Dieting is a Dub.
Diets, shmiets… You tried it. Maybe you weren’t consistent. Maybe you were and you just didn’t see the changes. In the end, it didn’t work. Why? Diets do not work because they don’t teach you how to listen to your body. Even the best diets don’t work. Over 65% of people who go on diets gain the weight back within a year later. They are good for the temporary win only. So yes, you may lose the weight at first but it will come back. They go against intuitively connecting with your body and learning what works best for you. The key to sustainable healthy weight-loss is changing your lifestyle habits.
When you try to lose weight you’re fighting with your cravings, your taste buds, and essentially your own body. Stop fighting your cravings and learn how to listen to them. Understand them and get to the bottom of what it is that you’re really craving. I wrote all about understanding cravings and what they really mean here. Depriving yourself of food causes certain hormones to chime in to make sure that you eat. These very same hormones make sure your food taste better. This makes eating even harder to ignore. That is why we shouldn’t be restricting, neglecting or ignoring foods. Instead we must surround ourselves around better, healthier foods. We are still eating. Just eating the good shit.
Now dieting has such a negative connotation of having to get rid of things or creating limits. The idea alone of a diet leaves a bad taste in your mouth. It leads you to feel unsatisfied with their meals. Or as if your meals lack taste or flavor. And feeling like this sucks the pleasure right out of eating. Eating is fun. It is beautiful. It is how we share love. It is how we connect with others. There is so much power in eating. There is so much power in listening to your body.
Solutions. It’s about the lifestyle changes:
Add so much more good shit you won’t even have room in your fridge, cabinets or stomach for the bad shit. That’s for starters. Create a shopping list with a ton of green vegetables, colored vegetables, more vegetables, and then a little bit more veggies. And fruits of course. Foods that are not only healthy but also your favorites that work for you and your lifestyle.
Mindfulness: Focus on foods that make you feel good before and after you eat them. Before you eat it just think: Will this give me more energy or take away energy? When you’re done eating think: Do I feel full and satisfied? Physically? Mentally? Spiritually? Do I feel guilty? Do I feel good about myself? The more connected you are with what your body needs the more you can make better choices that feel good in the moment AND in the long-run.
Cook more. Less eating out. Have more control over your meals and this builds an even stronger mind-body connection between your food and your body.
Be more intentional with what you consume throughout the day. Shit like TV, social media, the news, books, music, and even conversations. This is all a part of your diet. Make sure your external environment in conducive towards your health journey.
Positive movement. Finding an exercise that works for your inner child. Finding a workout that makes you happy will help you stay more committed and consistent. ((The more you move the more you want to eat cleaner and healthier.)
Have a spiritual practice. Be happy. Be grateful. Practicing gratitude is a part of having a spiritual practice. I have a gratitude journal where I write down 10 things I’m grateful for every single day. This forces me to look at the glass half full because when I move through a space of gratitude things get better and better. I feel better, I think better, I do better.
Diets are a dubbington. They stop us from having an intuitive healthy relationship with food. Food and our bodies are designed to have a harmonious relationship and diets tend to cockblock that. You’re not learning how to nourish your body by thinking you can’t eat all the shit you love. This just leaves an unhealthy disconnect between your food and your body. And that’s no bueno. So take the focus off of losing weight. Take the focus off of restricting yourself. Take the focus off of what you can’t have. Focus on what you can have and what you can do. Make peace with your food. When you start to listening to your body and what it truly wants, you’ll have a better understanding and appreciation for it. Focus on feeling good instead of looking good and this lead you towards naturally looking, feeling, and doing your best. And remember diets fail you, you don’t fail them.
And guysss, great news!! I’ll be hosting my first nutrition workshop on plant-based eating next Saturday, August 31 @ Heal Haus from 12-2. Learn how to incorporate more veggies into all of your favorite meals and how to keep your weight off (or on) for GOOD. RSVP here. So excited to see yall!!
Comment below! Tell me your thoughts and experiences with your diet.
If you feel like you need more assistance, book your one-on-one nutrition coaching session here.
