Susan Powter Stop the Insanity Review

During the 1990s Susan Powter, she of the militant manner and platinum buzz haircut, shot to fame with her aggressive "Stop the Insanity!" infomercials, multiple bestselling books, exercise videos and women-oriented talk show. Powter built a multi-million dollar fitness empire from the ground up not by creating a new and different program for weight loss - but by tapping into the psychology - the anger and desperation of the battle - and cutting through the bull peddled by the diet industry. The at-one-time seriously overweight Powter very openly expresses outrage - fed up at herself for having lost the reins of her life and becoming overweight, fed up with the sorrows and ills of being overweight, fed up with the diet industry for its myths, mixed messages and phony miracle cures. If you share similar outrage, her goal is to get you to channel it towards getting healthy like she did. Her meteoric success indicates that clearly, people connected with her. To quote Susan Powter, "I'm just a housewife who has figured it out."

Powter's nutritional guidelines are low fat, low sugar, high carbohydrates (the good, fruits and vegetables kind) in sensible portions. She advocates whole foods, organics and most importantly: daily cardio and strength-training exercise. It's that simple.

One of the things I like about Susan Powter is her assertion that "skinny" is an image and "fit" is a state of well-being. She holds that the advertising industry's definition of beauty (read: skinny) encourages women to pursue an unattainable image, putting them on a merry-go-round which is ultimately self-defeating. "The insanity" she says, "is the drinks, the starvations, the scheduled meals, all of it," while she defines physical fitness as cardio endurance, muscular strength and a healthy body fat percentage for you. Powter's popularity may have peaked over 15 years ago, but her message and her mission are timeless.