Shut Up And Choose - STOP DIETING. START CHOOSING.

Thanksgiving Didn’t F*ck You Up. Your Choices Did.

• Jonathan Ressler • Episode 230

Share episode

Send us a text

Stop Dieting. Start Choosing.


I’m Jonathan Ressler, Transformation Guide and author of Shut Up and Choose. I lost 140 pounds and built a movement the diet industry hopes you never find. No starvation. No obsession. No gym marathons. Real transformation starts when you stop outsourcing discipline and start leading yourself.

The truth is simple: weight loss isn’t about willpower—it’s about integrity. Every time you keep a promise to yourself, you rebuild confidence. Every smart choice strengthens self-trust. That’s the foundation of lasting change. My mission is to help busy, high-performing people take back control of their health, energy, and mindset—without diets, shots, or shame.

Each episode of the Shut Up and Choose Podcast cuts through the noise with real talk, proven strategies, and small, smart steps that actually last. No gimmicks. No hype. Just truth that works in real life.

Get free weekly tips at JonathanRessler.com/weekly-tips.

Click here for my Choice-Weight Analysis

Grab my book Shut Up and Choose on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram @JonathanResslerFatLoss.
Leave a review—it helps ...

Announcer:

If you're a whiny snowflake that can't handle the truth, is offended by the word fuck and about 37 uses of it in different forms, gets ass hurt when you hear someone speak the absolute real and raw truth, you should leave. Like right now. This is Shut Up and Shoes. The podcast where we cut through the shit and get real about weight loss, life, and everything in between, we get into the nitty-gritty of making small, smart choices that add up to big results. From what's on your plate and how you approach life's challenges, we'll explore how the simple act of choosing differently can transform your health, your mindset, and your entire freaking life. So, if you're ready to cut through the bullshit and start making some real changes, then buckle up and shut them up. Because we're about to choose our way to a healthier, happier life. This is Shut Up and Choose. Let's do this. Now your host, Jonathan Ressler.

Jonathan Ressler | Transformation Guide:

Hey, welcome back to Shut Up and Choose the podcast cuts in the noise. The nonsense of all the bullshit that the industry is throwing you away. You know what I'm talking about, all those Instagram gurus and internet influencers, all those idiots that don't know anything about weight loss, have never lost any real weight on their own. They're all selling you a bunch of shit. Bottom line is they're selling you shit. They're just trying to sell, sell, sell all you are as a customer. But we know that. We all know that. We've been we've talked about this quite a bit. So now, today, what I want to talk about is Thanksgiving, because it's right around the corner. And I want to try to demystify or debunk, actually, is the right word. I want to try to debunk the myth that Thanksgiving is a minefield. So let me just say this. Thanksgiving is not out to ambush you. Let's get that straight from the start. The turkey is not your enemy. The stuffing is not forming a militia. The pies are not sitting on the counter whispering, let's take them down. None of that stuff's happening. The only thing in your house on Thanksgiving with any actual power is you. And if that scares you more than the calorie count, good. It means you're finally paying attention. I mean, people act like the holiday is some unstoppable force that sweeps in and drags them into a food coma against their will. Come on, oh please. Thanksgiving isn't chasing you. It isn't holding you in a headlock. It isn't forcing you to shovel food into your face like you're on a game show. You're the one lifting the fork. You're the one choosing what and how much goes on the plate. You run the show, you always have. You just pretend you don't because pretending lets you avoid the responsibility of your own choices. You love to externalize things. The holiday's too tempting, the food is too good, the family is too stressful, the table's too big, the spread is too generous. Funny how everything gets blamed, except the one thing actually making the choices, you. It's easier to convince yourself Thanksgiving is the villain than to admit that you might be the one starting the chaos. But pretending the holiday is a threat doesn't change the truth. You're the one calling the plays. So let me talk directly to you for a second. You keep handing over your power to the day like it's some all-powerful event that you have no control over. You walk in telling yourself, if it's Thanksgiving, so as if those four words magically erase all logic. They don't. They never did. And all they do is give you an excuse to unplug your brain and blame the aftermath on something outside yourself. You know better. You just don't act like it. You run the day, not the food, not the family, not the kitchen chaos. You set the pace, you choose what goes on your plate, you choose whether you inhale everything like you'll never see food again, or actually act like a functioning adult. You choose how you want to feel after the meal. You choose the story you tell yourself before it even starts. Your choices control the outcome, not the menu. The holiday is neutral. You, on the other hand, you're not. And that's the best news you could ever hear. Because if Thanksgiving isn't the problem, then it means you're not powerless. You're not doomed, you're not one bite away from disaster, and you have full control. The question is whether you use it or keep pretending you don't. So let's drop the bullshit, let's cut the excuses, let's start with them. The truth. Thanksgiving isn't attacking you, you're attacking your own progress. And the second you own that, everything changes. That's the tone for this episode. Confident, clear, honest, and ready to push you forward. Now let's get into the part where you stop dieting and start choosing. So the real trap of Thanksgiving starts long before the turkey hits the table. It begins the second you flip into what you call holiday mode. You know exactly what I'm talking about. You wake up and decide that none of your habits count today. You convince yourself that the rules of normal life are temporarily suspended. You tell yourself it's a special occasion. That simple line gives you permission to behave like someone who's never made a healthy choice in their life. It's the psychological version of leaving your car on the highway and letting it roll. You start the day with what you think is a smart move. You skip breakfast, then you skip lunch, and you tell yourself you're being strategic. You tell yourself you're creating space for the big meal. You tell yourself you're saving calories. You are not being strategic. You're walking into a fire with gasoline. Every time you skip a meal, you hand your hunger control over to the rest of your day. You walk into dinner with your body begging for calories and your brain unable to make a rational choice. You set yourself up to fail and act shocked when you do. Then the big moment comes. The table is full, the smells are strong. You've been fantasizing about this meal since the morning. You sit down and pile food onto your plate with no thought behind it. Not because you want it, not because it tastes good. You pile the food on because everyone else is doing it. You pile the food on because it looks festive. You pile the food on because you think you should. You do it without intention. The worst part is that half of what you take is food you don't even enjoy. You take it because it's tradition. You take it because your family always makes it. You take it because it feels rude not to. None of those reasons are choices, they're reactions. Then there's the true beast of the holiday. Stress, noise, family chaos. You could run a full psychological experiment based on what happens at the average household on Thanksgiving. People drink too fast and too much, they talk too loud, they eat to cope, they eat to fill awkward silence, they eat to avoid the relative who still insists you should take the Tupperware home. The food becomes a shield, a distraction, a way to escape the pressure in the room. You think the food is the problem. The real reason is that you let the room run your emotions. And once your emotions run you, your choices evaporate. Then you take it one step further. You blame the day. You woke up on a Friday feeling bloated and angry, and immediately point to the holidays the reason. You act like Thanksgiving forced itself upon you. You talk about the day like it has some kind of agency. You shrug and say things like, it's the holiday season to excuse what actually happened. You hand all the power over to the calendar. You avoid the part where your choices drove every single moment. Holiday weight does not come from Thanksgiving dinner. The idea, well, that's just a comforting lie. It comes from unchecked choices before the meal. It comes from chaotic choices during the meal, and it comes from the spiral you trigger after the meal because you feel guilty about what you did. The weight gain comes from the way you think. It comes from the way you behave, and it comes from the second you decide to abandon intention. Stop dining and start choosing exists for days like this. Choosing cuts through the nonsense and it removes the drama and it forces you to stay awake instead of letting the day hypnotize you. You choose whether your habits count, and you choose whether you walk in starving. You choose whether you take food you don't even want. You choose whether you let stress run your fork or take a breath and slow down. You choose whether the day becomes a disaster or a moment of sanity. The trap is not the holiday. The trap is the story you tell yourself about the holiday. You keep repeating that story because it protects you from owning your behavior. But ownership is the only way out. Choice is the only real power you have at the table. Every moment of the day gives you another chance to choose how you want to show up. And when you choose with intention, the holiday completely loses its grip. The chaos quiets down, and the day becomes what it was always meant to be: a meal, a celebration, a moment, not a crisis, not a threat, and not an excuse. Thanksgiving is not the trap. Your unchecked choices are, and the minute you start choosing on purpose, the trap disappears. Dieting collapses this week because dieting is built for a world that doesn't exist. It assumes your schedule is clean, your emotions are quiet, and your environment is totally cooperative. None of that happens during Thanksgiving week. Life is loud, people are a mess, food is everywhere, stress shows up and sits at the table like an uninvited guest. Diets are not built for reality, they're built for fantasy. That's why they fail the moment the holiday season hits. Diets rely on rigid rules. Eat this, avoid that, follow these numbers, stay inside the lines. Those rules work when nothing is happening in your life. They collapse when the room gets loud. Thanksgiving destroys the illusion of control that dieting gives you. You walk into a home filled with childhood favorites, emotional triggers, and memories that still hit you. You can't fight that with a rule on a piece of paper. You can't overcome that with a list someone created in some office somewhere. Diet rules fail because they never belonged in a holiday setting in the first place. Then there's the good news versus bad news thinking. Diets train you to split food into teams. Vegetables are good, stuffing is bad, mashed potatoes are bad, pie is bad. If you think that you're nuts. But anyway, you convince yourself that certain foods define your moral worth. You take one bite of something on your bad list and instantly announce the day is ruined. The day is ruined, the rest of the week follows. One cookie becomes a free pass to binge. One slice of pie turns into leftovers for breakfast. Diet thinking is dramatic. It pushes you into extremes. You fall into that pattern because the rules tell you there's only success or failure, no middle ground, no flexibility, no forgiveness. Dieting teaches you to collapse when things aren't perfect. Thanksgiving just makes that collapse even faster. You sit at the table surrounded by emotional landmines, a comment from a relative, maybe hits an old wound, a tradition that can bring up something unresolved, a moment of stress that triggers a reaction you don't even expect. Diet expects you to rise above emotion as if you're a machine. Here's a little bit of news: you're not. You're a person with history, a family, and a set of emotional patterns that don't vanish because you decide to count calories for a few weeks. When emotion rises, willpower drops. That's not weakness, that's just biology. Dieting ignores that and then shames you when you behave like a human being. Thanksgiving week, full of emotion. That's the part that you keep forgetting. You're not walking into a controlled environment. You're walking into a room filled with family dynamics, expectations, responsibilities, memories, stress, pressure, and food with emotional meaning. Dieting tries to pretend that none of that matters. It expects you to sit there with a monk-like discipline while everything around you pushes your button. This is why dieting fails. It demands resistance instead of choice. It demands perfection instead of presence instead of being present. Dieting tells you to fight through temptation. Fighting is fucking tiring. Fighting drains you. Fighting never worked for long. That resistance crumbles when the stress rises and it collapses when the room shifts. Resistance is a losing strategy because it depends on force, not intention. Dieting tells you to grit your teeth through the entire day. You try, you fail, then you blame yourself instead of the plan that never stood a chance in the first place. The real problem is not that you lack discipline. The real problem is that dieting trained you to outsource your power. You hand your control to rules, charts, restrictions, and all kinds of other bullshit. You tell yourself that you'll be fine as long as you follow the plan. But the second the plan breaks, and it will break, you break right along with it. Dieting never taught you how to choose, it taught you how to obey. Obedience works until something interferes. Thanksgiving interferes loudly. Stop dieting and start choosing works because it does the exact opposite. Choosing sits inside of real life and it accounts for emotion and it understands that the room will shift. Choosing knows people can trigger you. Choosing gives you the structure without rigidity. Choosing gives you control without punishment, and it teaches you to take the next step even when the last step wasn't perfect. Dieting fails because it relies on resistance. Choosing succeeds because it relies on awareness. Dieting collapses when life gets loud. Choosing gets stronger. Dieting expects you to shut down your humanity. Choosing expects you to use it. And dieting sets you up for guilt, and choosing keeps you in the game. Thanksgiving exposes the cracks in every diet because the holiday doesn't give a shit about your rules. But it rewards the person who knows how to choose, the person who stays present, the person who understands that emotion is part of the day. The person who can own every moment instead of inviting it. That's why dieting fails during the holidays. And it's why choosing wins every time. Choosing works because it fits the world you actually live in. Not the imaginary one where your schedule never changes, nobody pisses you off, and every meal is perfectly curated moment with zero pressure. Real life is unpredictable. It throws shit at you. It throws stress at you, it throws emotional patterns at you, you thought you outgrew. Choosing, on the other hand, gives you a way to stay in control inside of all that. Instead of waiting for life to quiet down. Here's the reality: life never quiet down. You already know what happens when you try to force yourself through a holiday with rules. The room shifts. Someone says something that sends you right back to being 12 years old. A dish you didn't expect hits the table. Oh, that happened to me all the time. I'm not going to eat, and then boom, that did. Your emotions take over. And the structure you're holding on to falls apart. Choosing is not structure like that. Choosing is present. It's about being present, thinking before you put anything in your mouth. It keeps you aware of what you're doing instead of shutting down and going into autopilot. When you choose, you walk into the day with clarity instead of tension. You think about how you want to feel after the meal instead of obsessing over how perfect you need to be during the meal. That alone changes everything. People get stuck because they never ask themselves that question. They think the point of Thanksgiving is to eat everything in sight or avoid everything in sight. Choosing gives you that middle ground that feels sane, for lack of a better word. You eat what matters to you, you leave what doesn't. You stay connected to what you want later instead of what's in front of you right now. Choosing also gives you something nobody ever talks about relief. You stop performing and pretending that the holiday forces your hand. You stop making every bite an event. You have to pay attention without obsessing. You enjoy the food without losing the plot. Guilt no longer drives you. And once guilt is gone, the spiral dies with it. Most people don't overeat because they're hungry. They overeat because they feel bad about the first choice they made. Choosing kills that story. You own the moment and then you move to the next moment with a clear head. The power of choosing is that it keeps you engaged. You're not checked out, you're not panicking, you're not waiting for the damage to hit. You're in the moment, steering the moment. That's the difference between feeling out of control and feeling calm. You're not trying to wrestle the holiday into behaving. You're simply responding to what is happening with intention. You make one choice and then another and then another. Each one keeps you stable. None of them, none of them demand perfection. And the choosing works because it adapts, it bends, it shifts with you, it holds up whether the day is peaceful or fucking nuts. It lets you enjoy what matters without turning the table into a crisis. And it puts you back in charge of your behavior instead of your behavior running wild behind your back. So you don't need a perfect plan. You need awareness and presence. You need ownership. When you choose, you get all of that. And once you have that, you walk through the day with control you didn't know you had. That's why choosing works. It fits your life, it holds up when everything else cracks. So that was a lot of talk, but now I want to give you a few things that will help you keep control on Thanksgiving. Not hypothetical moves, not Pinterest wellness, bullshit. Actual, real, simple actions that work because they keep you choosing instead of just falling into autopilot. So let's start with breakfast. The real one. Not coffee, not a bar you found at the back of a drawer, an actual meal, protein, something grounding. When you skip breakfast, you're not being strategic. You're creating the perfect conditions for a binge. Your body is not impressed by you saving calories. It responds by making you ravenous. And ravenous people do not make thoughtful choices. They grab whatever's closest and eat like someone's timing them. Eating breakfast keeps your brain ready. So you walk into the meal as a human being, not a tornado. Next thing is pick the foods you actually want. I know that sounds obvious, but most people never do it. I never did it. They load their plate with items they don't even like. And they do it out of obligation or because their family expects them to. They do it because it's a tradition. None of those reasons are choices. They're habits you inherited and kept without ever questioning them. You don't need to eat everything that appears on the table. You get to choose what matters to you. That one shift alone cuts out half of the overeating without you even trying. Then, of course, there's the portion problem. Stop letting the size of the plate dictate your behavior. The plate is not your coach. When you serve yourself based on how much space is available, you're not choosing, you're complying. Choose the portion size before you scoop something out. Think about how you want to feel after the meal, not how impressive your plate looks in the moment. When you serve yourself with intention, you leave the table feeling calm instead of defeated. Next thing, drink water. Not to fill up, not as a hack. Drink because your mind works better when your body is hydrated. Dehydration makes every craving louder. It convinces you that you want more food when you actually just need water. A few glasses throughout the day, keep your decisions of crystal clear. Clear decisions are easier to choose. Walk after the meal. Not as a punishment and not as a workout. Walk because the movement resets your system. It helps your digestion, it clears your mind. It breaks the inertia of sitting around the table convincing yourself you ruined the day. A walk signals to your body that the meal is over and the rest of the day is yours. And then we get to the move that holds everything together. Own every decision. If you had more than you planned, own it. If you chose exactly what you wanted, own that too. If you had a dessert, fucking own it. The spiral only begins when you pretend you weren't in control. Ownership kills that story. The moment you acknowledge that you made the choice, the shame disappears. And once the shame disappears, the data no longer runs away from you. Everything comes back to choosing, not reacting, not coping, not checking out. The moves, the things that I just told you work because they keep you present. They keep you connected to yourself instead of to the chaos that's going on all around you. They let Thanksgiving be a meal instead of a meltdown. So you're not trying to be perfect. You're trying to stay awake. You're trying to choose your day instead of letting the day choose you. When you follow those simple things that I just told you, control becomes simple. Calm becomes natural, and the holiday becomes something you enjoy instead of something you survive. Here's the next piece. The holiday season doesn't begin in December. It begins the moment you sit down at that Thanksgiving table. That's your kickoff. That's the moment shapes the next six weeks. People pretend that Thanksgiving is an isolated event, but we all know it isn't. It's a domino that tips the rest of the season. If you walk into that day choosing with intention, December becomes manageable. If you walk in hoping for the best, the season just chews you up. Thanksgiving sets the tone for everything that follows. You know exactly how this plays out because you've lived it. When you start the season drifting and reacting, you spend the next six weeks in a fog of overeating, guilt, I'll start Monday, and the desperate resets that never stick. When you start the season choosing your behavior instead of excusing it, the next six weeks feel completely different. You stay grounded, you stay consistent, and most importantly, you stay in charge. If you choose well now, you keep your power. That one day builds momentum. You walk into December with clarity instead of panic. You don't feel like you need to make up for anything. You don't wake up regretting last night's chaos. You don't let one meal become the justification for a weeks long binge. You move through the season with intention because you started with intention. You chose the day instead of letting the day choose you. If you fall into that diet thinking, that restriction, that oh, that all or nothing, the season totally steamrolls you. Diet thinking has one speed, all or nothing. Perfect or destroyed. You slip once, and suddenly the entire month becomes a free-for-all. You convince yourself that you'll fix everything in January. Wow, how many times have you said that? You wait for the perfect day. Start fresh. That day never shows up. December is fucking loud. December is messy. It's got events and parties and travel and family and exhaustion and food everywhere you go. Waiting for calm conditions in December is like waiting for silence at a rock concert. It's just, it's not happening. Choosing handles all of it. Choosing meets the chaos and works inside of it. At parties, when you're stressed, travel, anything that triggers you, long nights, loud roots, emotional landmines. Choosing doesn't need perfect conditions. Choosing can adjust. Choosing keeps you connected to what you want instead of letting the environment run your behavior. Choosing gives you the ability to enjoy the season without losing yourself in the season. You feel normal and steady. You feel like you're in control because you never give that control away. Dieting can't do that. Dieting collapses under holiday pressure. Dieting demands perfection during the least perfect time of the year. Dieting asks you to resist everything, and resisting is the last thing your brain can do. Dieting leaves you waiting for a moment where everything aligns and you finally start again. That moment, it it never comes. Choosing removes that fantasy. Choosing gives you action right now, not later, not after the event, not after the slip, right now. Choosing is the only approach that survives the summer because it fits real life. It meets you where you are, it meets the stress, it meets the emotion, it meets the schedule, it holds up no matter what hits your day. It gives you structure without that rigidity. It gives you freedom without chaos, and it gives you calm without restriction. This is where the season begins. And how you choose here determines everything that comes next. If you made it this far in the episode, let's wrap it up the right way. You're one decision away from control. Not one diet plan, not one reset, not one Monday, one decision. The next one you make. That's the part that most people ignore because it puts the responsibility squarely back where it belongs. On them. Not the holiday. Not the food, not the chaos. On them. And now on you. Choosing is the only thing that works because it fits your actual life. It works when the room is loud. It works when the schedule is packed. It works when the stress hits you in the middle of the meal. You choose your behavior instead of hoping your willpower magically shows up and carries you. Willpower never carries anyone, but choice does. You choose how the day goes, you choose how the night ends, and you choose what to do next. Dieting never taught you that. It's only taught you how to restrict and how to judge yourself and how to fall apart the second things get real. So if you want more guidance every week without the noise, get my free weekly tips at jonathanressler.com. It's just one clear action with no fluff, no drama, no bullshit. Something you can use in your actual life, not the imaginary version where everything stays perfect. These tips keep you focused and consistent, and they keep you choosing even when things get a little bit hectic. And if you want the complete playbook, read my book, Shut Up and Choose. It's the straightest line you'll ever find between where you are now and where you want to be. It's how I lost 140 pounds without starving, without gimmicks, and without pretending life had to be perfect. I didn't take a supplement, I didn't take a shot, I just made choices. It shows you how to think, how to act, and how to choose. Basically, how to build control that actually sticks. And if you're really serious about changing your life right now or maybe after Thanksgiving weekend, reach out. If you're done circling the same frustrations and ready to transform for real, I can guide you through it. Not with gimmicks and not with pep talks, with the same approach that rebuilt my entire life. If you want to step into the version of yourself, you keep pretending you're waiting for the right time to become, then let's get started. So carry everything from this episode into this holiday season because you're not powerless, you're not trapped, you're not at the mercy of a holiday plate of food. Every moment gives you another chance to choose the direction you want. You can stay in control if you stay awake. You can stay on track if you stay honest, and you can feel proud of yourself instead of defeated if you choose your way through the day instead of pretending the day invented your problems. Now, enjoy the holiday season. Stop making excuses. It's time to shut up and choose.

Announcer:

You've been listening to Shut Up and Choose. Jonathan's passion is to share his journey of shedding 130 pounds in less than a year without any of the usual gimmicks, no diets, no pills, and we'll let you in on a little secret. No fucking gym. And guess what? You can do it too! We hope you enjoyed the show. We had a fucking blast. If you did, make sure to like, rate, and review. We'll be back soon, but in the meantime, find Jonathan on Instagram at JonathanWrestlerBocaraton. Until next time, shut up and choose.

Head Shot

Jonathan Ressler

Host