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WHY 'DIET' IS
A FOUR LETTER WORD
DIET - A simple enough word with
a simple enough meaning. Ask anyone who is either weight or health conscious,
and be prepared for a multitude of answers, views and applications. To most
people though, they have the totally wrong view when it comes to diet, and as a
result, can waste many months if not years training away with little or no
results. This is the reason why I think the common definition of 'diet' should
be deleted from everyone's vocabulary.
To most people, diet refers to
going without. If you are on a traditional diet, you eliminate all the tasty,
often not so nourishing food from your diet and try to 'starve' yourself to
perfection. Whilst the determination is there, most get confused in its
application. I ask you this, what is a diet - for you?
Different people with different
goals, lifestyles, stresses etc, all need unique dietary requirements to suit
their own needs. Your diet must reflect not only what you are doing, but what
you are also trying to accomplish. In the traditional sense, if I were to go on
a diet, I would cut my calorie consumption down, live on salad and most likely
exercise like crazy as well. Now would a traditional dieting approach work if my
sole goal was to build maximum muscle - nope! This is where traditional thinking
needs to be changed, and this is the reason why I do not like the word diet.
From now on, we will use
nutritional plan. Your nutritional plan can often make or break your efforts in
the gym so it is something that needs to be right - for you. To best devise what
the ideal nutritional plan is for you, you must ask yourself the following 5
questions and be able to give an answer to each:
* What are my goals
* When do I want my goals by
* How determined will I need to
be to reach my goals
* What can I do to guarantee my
goals
* What do I need nutritionally to
reach my goals
When you come up with your own
answers, you will see that your nutritional plan will be different to someone
else's. If your goal is to lose a lot of unwanted body-fat, it would be
different to say that of a tri-athlete's. See what I am getting at. We are all
unique individuals with different goals and limitations, so we need variation
from one another. As long as we follow the basic dietary guidelines, which are
detailed in this website, then our goals are only a short step away.
Remember, the word diet often
means calorie deprived, hunger inducing, result limiting eating plans, where a
specific nutritional plan means results, results, results. Say good-bye to that
carrot and cabbage diet for good and say hello to efficient, goal producing,
functional nutrition.
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