If you haven’t read my previous post already then I suggest you head on over and give it a gander (who even says that anymore? ugh). We talk about the beauty of 80/20 and how it can be the shiny silver lining to a diet. However, here’s another take on it.
Do you ever find yourself giving in to cravings and spend the next day feeling terrible about yourself? Maybe the food physically made you nauseous because you ate a bit too much? Or maybe you beat yourself up because you thought you had more self-control than this? Here’s a different approach: temptation makes life just bit more exciting. You gave in not because you’re weak but, because you wanted a break from the routine and that’s OK! How you deal with that break in judgement is what matters a lot more than giving in. Here’s why.
People often expect the most out of themselves and become overly ambitious when aiming for new goals. Focusing on being perfect all the time adds up to exhausting willpower that could be used elsewhere. After all, our willpower is limited so why not use it on things that matter more? However, there are a few things to think about before you get too negative on yourself:
Is your diet/meal plan sustainable for your lifestyle and behaviour? Do you feel energized and satiated? An unsustainable diet is one that you can’t adhere to and one that does not take into account your preferences or what you enjoy eating.
Are you stressed out/not getting enough rest? Higher stress levels can increase hunger and can also lead to emotional eating.
When we’re following a meal plan we might be depriving ourselves of the things we want and that can be a recipe for disaster. For example, having episodes of binge eating, falling off the meal plan completely, starving yourself afterwards, etc. can all have negative long term effects. What you don’t want to do is take one mishap as a defeat. The problem with trying to follow a plan 100% 24/7 is that it just isn’t realistic. Life happens. Some things are out of our control and thus, we’re left to adapt to the circumstances. Therefore, following an 80/20 approach, and even IIFYM, enables us to be flexible in our choices. If anything, flexibility is as important as the meal plan itself. Now that we’ve cut ourselves some slack, let’s think about our next step.
Firstly, eating a pastry every now and then isn’t a problem. It’s only a problem if the one pastry turns in three and you don’t even remember eating the other two. Having flexibility in your meal plan means that you can eat the one or two pastries guilt-free without it impeding your progress. Unfortunately, individuals often think that they can combat the calories by doing extra cardio. This is a bad idea because 1) you’re wasting time doing cardio that could have been spent doing something you actually enjoy and 2) it’s difficult to accurately estimate how many calories you burned doing cardio (yes, even with your fitbit).
Therefore, a better way to approach this is my seeing your calorie budget over the week. If you overate by 500+ calories on one day, take it with a stride and continue with your diet the next day as though it never happened. By giving it less importance and focusing on the bigger picture, you show more self-compassion and realize that it isn’t a make or break situation. What you do tomorrow matters as much, ,if not more than what you did today.
If you ended up eating at a surplus of 1000+ calories, the second option is to acknowledge that it happened and lower your calories to account for the surplus over the next few days. That means maybe eating 250 less calories for the next four days on top of your deficit. This will minimize total fat gain.
Alternatively, if you know that you’re going to eat a lot or drink alcohol you can fit it in before hand. For example, if you’re going to an event on Saturday and know that you like to indulge, lower your calories by a hundred or so a week before hand so that it fits into your calorie budget. Although this will be an estimate your progress will not be affected drastically and you can enjoy yourself without any feelings of guilt.
Furthermore, if you’ve been dieting for a couple months and think you’re going crazy consider taking a diet break for a week. This enables you to eat at your maintenance calories and helps prevent any adaptations to your deficit calories so your body will be more responsive when you cut your calories again. Even though this could mean your progress will be stalled it helps with long-term adherence.
We see that diets that are consistent with the preferences and behaviours of those following them, and not ones that follow a cookie cutter approach, are more likely to yield results and prevent individuals from regaining the weight once they’re no longer in a calorie deficit. After all, no one wants to diet forever. Once the weight is off there’s a greater chance of it staying off if the habits you followed were consistent with what you like to do.
Additionally, I made the assumption that people are tracking their calories because it becomes immensely difficult to troubleshoot the problem when you haven’t a clue how much you’ve overeaten. Even though it happens to everyone at some point in time, there’s no harm in estimating. However, tracking your calories/macronutritents gives you the power to adjust them according to your lifestyle and gives you quantitative measures for hitting your goal weight. Following an 80/20 approach also enables you to be more flexible in your choices. Therefore, what’s important is that you’re making the better choices 80% of the time the other 20% can be left up to good fate.
Marie
Marie Writes (A Fitness Blog) 