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The Importance of Cheat Day (Why Diets Fail)

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How did you spend your Fourth of July? I spent mine eating bagels, donuts, cookies, potatoes, potato chips, corn chips, and ice cream (among other things). But I did not fall off the wagon. Rather I indulged in a well deserved cheat day.

If you do not already know, a cheat day is a day when you can eat all those foods that you do not normally eat. Foods that are “bad for you.” Cheat days are important and you should not skip them. Why are they so important? Here are two reasons.

Psychological

In an earlier post, I talked about one of the reasons why diets fail. And that reason was an un-manageability factor. In other words, any diet that is going to work has to be a diet that you can live with.

How does this concept figure into a cheat day? Well, what if you were on a diet that forbid you to eat any unhealthy food–ever. Could you do this? I know I could not. While I love eating healthy, I also love some unhealthy foods as well. If I were told I could never eat them again, eventually I would break down and go off the diet. And without the regulation one gets form cheat day, I would probably continue to eat unhealthy food and regain weight.

But this is not a problem when you have a scheduled cheat day. I know that all my sacrifice is going to pay off. I know that there is a day coming when I can eat all those pleasure foods I have been avoiding. And the best part is I’m not breaking my diet! Cheat day gives me the psychological advantage to continue to eat healthy between indulgence days. I don’t have to live without those foods forever. All I have to do is weight a little while.

Health Benefits

The other reason to have a cheat day has to do with the health benefits that accompany them. That’s right. Cheat days have health benefits. It is not all just indulgences.

How is cheat day healthy? As many of you know (particularly those of you who follow a low-carb diet), fat loss is a hormonal process. As you lose weight, you also decrease the production of weight-loss hormones. When you have a cheat day, you re-set all your fat burning hormones. This becomes very important when you are trying to continue to lose weight. In fact, not having enough cheat days is one of the reasons why people plateau and stop losing weight.

So enjoy your cheat day. And don’t cheat your self out of it!

One last thing. You may be wondering how often you should have a cheat day. You may also be wondering what and how much you can have on a cheat day. Keep coming back to this blog to find out.

Finding Motivation for Weight Loss

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motivation 002Finding Motivation for weight loss can at times be difficult. Particularly if you have yo-yo dieted your whole life and have experienced failure after failure. You may wonder if you can really find the motivation to try again.

Every one who has lost a significant amount of weight and kept it off has had their own “breaking point” so to speak, a point in which the pain of being overweight out-weighed the love one may have unhealthy food. I know I had my breaking point (a story I will share in a later post).

Perhaps you are looking for your breaking point. Perhaps you are looking for that moment when you find the motivation to break though and finally lose those extra pounds. What follows is a technique I have learned and have found very helpful in gaining motivation:

Take out a piece of paper and write down everything negative that you have experienced by being overweight. Dig deep into you life. Think of all those painful memories. Think of all those clothes you cannot where because you were too fat to fit into them. Think of those people who you have been interested in romantically, but they were not interested in you because of your weight. Think of all those times you were chosen last for the team because you were looked down upon by others. I know this may be painful. But the more real you make the pain the more motivation you will find for change.

Now think of your future. Think of what it will be like if you continue to mistreat your body though poor diet and non-exercise. Think of what it will cost as far as your health. Think of having to be put in a home much earlier than necessary because you cannot take care of yourself due to your weight. Again, I know it’s painful, but let the pain drive you to change.

Now for something positive. Think of what your future will be like if you take control of your health now. Think of how great you will feel and how great you will look. Think of all the compliments you will receive. Think of the deep feeling of accomplishment you will experience by losing all that weight. Think of all those great things.

Please take the time to write all of these things down. And remember, the more vivid the emotion,  the more motivation you will find for change. Take the time to do this. Make this your breaking point. Make this moment your time when you have finally had enough of that extra weight.