We tend to greatly over-complicate the dieting process. I aim to fix that. Here are some very simple things you can implement to help yourself stick to your diet.
Don't Make Such Drastic Changes.
There are two main ways I see people making this mistake:
1) Cutting Calories Too Low
The average American consumes approximately 3700 Calories in a day. This isn't surprising since a large Big Mac combo has over 1300 Calories by itself- and for a lot of people, that's just one meal. It's very common for me to hear of people attempting to stick to a 1000 Calorie diet. That's a ~73% drop in your intake right out of the gate. There's no way anyone will stick to that long term.
2) Cutting Out Foods You Enjoy
In an ideal world, we would all be eating mostly whole/minimally process foods such as lean meats, fruits, veggies, etc. but we don't. On top of the wide variety of easily accessible junk foods, we are humans with limited will power. Completely cutting out our favorite "junk" foods is just too much for most people and leads to eventually breaking the diet. The recommendation I typically give people is to eat at least 80% "clean foods" as some people refer to them and allow for up to 20% of your daily Calories to come from junk food. This is assuming that you are sticking to your Calorie target and getting enough fiber.
Don't Add Foods You Hate to Your Diet.
This problem isn't quite as widespread as the ones mentioned above, but I do see it pretty regularly. Let's get this straight. There are NO foods that are "fat burning." Adding ____ food to your diet is not going to make you lose weight faster. If you don't like broccoli, don't eat it. If you don't like asparagus, don't eat it. If you don't like raspberries, don't eat them. Are you sensing the pattern here? (Let's be honest though, raspberries are the best fruit on the planet.) There is no reason to add any specific food to a fat-loss diet if you don't like that food. It's as simple as that.
Summary
Don't make your diet too hard. Ideally, you want your diet to be as easy as possible while still making progress. I often ask people, "Can you actually see yourself sticking to this diet for at least 6 months?" If the answer is no, you need to change the diet. Remember The Tortoise and the Hare. Slow and steady wins the race.
Thanks for reading! I will be making a part II to this article next week. The strategy that I will be covering is slightly more advanced but was absolutely fundamental to me sticking to my contest prep diet last year and I think you will want to hear about it. God bless you AND your family and I'll see you next week.
