Dieting is Dead, Long Live the Diet

Millions of people around the world have endured the frustration of yoyo weight gains. Often extreme methods are used to achieve some target weight, but once attained the dieter relaxes and the pounds are quickly packed back on – usually with a few extra for good measure. After years of weight losses and gains self-esteem plummets and the towel is thrown in. “I’m just big-boned”. Dieting has failed again. Yet every living creature on the planet has a diet and those animals that eat their natural foods are generally healthy; obesity is certainly rare. Why is it so difficult for humans, supposedly clever and with highly developed brains, to match the natural health of other species? The answer is multifactorial and any sustainable solution addresses the issue Holistically in Body, Mind and Spirit. Will Power is certainly important to initiate change and to achieve a target but in itself is unsustainable. We want our efforts to provide lasting benefits without fear of regression and threat of disease. So let’s get clever about it and change our approach. As they say – ‘If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got’. So this is where we go ‘Back to the Future’ and look instead at how humans lived in antiquity; what they ate, what they thought and what higher purpose they chose to serve. From our dental construction and our digestive tract it is clear that humans are omnivores. Consuming animal proteins through wild game and fish probably gave us the evolutionary advantage of a relatively large brain mass. Sadly we have not yet learned to use it properly. We can eat meat, though we eat too much of it and we are certainly intended to eat vegetables but don’t eat nearly enough. In the last century we have drifted still further from our natural diet with the introduction of an entire industry serving us with edible products carefully formulated to create addiction and repeat purchase. Mentally we are controlled more than ever by media influences that effectively ‘dumb us down’ with a diet of soap TV and advertising that tells us what to think. We’re targeted as different market sectors yet encouraged to collectively ‘race to the bottom’ where only our most basic human instincts are held in common. Free thinking is viewed as subversive to the status quo. A fundamental curiosity pervades humanity. We have an innate desire for growth in understanding of our place in the universe and are driven to ask the big questions in life like ‘Why are we here?’. There are as many answers to that question as there are people on the planet yet there is a common reason that is revealed to us in unique ways; we are here to serve one another. In his 7 habits model Steven Covey described the journey of maturation from Dependence to Independence and finally Interdependence. It seems that Independence is only tolerated as far as it allows us to pay taxes, but true Interdependence is discouraged. It's too challenging to seek true harmony among mankind rather than divide into 'Them and Us' and seek to dominate. It’s too challenging to admit interdependence with our environment and to respect nature rather than simply exploiting it. This indifference is now causing mass species extinction as natural habitats are poisoned or destroyed. The coalmine canaries have died already. We’re just listening to recordings of how it used to be. So dieting to squeeze into tight jeans, a business suit or a black party dress can provide only temporary results and frustrating relapses. Only an honest appraisal of our behaviour, our patterns of thinking and our true vocations can provide an integrated and sustainable diet that will deliver lasting health – to ourselves, our families, our communities, our environment and ultimately our world.