Some thoughts on dieting
Some thoughts I’ve been wanting to get down somewhere. File under “secrets of success”. Maybe.
“I don’t do diets”
There are arguments out there, mainly put forth by nutrition teachers and health class instructors that dieting is unnatural and impossible to adhere to. They say that, sure, some diets may “work” and you’ll lose weight, but that they are so out of the norm of what we eat that they are nearly impossible to keep up and so eventually, you put the weight back on.
This would be true except for a couple things: 1) The “norm” of what we eat is hardly “normal” for humans. Today’s industrialized society and differs so greatly and happened too rapidly for evolution to compensate. Therefore we’re all too fat here in America and a “diet” of something more normal (real definition) is needed to trim ourselves up. The word “diet” also has a bad connotation because it usually outlines what one cannot eat, when in fact, it has everything to do with what you can eat. That said, the stigma of being “on a diet” is unfortunately necessary when you consider that in order for us to break our current unhealthy eating habits, we need to make a concerted effort to stick with something. Which leads us to 2) Diets are difficult to adhere to because our society wants us to keep consuming (monetarily and physically), high fat, high sugar, high caloric foods. And to this I say: buck the fuck up and commit.
Commitment
When I hear folks complain (endlessly) about their weight or physical appearance or how they go to the gym, then eat donuts and wonder why they aren’t losing weight, I sometimes venture forward and give them advice on their diet. I give them a list of foods that can help break up their new diet and compensate and easily transition them from industrial diet to something a little more natural and yet possible.
They turn their nose up at it. They complain (again) about how they don’t like this or that food (usually the healthy ones), how they can’t “live” without x, y, z (usually the fatty, sugary ones), and how it’s too hard to do it.
This is where commitment comes in. Our current society has trained you to like fatty sugary foods. Get over it. It’s like an addiction. It will be difficult, you will have cravings. But you will eventually get over it. If you really don’t like that type of food, then find something with similar qualities. But if you just can’t stand whole classes of foods (like green vegetables), grow the fuck up. Consider it medicine. It tastes bad, but it will make you feel better.
Tastes are highly adaptable. Eventually you’ll love peas. I used to hate brown rice, now I love it. I used to hate most beans, now I love them. You can make it work, but it takes good old fashioned commitment.
Fad Diets
Like eating one thing and only one thing types. They are dumb, don’t do them.
I think people’s positions on diets comes from interpretations of what a diet is. If a diet means to eat a few foods, or obssesively rely on some narrow counting technique, it is likely doomed to fail. Also, diets are often assoiciated with what basically is equivalent to starvation and anorexia. If diet means things like eating smaller portions, more veggies, less refined stuff, in other words, broadly eat more healthily, then that diet is better. There is no one good diet. French diets typically involve eating foods thought of as unhealthy, but they eat little and fewer portions. East Asians tend to have traditionally ate more veggies and use meat basically as a seasoning except for special occasions. Whatever works for you is what you should do. But commitment is likely needed no matter what. People just aren’t used to certain foods, or not eating until they’re not hungry, not until the their stomach are about to burst.
January 6th, 2009 at 1:45 pm