I often get asked questions like this:
“What is the best diet?”
“Dan how do I lose the gut?”
“Dan what can I do to get rid of cellulite around my bum?”
“What should I cut out to get skinny?”
My personal favourite goes something like this
“Dan I want to look better and fit into my clothes from a few years ago but you know me I love my grub so what exercise can I do to lose the belly?”
After I tell them I love my food too, my reply is usually pretty standard…
Eat less, Eat better and Move more.
I could wrap this article up with that sentence alone but I love to help you guys out so I’m going to go into a bit more detail.
The funny thing about giving someone diet or nutrition advice is they will always have a question or a reference to a friend who is on something else.
If I told you to eat a nutrition plan using only whole food with moderate amounts of carbs, high in protein and low in fat, a typical response would be ok that sounds cool! BUT my friend Jenny is doing this new shake diet and she’s lost 8 lbs in 5 days and then there is Peter he eats protein and fat with no carbs all day and the weight is falling off him.
Ok, I hear you!
It sounds appealing with the weight loss figures but If I told you not to eat any food like Jenny of course your going to lose weight. Peter, he hasn’t been eating any carbs so initially he will lose a lot of water weight from that, there is often a lot more to it when you look at it sensibly.
The question I often ask myself though, is it SUSTAINABLE?
Would you be able to live the rest of your life like that?
9/10 the answer is NO!
That brings us to the main topic of todays article.
What is the Best Diet?
If I could sum up the best plan for you in one sentence it would be:
The diet plan that fits seamlessly into your lifestyle with the least amount of stress caused.
You want a plan that you can sit down and think, this can work and I can see myself following this over the course of the next 3,6, or 12 months to get where I want to be. It will also be the most effective plan that can enable you to progress, either on to a fat loss or muscle gain approach. This will help you maintain your healthy lifestyle without further loss or weight gain if you want to maintain.
The problem with most diets is they fall into the category of getting you where you want to be for a short period of time but in the majority of cases many people rebound back to their old weight pretty quickly. This happens because the diet didn’t allow them to re-introduce certain foods or it simply wasn’t SUSTAINABLE over the long term.
“The obvious reason for weight regain after weight loss treatment is that participants return to inappropriate eating and exercise habits. These habits need not be as bad as pretreatment habits to cause regain, because metabolic factors may make it easier to regain after a period of dietary restriction…The pattern of relapse and regain appears to be the result of a war between the will and physiologic demands over which self-control appears relatively powerless.” Why Treatments for Obesity Don’t Last, Goodrick & Foreyt, 1991
As I previously mentioned there are a ton of diets out there that all work and I can name a few here:
- Paleo Diet
- 5/2 Diet
- IIFYM – If It Fits Your Macros
- Flexible Dieting
- Low Carb Diets
- High Carb Diets
- High protein Diets
- Low Fat
- High Fat
- Intermitten Fasting
- Fish Diet
This is just a small list, type the word diet into google and you will find 490 million results. I will write up a post in the future detailing pros and cons for some popular diets and my recommendations on what ones to follow.
How is anyone suppose to know what diet to follow if there are so many of them?
It’s hard to pick one and it may take some experimentation with yourself to see what works best for you. Some people work well on a lower carb approach while others thrive and get into the best shape possible following higher carbs. It all depends on you, your activity levels, your job, your sleep pattern, your stress levels. There are so many important components to look at, this is why nutrition plans have to be specific to you.
WHY DO DIETS FAIL??????
There are various reasons why diets fail for most people. Most diets fail due to the fact that you can not adhere to the plan 90% of the time but there are other lifestyle factors that can affect results.
Some factors that affect the adherence to your diet:
- Stress levels
- Working long hours
- Budget
- Time
- Cooking Skills
- Food likes and dislikes
- Exercise Regime
One of the main reasons why you may fail on a specific or strict diet regime is RESTRICTION. If you restrict anything in life its usually the thing you want the most.
RESTRICTION IN ITSELF IS NOT SUSTAINABLE
Before you carry on reading please read the sentence above one more time.
Think back to your childhood when you where not allowed out to play because it was raining and all you wanted to do was go out with your friends even though you knew you would be back in the house in 10 mins because you where wet and cold.
When you restrict certain foods from your diet it can be a recipe for disaster in terms of your long term adherence to the diet. You can use a smarter approach that will allow you to enjoy the foods you desire in a smart and flexible plan.
If you are getting good clean food regularly along with an allowance of food that you can eat (‘FREE’ foods) then you are more likely to stick to the plan as you get a reward for doing well. I am not talking about having a full pizza meal just because you ate chicken and broccoli 3 times in a week. It would be more like 200-300 calories to allow your mind a break from dieting and eat a food or have a drink you enjoy.
For that reason I am here to help you pick the correct one for you.
Considerations when picking your diet
There are a few things you need to look at when picking the right diet for you. If you want to find out what kind of to eat and how to build your own nutrition plan check out the link below:
- TIME– How much time you have during the week to prep, cook and eat your food. I feel this is one of the key factors in making your nutrition plan work and it also allows you to pick a diet plan that is best suited to your needs based on the time you have available. Something worth considering is how many hours your spend on your couch watching TV or browsing the internet before you say you don’t have time to prep?
- COOKING SKILLS- I feel this is often over looked when making a nutrition plan for a client. If they can’t cook their food is going to taste like shit and who wants to eat rotten food? Exactly so it is imperative that this area is looked at. If your nutrition plan details gourmet meals then you may need to dial it down and a bit. At the start of your journey it is a really good idea to keep it as simple as possible as in meat, veg, & carb source (if required).
- FOOD LIKES & DISLIKES- If you have a nutrition plan which requires you to eat food regularly that you don’t particularly like then how likely is it that you will stick to that plan? I am a big advocate on trying to keep things as simple as possible in both training and nutrition but it is also vitally important that you get a good variety of quality sources of food and you aren’t eating the same bland food day in and day out.
- MONEY/BUDGET- This is a funny one to speak about I find as money plays an important role in the quality of food you can buy. If your plan calls for you to eat grass fed beef and organic fruit and veg they are generally more expensive. You may choose to buy the cheaper option as its more accessible to you, that’s fine if it keeps you on track with your plan. The one thing I always mention to clients though is how important is your health? People generally have no problem spending £70-£100 on one night out but they won’t spend that on food to feed them for an entire week, just think about that the next time you say you can’t afford healthy nutritious food.
LIFESTYLE- This is a big one and I generally feel many people overlook it when they are planning to enter into a new diet plan. If I was to make you a plan to eat 6-8 meals per day but you could only realistically get time to eat 3 meals due to work and other commitments., how likely are you to stick to that plan?
Not very likely. It is an easy problem to fix, just find one that suits you better. If you can only eat twice per day then maybe intermittent fasting would be a viable option. If you have quite a few breaks throughout the day then maybe the smaller meals every 2-3 hours would work extremely well for you.
Look at your lifestyle and see when you can eat? When do you feel hungry? Do you operate better without a breakfast? Do you prefer to have a big meal at night?
Now all you need to do to perfect your diet is take action. Don’t just read this article, take something away from it and change your lifestyle for the better.
If you want to find out what kind of to eat and how to build your own nutrition plan check out the link below:
What foods should I eat CLICK HERE >>>Build you own nutrition plan here <<<CLICK HERE
Thanks
P.S if you would like any more information on nutrition or training please feel free to book in for your FREE CONSULTATION
PSS If you would like to know more about my 30 Day Fat Loss program (4 days training per week, nutrition plan £50) leave me a message at daniel@nolimits.fitness or ring me on 07731312118
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