Sometimes we want to believe something so bad that even though we know deep down that it’s not true, we still ignore our gut feelings. Maybe we’re completely unaware of information that disproves what we want to believe in. But more than likely, we knowingly turn a blind eye to that information. We stick our fingers in our ears and sing la la la at the top of our lungs. If we can’t see the information, then it can’t be true, right? We can keep believing in the fantasy, even if it hurts us.
Today’s post is illustrated with pictures of food I took on my vacation.
Check out this grouper topped with crab. Yum!
Take weight loss. We want so very bad to believe that permanent weight loss is possible. And why wouldn’t we? Not only are we told repeatedly that it is possible, but we are also reminded that if we are fat, achieving permanent weight loss should be our primary goal in life. Everywhere we turn, there are books, diet plans, exercise plans, drugs, and surgeries that promise if we spend our money on them, we’ll be forever thin. Believing in that sounds pretty great, doesn’t it? Being thin, we’re told, will make us healthy, happy, successful, prettier, more lovable…
Delicious chocolate cake!
But think for a minute about how many times you’ve tried to lose weight. You have probably succeeded – over and over again. There are millions of people in the world who have successfully lost weight. But almost all of those people have also regained that weight, and a lot of them gained back more than they lost. Now, the diet industry wants you to believe – and you probably have – that this is your fault. If you hadn’t failed, if you had just stuck with it, you’d be thin right now.
Breakfast at the beach! Life cereal, plus bananas.
There is a reason that 95% of people can’t sustain weight loss, and it’s not because 95% of people are failures. It’s because diets don’t work, not in the long term. It’s because eating too few calories (the go-to “solution” for weight loss for most people) isn’t a sustainable way to live. And it’s because the solutions that the diet industry sells us are not meant to work in the long term. If they were, how would the diet industry make money? They are counting on you regaining weight so that you’ll give them more money the next time around.
How about some crab-stuffed shrimp and a baked potato?
A couple of people sent me an article from Cracked about “shocking” realities behind weight loss products. It’s one person’s story of the ridiculous lengths they went to in order to be part of an ad for a weight loss product. It’s depressing and ridiculous, but I don’t know if I’d just the word shocking to describe it. I wasn’t surprised at all that companies go to these lengths to trick us into buying their products. They aren’t in it to help us get healthy. They want us to lose and regain and then pay them money to help us lose again. And repeat.
Donuts? Yes, please!
Here’s what happens next: You can either keep believing in diet culture, keep spending your hard-earned money on “miracle” cures and “secret” formulas that promise “permanent” weight loss. Or you can follow my two-step plan to becoming immune to those empty promises. Ready? It’s easy:
- Stop being gullible. You know that some weird berry or a 20 minute cardio routine isn’t going to make you magically thin forever. You know it. Now, eating fruit and working out are good for you, no doubt. But isn’t it a better use of your time to adopt healthy behaviors because they’ll help you to get and stay healthy, and not because they will make your body smaller – temporarily, at best?
- Stop hating yourself. The diet industry does not want you to love yourself. Ever. It wants you to look in the mirror and be disgusted by what you see. It wants you to open your wallet over and over and over again, and it wants you to blame yourself when the products or services you purchase fail. It wants you to believe that it isn’t Weight Watchers or the Beachbody DVDs or Body By Vi shakes that failed, it’s you. It wants you to believe you didn’t do it right, you didn’t try hard enough. The biggest nightmare of people who peddle weight loss “cures” is that we will learn to love and care for our bodies right now, not ten, twenty, or a hundred pounds from now.
The best thing I ate: Seafood quesadilla.
So, tell me: How many times have you spent money to lose weight, succeeded, and the “failed”? How did that make you feel about yourself? Are you surprised that a weight loss company like the one in the Cracked article would go to such extremes to sell their product? Have you fallen for those promises before? Share your stories in the comments!
