TheBrainChangingDiet

Part 5 is the last installation in the best diet for weight loss series. Throughout this series we have learned the importance of creating your own diet blueprint. We also discussed why substituting somebody else’s diet for your own, simply doesn’t work. Finally we outlined some strategies for change, and how you can use neuroplasticity to reshape and reconfigure your diet blueprint.

Despite this process being quite simple, it is certainly not easy. Most weight loss information will have you believe that you can lose all the weight that you want in 30 days, and that rapid weight loss is the key to success. I wish this were the case, but sadly, it’s not.

Your brain and body are hardwired to GAIN weight, not lose it. Moreover, your brain HATES change and it does so at quite a slow pace. So when you make huge changes in such a short period of time, your brain never really changes and that is why you will always gain back the weight that you have lost. If there is one thing that you must learn here then it is this…You will never change your weight unless you also change your brain. Yes you may have short term change, but you won’t have lasting change.

It really is that simple and yes, that is the “key” to weight loss. In fact neuroplasticity is the key to all change and behavior modification. The “problem” of course is that you won’t lose “7 pounds every 11 days”. The good news is that you will not have to lose weight ever again, whereas in the other example you will be losing 7 pounds in 11 days for the rest of your life!

Week 5:

Rinse, wash and repeat. Now that you know how to change, it is simply a case of continuing the process. Choose one activity that you want to change and that will contribute to your weight loss. Create strategies that ensure that you will make this change and continue until you have made this change into a habit. Once you have a habit in place, you will no longer have to think about it. This will free up some of your brain power to repeat the process. Continue to rewire your brain and your eating blueprint and weight loss will never be an issue for you again.

In part 3 of the best diet for weight loss, we are going to start to evaluate your eating behaviors. By now you should be starting to get a basic understanding of your current eating blueprint. This is critical, so if you have not managed to write down everything that you eat during a week, then go back to part 2 of this series.

This first thing that we want to identify is your current eating patterns. Human beings are hardwired to create habits because it makes us efficient. One of the fundamental and ingrained habits we have is our eating behaviors, because we do them on such a consistent basis. As you go through your journal, try and identify some of these habits and behaviors. What time of the day do you always eat? What are the foods that you eat the most? When are the times when you eat too much of a certain food? When do you eat the majority of your food?

Why is this so important? Because 99% of the things that we do, think, and feel are the same as we did, thought and felt yesterday, and are the same as we will do, will think and will feel tomorrow! This is why every single diet that you take from somebody else will fail over the long run. If you drastically change your eating behavior and habits, your brain will repel and you will go back to your previous eating habits eventually. This is why almost everybody will regain weight (and more!) during their weight loss campaign.

So how do you change? By replacing your old habits with new ones. Although that may sound easy, changing your habits can be very difficult because your brain HATES CHANGE! This is because your brain is always looking for ways to conserve energy and it literally has to burn more glucose when we do something out of the ordinary. So when you decide to “go for broke” by changing  your whole eating behavior and introducing excessive exercise, any unplanned event in your life can easily derail the changes that you want to make. Your body literally runs out of energy to manage all of the changes, and falls back to what it knows best to get through the rest of the day.

With this in mind, over the next few weeks we are going to focus on making one small change. We do this by identifying something small that we want to change, establishing a strategy for change, and then implementing the strategy. If you do this everyday (for approximately 21 days) you will create new neural pathways in your brain and a new habit will be formed. While it may be frustrating to make changes gradually, it is a much more realistic approach for guaranteeing success because it requires less energy and won’t place unrealistic demands on your body. Remember, success breeds success, so it is much better to have many small successes that add up, than to take on TOO much at once, fail, and have to start all over at square one.

Week 3:

Evaluate your current eating blueprint. What is the one change you could make that you could feel like you could accomplish? Here are some examples to get you thinking:

Cut out or reduce your intake of ONE snack

Replace ONE starch with vegetables

Reduce your intake of calories from liquids.

Remove or reduce your intake of ONE desert.

Begin eating your meals NOT in front of the T.V.

There are hundreds of different eating behaviors that you can change, but what is important is that you change the ones that are relevant to you. Next week we will observe what eating behavior will be most beneficial for you to change in order to create your new eating blueprint.

In our first article on the best diet for weight loss, we discussed the importance of creating your own diet blueprint. Creating your blueprint is not a quick and easy process. It requires attention, commitment and high priority in your life. Last week, you had one exercise to do, which was to write down everything that you eat. Although it sounds easy, it usually takes most people around 4-5 weeks before they actually get a week where they have written everything down. So if you failed to complete the task last week, don’t worry! That’s normal and you will get another chance this week.  Most people find that success comes as they continue to apply themselves.

So why is it so important to write down everything you eat? There are a number of reasons. First of all, we all have unconscious habits, especially when it comes to eating. This means that you will eat food at various times without even noticing it. Writing down every time that you eat makes you more aware of these occasions. Once you have enough data you will notice when these habits are most likely to occur. The next step is to either eliminate the habit by changing it, or replace the problem habit with a new and better one. But it is essential that you remember habit changing requires mindful diligence to the new behavior. Ritual makes habitual.  

Next, writing down every time you eat will give you a good indication of when you eat the most calories. You will soon recognize when this is. For most people it will be dinner or late at night. Another common time is during the weekend, because you have lost the structure of your Monday to Friday routine. Many people are also surprised to discover that a large portion of their calories come from snacks or nibbles.  Make sure you include every bite or sip you consume in order to have an accurate assessment.

Finally, writing down everything you eat will reveal to you what it is that you actually eat. When asked, most people give a totally different representation of their diet. What is more remarkable is that they actually believe what they are saying, even though it is so far from actual reality. Yes it is true …  our memories, even the strong ones, are often completely inaccurate.  When you write something down it will always be there, and you will not have to rely on your memory for an estimation of your average daily or weekly diet.

There are numerous other reasons that are just as important for writing down everything that you eat. Don’t worry this is not something that you will be doing for the rest of your life, but it is a fundamental step in creating your own blueprint. If you have not yet done so, buy yourself a journal where you can write down all of your information and keep it on one place. 

So the exercise of this week is to repeat last weeks exercise. Even if you are a part of the 1% who completed last weeks exercise, doing it again is still extremely beneficial. And when I say write down everything I mean everything, ESPECIALLY snacks!

Week 2:

Write down everything that you eat. Sounds simple right? Actually, writing down everything that you eat is very time consuming and requires attention and awareness. The goal of this exercise is to make you CONSCIOUS of what you currently eat. Most people are unaware of approximately 30-50% of the calories that they consume on a daily basis. Simply becoming aware of your unconscious eating habits and what you eat during the day will have a profound affect on your success in the future.