The GREEN Diet?

What diets have you tried that didn't work? I have tried so many diets it's hard to remember them all. The first diet I can remember is copying what my mom was doing to lose weight which was to mix tomato juice and vinegar and drink that first thing every day. It was so gross tasting. I thought I was going to throw up, but I  kept drinking it thinking it would help me lose weight and not be the biggest girl in the 5th grade. I was taller and bigger than all the kids in my class. I wasn't called fat in those days, just big-boned. I grew up thinking being big-boned was my destiny, but that didn't stop me from trying every fad diet that came along.

I did the fiber pill before meals, diet pills that had wild side effects such as extreme mood swings and insomnia, $200 a week "doctor supervised" liquid diets, low carb, no carb, all meat, no meat, juicing, no juice, low-cal, no-cal (fasting)... the list goes on and on. What happened when every diet inevitably ended was that I would often go on a binge because I felt so deprived and I would gain back all the weight I lost plus more. This pattern continued until the past couple years when it has started to click. What helped me flip the switch was learning about whole food plant-based nutrition and realizing that it is not a diet, it's a lifestyle.

I learn something new almost every day that helps me on my wellness journey. Just a couple days ago I learned that I no longer need to track what I eat because it perpetuates the diet mentality. I was recording everything I ate and I think it helped me at first to realize what I was eating and gauge the portion size, but I know writing everything down and counting calories is not sustainable. The more I study and learn about nutrition, the more I think of food as fuel and want to nourish my body with whole, unprocessed foods, and the more I do this, the less food controls my life in an unhealthy way.

The deprived diet with willpower approach doesn't work. Last night I listened to sports psychologist Dr. Rob Bell talk about his new book, The Hinge, which is about mental toughness. He gave a great example of the deprivation mentality by saying don't think about the number 13. What happens when someone tells you not to think about something? Of course, it's the FIRST thing you think about. I believe the same thing applies to food.

If some diet is telling us not to think about chocolate, or pasta, or french fries, it's going to be on our mind. Dr. Bell suggested instead of not thinking about the number 13, to think about the number 16. So again, instead of not thinking about the forbidden foods, what if we focus on the foods we know nourish our body? Think about fruit and leafy green vegetables. I think this type of reverse psychology and positive rewording is a simple, yet powerful approach to overcoming the restrictive and deprivation based diet model and helps us develop an abundance mentality that leads to a healthier life.

When it comes to diets I feel like Thomas Edison, I have tried 10,000 things that don't work and now I have that light bulb going off above my head with that one pivotal concept that has the power to change my life. Dr. Bell calls it "the hinge." Instead of "no more diets," I am thinking green (as in sustainable) so I can live healthy and lean. I can see it now,. "Kathy, how did you lose 100 lbs?" The GREEN Diet. Maybe we can start a new fad diet that ends all diets!

Think Green!

Kathy