Why do most weight loss diets fail?
I’m betting you already have an answer right at the tip of your tongue.
As a matter of fact, if you happen to have a long and colorful diet history as I do, then I’m certain of it.
Let me guess. Your answer to the question, why do most diets fail? Hunger?
Yup. Number one.
It’s just not natural!
Most diets fail, frankly, because they ask that we limit the quantity of food we eat. We end up feeling hungry – and deprived – most of the time.
Or we’re good to go for a day or two until our hunger deepens, the storage vat from the last binge is depleted, or something else comes along that interrupts our necessary focus on the steely resolve to stick to our diet.
No wonder we abandon our best intentions and dive into the brownie batter.
It’s embarrassing!
Between you and me, I’m embarrassed to say how many times I’ve scrimped on calories in the morning, gone out and ran 5 or so miles, only to polish off a bowl of cookie dough in the afternoon.
This painful scene played itself out over and over again over the course of several years.
Decades even. No wonder I couldn’t lose weight.
Hunger is our primary survival drive.
Denying hunger – ignoring, suppressing, or trying to distract ourselves from it – is doomed to fail.
It is just a matter of time.
To deny our hunger drive takes enormous effort, energy, steely determination, understandably, all of our attention. If you have dieted before, you know how focused you have to be to manage the details and hunger of dieting when you are simply trying to limit your calories, right?!)
This results in pain and misery for the dieter. The diet is quickly abandoned as weight loss and body-shaping goals lose their importance in the face of growing hunger and depletion of vitality.
Yet knowing that it is, bottom line, all about the calories, is there any possible way to create the calorie deficit necessary for us to lose weight without being deathly hungry all the time?
It’s all in the food selection
In developed countries, with our access to all quantities of rich edibles, people are overweight because we eat so many foods that are extremely calorie dense, such as refined and processed grains, meat, milk, cheese, vegetable oils, and huge handfuls of roasted and nuts.
Because these foods are so concentrated in energy, it is next to impossible for us to eat them without consuming an excess of calories.
When you replace this disastrous menu with high fiber starchy vegetables, whole grains, high water-content vegetables, beans and legumes, and fruits – a plant-strong diet – you jack up the amount of food you can consume without overextending your calorie limit.
And you spare yourself the agony of addling your brain by constantly counting, weighing, and measuring to keep your calories under control. Your appetite is your guide.
Can you tell I speak from experience? Some day I’ll have to show you my stacks of ‘diet’ journal archives with intricately tracked carbs, protein, fat, and calories in a futile effort to keep my weight managed in the face of hunger.
Fullness and satiety come from the bulk and nutrition in the belly
Remember, fiber is an essential nutrient. Eating fiber-full foods with the least processing possible is a perfect match for our need to have a full belly while still being able to slip into our favorite jeans.
Then, you can enjoy the richer fare on special occasions without the impossible burden of having to go hungry every single day to keep your weight under control.
OK, I’m betting this is not the first time you’ve heard this. You may even be saying “I know that!”
The question is, are you doing it?
Remember, your trail to trimmer, healthier, and a more energetic you begins with your next breath, your next bite.
In each instant, your life can change. A transformation can begin or take another step to unfolding.
Take action today with what you eat. Make your diet a success by avoiding the hunger trap.
It’s a wonderful way to live. Keep up your great work with staying well fed, keep your arsenal of high quality foods well supplied, and watch your body change.
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Lani, I don’t know if it’s you or me … or the day or time of day …. or just the combination, but this post is just so dog-gone clear! You know that I have read and heard gobs and gobs of what you have written and spoken, but this is the most clear description (in a nutshell) of just what I need to follow. In fact I just received another McDougall cookbook to give me even more ideas. Thanks for posting this today. It’s getting printed out and posted on my fridge. Hugs to you!
Nancy, BIG thanks for your post today because I know so many women KNOW this – but it’s the ACTION that makes the difference and the days that we hear things in just the right way are breakthrough days for us!
Which cookbook did you just pick up?
Proud to be on your fridge! 😉
I just finished reading Geneen Roth’s Women Food and God. She is all about quitting the dieting game and really listening to what your body wants (not what our brain wants). She teaches those of us who fear our behavior around food to trust our bellies to tell us when we’re hungry, what we’re hungry for, and when to stop. It’s a very ‘conscious’ activity.
Anyway, I appreciate reading your post as it reinforces Geneen’s message that for every diet there is an equally strong binge waiting in the wings 🙂 Yay for greens!
Hey Cindy, I agree listening to your body is an important part of success here. However, I have some qualifiers and I need to read Geneen’s new book to see if and how she addresses them. That is that we have to level the playing field. We can trust our bodies when we present it with the options it was designed to eat. But if intuitive eating means if a cookie sounds like it’s what your body needs – then go for it! – then you have a recipe for trouble. Our bodies don’t have the inner natural trigger to shut off the overwhelming stimulation of high fat, high sugar, processed foods, because the rules have been changed. I think this is very important to consider.
Thank you so much for your contribution to this discussion because you bring up something I really want to address and have pushed it up on my agenda!
yay for greens indeed!
Lani,
Please keep telling the truth…
I love your photos of your history and I love the photo showing a generous meal on a plate.
I appreciate you.
Janis
Hey Janis, you have no idea how I love this: “please keep telling the truth”. Wowza!
Thanks on the photos! As for the history, I’ve been getting nudges from several readers to add to the lineup – for the past couple of years. I think it would be fun so hope to have new graphics for that soon.
And YOU taught me to say this more often: “I appreciate you”. Thank you for that!
xo Lani
I feel like you were talking about me – running 5 miles, carefully tracking my calories, and then polishing off a bowl of cookie dough. Seriously, are there hidden cameras in my house?! And then, of course, the guilt from the cookie dough leads straight back to another diet. And since I always plan my diets when I’m stuffed, it seems like it will be so easy – because I forget about the whole hunger factor.
Is there a place in a healthy diet for homemade chocolate chip cookies, and the dough? How do I enjoy it occasionally without overdoing it?
Rebekah, see, we are NOT alone! And boy do I hear the “planning the next diet while being stuffed”. Does that mean I’m not the only person who would read a diet book over a big gnarly bowl of ice cream?
You say:
Is there a place in a healthy diet for homemade chocolate chip cookies, and the dough? How do I enjoy it occasionally without overdoing it?
Tell you what, the real prize is actually finding yourself in that place where you don’t even think about it, so that it just doesn’t matter. And sure you could do it, but you will be able to get to that place where you don’t think about it. Now, isn’t that even better? Right now it may sound like a loss – but it is total liberation
Your post made me think of Holiday Food Survival Tip #2. There, I talk about running 7 miles pre-pigout at the brownie batter bowl. No doubt over a diet book, of course!
Thanks for coming by today Rebekah