One of the more frustrating aspects of weight-loss diets is the great chance of weight return and perhaps a few more pounds on top after stopping the diet program.
Most people think a diet that can work for their body type has to be as complicated to figure out as rocket science.
It truly is not that difficult, but with the many choices and types of diets out there, it’s no wonder that most people fail to get the results they are looking for.
When you look at the different weight loss diets, there are many programs and combinations of programs to choose from.
The three main nutrients, proteins, fats, and carbohydrates can be broken down to different ratios for total daily calorie intake.
For example, you can have high, medium, low, and zero-calorie amounts of fats, proteins, or carbohydrates.
The calorie ratios of each nutrient set against the others are numerous. This is where a diet guru can come up with his or her own program, advertise it as the best and further confuse the general public with yet another choice.
It doesn’t have to be this way if we look at the real key to this diet program conundrum. There are some general guidelines to follow when you are shopping for a weight loss diet that will allow you to decide if a particular one is right for you.
These guidelines can be found in virtually every diet manual.
The aim here isn’t an explanation of what diet you should actually follow, but to give you a logical approach as to how to succeed with whatever program you decide to do.
Apply some common sense to a nutritional plan and you will make your weight loss permanent and lifelong.
If we can understand why diets fail in the long term, then we can try to prevent it from failing over and over again.
Basically, weight loss goals for most people don’t succeed because of the lack of long-term commitment.
Most people already know that they need to expend more calories than they are taking in. No real rocket science here.
Unfortunately, most are not willing to do what it takes to achieve this calorie deficient ratio for longer than a few months or less.
Generally all diets work. It can be high fat, low fat, high carbohydrates and the many combinations of fad diets we see so often.
In the short term, by burning more calories than you consume there will be some weight loss, but we need to find the real key that will give us permanent weight loss.
Recent studies have shown that when the popular commercial diets were compared to each other over a 6-month to one-year span of time, they generally had the same weight loss results.
The conclusion of one major study sited that the adherence level rather than the diet itself was the primary predictor of whether the weight loss program would work.
The bottom line is that even though some diets are healthier than others, or suppress the appetite better, virtually all diets work the same in the short term.
What is clear is adhering to the diet becomes the most important thing when looking at weight loss for the long term.
Lifestyle alteration is the basis here and any thoughts of having permanent weight loss need to be addressed as life long management in order to succeed.
Although most people are looking for the magic bullet to end their weight loss woes, there hasn’t been any real advancement in trying to lose weight without drugs or surgery.
People for hundreds of years have known about cutting calories as the method for getting leaner. So the guide to permanent weight loss is to reduce your calories and do your diet program for the long term.
That is the real secret. Save your money looking for the next best thing and do what has been proven to work for everyone throughout the ages.
