Posted by
Mike Whitfield
I hate diet food.
I despise raw Kale. I think it’s gross.
If you were to ask me if I would like broccoli or a sweet potato bathed in butter with brown sugar covering it like a blanket, you better believe I’ll be going for the sweet potato.
And you know what? I’ll proudly say, “I’m eating a veggie you bastards”.
Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t eat crap all the time. If I did, I wouldn’t have been able to do this:
But the truth is… I LOVE to eat. I’ve been known to eat a stack of 8 pancakes drenched in syrup without blinking.
I can put down a pint of ice cream in under 10 minutes while watching an episode of The Walking Dead. The walkers are eating humans. I’m eating Ben & Jerry.
So you might be wondering how I can do this and lose (more importantly, KEEP OFF) 115 pounds of fat and 10 inches in my waist.
In a nutshell, I refuse to succumb to “Decision Fatigue”.
Decision Fatigue hits all of us. It’s evil.
Ever hit a brain fog or an energy slump? Yeah. That can easily be Decision Fatigue.
This phrase was coined by social psychologist Roy F. Baumeister and “DF” shows that there is a limit of mental energy for using self-control.
When you fight temptation for a long period of time, you’re less able to resist other temptations like yelling at people in traffic or wanting to beat the crap out of the office printer in frustration.
You see, people like you and I spend anywhere between 3-4 hours a day resisting desire and this willpower drastically DECREASES (up to 60%!) as the day goes on.
Now imagine how your willpower is affected over the course of a brutal week.
Have you ever started a diet on a Monday and absolutely crushed it? Then Tuesday, you lost a little enthusiasm, but you hang in there.
Finally, a few days go by and Friday is here. You find it draining to say “No thank you”.
You just ended a long stressful week. The last thing you want to do on a Friday night is eat a dry chicken breast and some green beans…. all while saying “no thank you” to your work friends to a night out.
Well, I have good news. There’s a loophole with willpower.
A study from the University of Minnesota shows that rewarding yourself after you’ve followed through a healthy behavior will increase long term willpower.
In fact, it was quoted…
“It might be an even better approach idea to reward ourselves first, and use the mood to boost follow-through”.
Now for me, one lousy cheat meal isn’t enough. It’s like 15 minutes of glory and 10,065 minutes of misery eating “diet” food.
No thanks.
Give me the ENTIRE weekend of “fun” food like piping hot pizza Friday night, a stack of gluten-packed pancakes Saturday for lunch (because pancakes at lunch rocks), and a ridiculously sized slice of cheesecake Saturday night. Let me end the weekend with a fat, juicy burger while I watch NFL football on Sunday.
“Dude, is that even possible?”
You bet it is, thanks to the breakthrough study I fell in love with from Cornell University.
Scientists looked at weight loss among men and women of a variety of ages. Participants were asked to weigh themselves after waking up over a period of 15 to 330 days in order to include weight fluctuation patterns and corresponding days of the week
The researchers observed that the individuals, who lost more weight over the period of the study, “splurged” over the weekend, yet cut calories Monday through Thursday.
“Weight variations between weekdays and weekends should be considered normal instead of weight gain.”, Cornell University Brian Wansink said. “The big difference between those who gain weight over time and those who lose or maintain weight is directly related to the way they eat from Monday to Friday.”
Pretty cool, right?
So how do you do it?
Well, look at your diet like intervals. Monday through Thursday is your “interval” where you would focus and tighten up your diet a little more than usual. You can even do some simple carb cycling to make it work even faster.
Then Friday, Saturday and Sunday you cut loose. Release the hounds. Let the dogs come out and play. You get the picture.
Now you probably already know that simply cutting calories Monday through Thursday is definitely a good start, but it’s more than that.
Imagine cutting your calories by 500 per day, but having 3 bowls of Frosted Flakes as your meals. That’s not a good plan, right? And I don’t know about you, but cereal makes me hungrier.
And not to mention… it can cause major inflammation in your joints, creating unnecessary pain.
Now that doesn’t mean you need to skip carbs altogether, either.
This “Diet Free Weekends” approach is certainly not a “lose 10 pounds in 7 days” approach… but instead, it’s a doable, more sustainable way to enjoy life a little bit and still get in the best shape of your life.
It’s a matter of “WEEKLY calories VS. DAILY calories, along with some carb cycling trickery…just follow the step-by-step Diet Free Weekends Solution here
