Reb Shira Smiles on Parshat Lech Lecha says that the greatness of Avraham was not the actions that he took, but the love and dedication that he had for Hashem when he did them. Through the years many people unfortunately sacrificed even more then Avraham did in the Akedah. The thing that made him so great was the way that he did it out of love for Hashem.
This points out that our motivation in doing an act is greater then the act itself. When we follow the program, losing weight is a nice thing but our focus and benefit should be on abstinence and serving Hashem by taking care of ourselves.
The way to fool the yetzer Harah is to let him think that you are trying to reach a goal that is physical when your real goal is spiritual.
We can begin the program saying that we want to loose weight, but our higher motivation should be to serve Hashem by being healthy.
Avraham's essence was chesed. The greatest chesed that a person can do is to give something that the person does not have. The greatest chesed we can do is to give to Hashem. What is the thing that we can give to Hashem? To improve ourselves. If Hashem would improve us without our effort, then we would be robots not people. Therefore, working to be Misaken our own tikun is a tremendous gift that we can give to Hashem.
How do we improve ourselves, by making a concrete specific plan and sticking to it. By breaking out of our old habits and growing. When we do this, we will find that Lech Lecha means go out of our old selves, L'tovatcha, for your own good, L'atzmacha for yourself and for Hashem.
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