You really can eat what you want, lose weight, and keep it off. You really can free yourself from diets forever.
So today, weāre gonna play round two of: is it a diet?Ā
Sometimes itās hard to tell whether something is a diet or not, especially with a lot of conflicting information out there. So I thought Iād make up a list of things that I consider some of the hallmarks of diets. (If you’d like to play round one with the first five hallmarks of diets, just click here.)
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To free yourself from diets forever, you need to ask some questions:
1. Does it tell you that you must eat everything on a daily food list?
That means now youāre following somebody elseās idea of what your body needs. Even if that somebody has never met you and doesnāt even know who you are.
You may end up forcing yourself to finish everything on your plate and eating past comfortably full. Or maybe the listed foods are not enough and youāll end up not having an allotted portion to eat when youāre hungry. No matter what, you will end up feeling like the list has all the power and you have none.
2. Does it tell you to drink so many liquids in a day?
You may end up feeling waterlogged or parched, depending on the rules. It also may tell you to drink certain kinds of liquids, whether you like the taste of them or not. It may substitute liquids in place of eating food. You will likely end up feeling like you hate your life if you follow the rules/guidelines and consume so much water, broth, shakes, etc. every day.
3. Does it require you to keep a food journal?
Writing down every morsel you eat, down to the ounce, will make you hyper aware of when you make a mistake. It leads to obsessive thoughts about food and obsessive behavior around food. It also can lead to a paralyzing fear of making a mistake. Your life will become very small indeed and will revolve around weighing, measuring, calorie or other nutrient counts, reading ingredient panels, and other time-consuming activities. That’s time that you could be using that time to pursue your passions instead.
4. Does it reinvent itself every January 1 or reinvent itself often?
Quick and simple: if it worked long-term, it wouldnāt have to reinvent itself every year or more often than that.
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5. Can you do it enjoyably for the rest of your life?
If you canāt incorporate it into your life and do it every day forever without hating it, yourself, and/or your life then itās a diet. The only thing Iāve found for long-term weight loss is to find what works for you and do that. Iāve never found a diet that worked long-term as-is.
Thatās why you need to cherry pick and take any techniques or methods that work for you and leave anything that doesnāt. Thatās also why you need to modify and change any methods or techniques to suit your particular needs. Once you find out what works for you, then youāll be able to do it every day without strife and struggle. Youāll be able to do it every single day for the rest of your life. And thatās the only way youāll be able to stick to it long-term.
And if you want to free yourself from diets forever, pay attention to the biggest tell there is …
If it makes you feel imprisoned and not free to do what you need to do for yourself, then itās a diet.
Get off the diet-go-round. Get on with your life.Ā®
Stop wishing, start doing.
Create your own weight loss before and after success story.
My weight loss transformation & how it can help you free yourself from diets forever
You absolutely can break the diet cycle. I got free. Your life can be that way too.
I made my own path because I needed to get myself out of the crazy-making behavior I was having around food. I needed:
- no more dieting.
- no more restrictive eating.
- no weighing and measuring food.
- no off-limit foods.
- no more judgment around food.
- no more trying to figure out healthy eating or just what healthy foods to eat.
- no more judging my self-worth based on the scale.
- no more youāre-not-doing-it-perfectly diet rules that were only fueling my constant thinking about and obsession with food.
I needed to stop: searching for weight loss tips, wondering how to lose belly fat fast or how to lose weight fast, worrying about how to eat healthy or finding healthy snacks for weight loss, coming up with yet another healthy eating plan, trying to have quick weight loss, or forcing myself onto yet another weight loss diet. What I needed instead was to find, out of all the weight loss programs out there, the best weight loss program for me. Turns out, the best way to lose weight was to find out what works for me and do that.
- I’ve lost 160+ pounds naturally by simply trusting myself and listening to my intuition (mindful eating and eating intuitively).
- I have maintained that weight loss for 9 years and counting by trusting myself and listening to my intuition (mindful eating and intuitive eating).
- I no longer have any eating disorders, including bulimia (bulimia nervosa) and binge eating disorder (compulsive overeating).
- I no longer have a fear of food.
Just imagine what you could be doing with your life if you’d just commit to having your own before and after weight loss success story. You could be:Ā following your own dreams and reaching your own goals, cultivating your own passions, and making both your inner and outer worlds a more blissful and peaceful place.
I got that for my life. I want it for yours. I will teach you how.
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Let today be the day you make peace with your body and with food.
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