthy weight loss books are listed in no particular order. I was going to rank them, but decided it would be like trying to rank my friends. Something I’m not willing or able to do 🙂

1. How to Have Your Cake and Your Skinny Jeans Too: Stop Binge Eating, Overeating and Dieting For Good Get the Naturally Thin Body You Crave From the Inside Out (Binge Eating Solution)

This is the most recent addition to my list of best healthy weight loss books. I somehow discovered Josie Spinardi’s website, which led me to a one-click purchase of her ebook on Amazon. Read a few of the more than 70 5-star reviews and I bet you buy it too.

I read Have Your Cake and Skinny Jeans Too during my last 10+ hour plane trip and couldn’t put it down. It’s smart and funny, and clearly written by a woman who totally “gets it.”

As a researcher, who suffered with emotional and binge eating, Josie’s book provides lots of scientific research for why diets don’t work as well as strategies for putting her hunger-directed approach into practice.

7 Intuitive Eating Guidelines

2. Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think

The reason this book is one of my best healthy weight loss books is simple. It helped me finally lose weight in a way that feels easy and effortless. It helped me see that I wasn’t broken, my environment was.

And showed me how to re-engineer my environment so that I can eat what I want without guilt and without gaining weight!

I love this book. It’s funny. It’s geeky. Some of the suggestions are so simple you won’t believe they could work. But they do. Read my Full Review of Mindless Eating

3. The Slow Down Diet: Eating for Pleasure, Energy, and Weight Loss

This great book explores the mind-body link to the weight loss conundrum. It’s written by Marc David, Director of The Institute for the Psychology of Eating. If you believe, as I do, that stress is a major factor in our weight loss struggles, this book is for you.

He convincingly shows that how we eat is as important as what we eat. And explores the power of relaxation, food quality, awareness, rhythm, pleasure, thought, story, and the sacred to our overall health.

Read my full review of The Slow Down Diet

4. Naturally Thin: Unleash Your SkinnyGirl and Free Yourself from a Lifetime of Dieting

This was a book I never expected to like, let alone list as one of my best healthy weight loss books. But I picked it up in a bookstore a couple of years ago and was immediately hooked by her honesty and down-to-earth style.

After years of yo-yo dieting, Bethenny was able to find balance by changing her habits and learning how to think like a “naturally thin person.” Her ten rules are practical and helpful. I’ve made most of them my own.

Read my My full review of Naturally Thin

5. The Seven Secrets of Slim People

This is an oldie but goodie that was written back in 1997, and recommended by Wayne Dyer. I discovered it earlier this year and find myself referring back to its suggestions often. Which is why it is on my list of best healthy weight loss books.

The simple sane plan is presented in a fun, easy to read style of sound bites and bulleted notes. I especially appreciated the section on learning to listen to your body, not your mind, for guidance on what and how much to eat.

You can be slim without dieting and this book provides the road map. Do the exercises for as long as it takes to make the “7 secrets” second nature and you too will never struggle with food or dieting again.

10 Secrets of the Naturally Slim

6. 10 Habits That Mess Up a Woman’s Diet: Simple Strategies to Eat Right, Lose Weight, and Reclaim Your Health

When I picked up this book and began reading, I couldn’t put it down. I was impressed and maybe more than a little ashamed at how much I resonated with her message.

In the preface she says to “think of the book as your best friend who honestly tells you like it is. You can lose weight and regain your health and energy. You can wow the crowd once you get honest with yourself about a few little habits.” (Ah, the power of getting real and honest.)

She claims to know these habits intimately, from both her own personal experience, as well as from her more than 25 years helping her female clients recognize and address them.

Read my My Full Review of 10 Habits That Mess Up A Woman’s Diet

7. French Women Don’t Get Fat

The last of my seven best healthy weight loss books has become my personal manifesto. I love its philosophy of making little alterations to your eating habits steadily over time instead of subjecting yourself to tasteless “diet” food and unsustainable extremism.

Thanks to French Women Don’t Get Fat, I’ve given up most “diet-foods” in favor of the real thing in moderation, stopped snacking so much, watch a lot less television, take the stairs whenever I can, drink a ton of water and am allowing myself to take more pleasure in my food.

I’m constantly amazed by how committing to little changes over time has worked like magic to help me stay happy, healthy and slim.

45 Reasons French Women Don’t Get Fat

So there you have them. The seven best healthy weight loss books.

What do you think is the best healthy weight loss book? I’d love to hear! Let me know in the comments below.