This Is Why Your New Year's Diet Still Isn't Getting You Results
And How To Make Changes That Last
How many different diet ideas have been blasted at you through the media since you started your resolutions just over a month ago?
How many of these ideas have you tried to implement?
If your answer is more than one, I can already tell you the reason why your resolutions aren’t working for you.
The human body doesn’t like to change overnight. In fact, it resists change with everything it’s got. It’s called homeostasis and it’s how we are able to survive famines and harsh climates but it’s also the reason why the weight you gained over the holidays is still sticking to you.
Here are three thoughts you need to keep in mind and act on if you're going to be successful long-term with your health goals.
Stick To The Plan
In order to see the results you want, you need to free yourself from the dietary drama and stick to one diet for a long time. A long time is not measured on a weeks scale but on a months scale. You might have to make caloric adjustments during this time to keep progressing but if the changes you are seeing small differences of a couple of pounds every two weeks, that’s actually a good thing and will get you towards your goal better than any dramatic weight loss changes do.
Foods Don’t Change Your Body Instantly
We get a lot of instant gratification from drugs that solve headaches and back pain like magic but foods don’t work that way. If you’re making dietary changes to try to see some benefit you need to know that most cellular processes will take several weeks to adjust. If you’re taking fish oil to help with your joints, it’s not going to work overnight, it will take several weeks. Likewise, if you’ve heard extra vitamin D will help with your mood during the cold winter season and you start taking it to see a result. Most people assume that if after a couple of days they feel no different, it’s not working. If whatever habit you’re working on is part of the plan, once again you’ve got to stick to that plan for longer.
Sweep The Floor
One of my favourite quotes from modern-day Stoic philosopher Ryan Holiday in his book Ego is the Enemy comes at the very end and is about sweeping the floor daily. While he was referring specifically to how we need to remind ourselves daily of practising the teachings of the Stoics, this can be applied to any goals that we have. You have to know what it is that you value most - write down your core values - and then also relate your current goals to those core values. It’s not enough to write down your goals once and then tuck them away out of sight. You’ve got to act on them daily to keep your daily actions aligned with your greater vision. This may be done by reading the goals out loud to verbalize the goals in an affirming way, writing about them as part of a daily task list exercise or journaling about what you'll do each day to stay on track. Writing the same thing over and over again may seem like a silly idea but is astoundingly effective for how simple it is to take a few minutes to do. This is actually the first habit that should be developed before you get started on any actual diet-related habits because it helps you to better see the clear path to success.