“I had this really amazing ‘ah ha’ moment. I realized that I could either spend my life thinking ‘I wish I could lose weight’, or ‘I’m going to’, or ‘Im trying to’. One of those things was going to need to happen, but I couldn’t be a whiner anymore. I couldn’t be that person who is like, ‘I wish I could. I wish I could.'”
Those are the words from one of Hollywood’s most powerful women and undeniably owner of Thursday night TV (unless it’s football season), Shonda Rhimes. Yes, that Shonda Rhimes who is the creator, head writer, executive producer and showrunner for “Grey’s Anatomy”, “Private Practice,” and “Scandal.” In addition, Rhimes is the executive producer for the show, “How to Get Away With Murder”.
Rhimes, 50, grew up in Chicago—her father was a professor (he was the CIO at the University of Southern California); her mother earned a PhD in educational administration after raising six children. Graduating from Dartmouth (where she gave a rousing commencement address last year), Rhimes found her way to film school at USC and, eventually, to one scriptwriting success after another. Grey’s Anatomy earned her a Golden Globe for best TV drama in 2007—the same year she made Time magazine’s hot 100 list; and she recently completed a trifecta of awards from the Writers, Producers, and Directors Guilds of America.
Shonda has lost an impressive 150 pounds since she has been in the public eye.
“After I lost weight, I discovered that people found me valuable. Worthy of conversation. A person one could look at. A person one could compliment. A person one could admire. A person. You heard me. I discovered that NOW people saw me as a PERSON,” she wrote in her newsletter, Shondaland.
In order to acheive a 150-pound weight loss, obviously her diet changed and she exercised more. But Rhimes claims another factor has been the catalyst to her weight loss journey: Happiness.
“Part of it is that I got really happy. Being really happy was an extraordinarily huge part of it, and I don’t know how to explain it except that I stopped eating my feelings because