Dieting isn’t the answer.
Ever.
The only time you should say the word “diet” is when you’re simply talking about the foods you eat.
Don’t go on diets, don’t be dieting.
Why?
Your body and mind don’t like it.
Do you even like it?
If you think you need to diet to lose weight, know that is not true.
Then how do we lose weight?
By eating what your body needs.
How do you know what your body needs?
How do you know what anyone or anything needs?
You listen to it.
Dieting will drive you nuts. You don’t eat enough, you become energy deprived, you don’t feel well physically and emotionally, and eventually you give up because this is all awful. If you’ve dieted before, you can probably relate.
I counted calories off and on, mostly on, for my entire adult life. When my calorie goal was on the lower side, many days when I stayed below my goal, my energy was pretty off and I didn’t feel that great. On the days when I didn’t stay below my goal, I’d say screw it and then just go overboard. Basically I was getting frustrated because my body needed more food than I was giving it, but when I gave it more, I felt bad about it.
This just doesn’t make sense.
We get these ideas in our heads about what we think our bodies should look like.
Regardless of what we think, we all have a set point, a weight range, of where our bodies naturally want to be. While you’re over there trying to control your weight, your body fights back and that’s where the mess happens. Maybe you’re already exactly where you’re supposed to be.
Accept it.
If you know you’re not, what would happen if you fed your body exactly what it needs to function properly and let it naturally fall to its natural size? I don’t know about you, but the word natural sounds really nice to me. It sounds like it requires way less effort than forcing yourself to eat less because you want to be at your high school or college weight, which, might I add, is probably going to be next to impossible for you to maintain if you get there.
For my binge eaters out there, this is extra important because if you are restricting food, you’re more likely to put your brain into survival mode, causing it to push you to consume extra food to compensate for it’s false sense of starvation. Dismissing urges to binge becomes nearly impossible.
So no more “I’m on a diet”, lot’s more “I eat what my body wants.” Fuel your body, have a treat if you want one, eat when you feel hungry, and do your body right.
