How to Escape a Dieting Mindset
How to Recognise You're Stuck in a Dieting Mindset and What to Do About It
Did you know that the average person does 126 fad diets in their lifetime (that’s about two a month!)?
That they lose their body weight nine times over and spend about £20,000 on weight loss and weight gain?
Clearly dieting doesn’t work.
Yet it’s promoted as ‘normal’ which is why the weight loss industry is predicted to be worth almost $300 billion by 2027. The weight loss industry makes it seem like it’s our fault we have this problem, yet the biggest industry in the UK is manufactured foods valued at over £100 billion - and they are the source of the problem. Alongside a work culture that has put wellbeing at the bottom of its priority.
Dieting culture is pervasive and I would argue it’s insidious, as it’s invisible, shaping our thoughts, behaviours, and language around food. Even though 75% of Brits believe diets don't work according to a report by Ipsos, it can be difficult to break free from dieting thinking. Perhaps you even find yourself saying “I am a yo-yo dieter” where your language has you identifying with repeatedly starting and stopping diets.
Your energy goes to where you give attention. Your language creates and reflects your thinking. Just by choosing different words and shifting your focus, you can change how you feel about food and dieting.
Here’s how to recognise the signs of dieting culture, and importantly how to start retraining your brain and changing your relationship with food.
5 Signs You're Stuck in a Dieting Mindset
Obsessing with Calorie Counting
Labelling Foods as "Good" or "Bad"
Using Restrictive Language
Engaging in Negative Self-Talk
Equating Weight with Self-Worth
1.Obsessing with Calorie Counting
Constantly tracking every calorie consumed and burned. I could have got an O’level in calorie-counting in my teens, and there is a plethora of apps out there to get to addicted to monitoring your every calorie in and out. Yet there is more to food and our weight than calories.
The alternative: Focus on the nutritional value of food and how it makes you feel. Research what to eat for gut health, or heart health, or brain health.
2. Labelling Foods as "Good" or "Bad"
Describing foods in moral terms. This leads to guilt when you eat "bad" foods, creates a sense of blame and shame, and often leads to self-sabotage when you’ve been focussed on a plan.
The alternative: Think of foods in terms of how they nourish your body and provide energy and rate them according to how often your body needs you to eat them, as ‘always’ foods, or ‘sometimes’ foods or ‘rarely’ foods.
3. Using Restrictive Language
Phrases like "I can't eat that," "cheat day," or “off-limits”, “treat”. Phrases that suggest a lack of choice or a sense of poor judgement or blame, create a toxic relationship with food. A certain dieting company even describes some foods as ‘syns’!
The alternative: Use assertive and considered language like "I choose to eat foods that nourish me,” “my body needs the right fats and sugars to function” “this is part of a balanced approach to food”, “I will thoroughly enjoy every moment of this food”without self-reproach.
4. Engaging in Judgemental Self-Talk
Criticising yourself for eating certain foods or for your body size, even just a temporary state of feeling bloated or after a weekend away.
The alternative: Practice self-compassion and positive affirmations. Understand that you have been ‘taught’ your habits, be kind to yourself and uses phrases to reply back when you catch yourself thinking critical thoughts, eg ”I am learning to nourish my body" or "My worth is not determined by my weight.”
5. Equating Weight with Self-Worth
Believing that losing weight is the key to happiness or success. Happiness is a state that you can choose to have at any time. It has nothing to do with your physical being or your qualities. Yes, we are judged on our weight, because this is the other side of the diet culture. See my separate blog for tips on how to challenge weight bias.
The alternative: Recognise your own value beyond physical appearance, and learn to be able to say how remarkable you are.
How to Escape the Dieting Mindset
Shift Your Perspective on Food. Instead of seeing food as the enemy, view it as fuel and nourishment for your body. Enjoy a variety of foods and pay attention to how they make you feel. Focus on the nutrition and what the food gives you, rather than “low carb”, “low sugar”, “low fat”, “keto”, Notice how you can feel more at ease with food and what you can add to your diet, rather than on deprivation and “no pain, no gain”.
Adopt a Conscious Approach to Eating. Listen to your body’s hunger and fullness cues. Eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re satisfied, without judgment. Choose the hours you want to eat after noticing your natural hunger patterns and digestion needs and ‘close the kitchen’ rather than ‘“intermittent fasting”. Choose your foods for quality rather than quantity and focus on the experience of eating, rather than inhaling your food or eating while you multi-task.
Set a Holistic Wellbeing Goal. Instead of focussing on weight loss and aiming for a specific weight, set a goal that is related to your health and well-being, such as choosing foods for nutrition, increasing your energy levels, improving the quality and quantity of your sleep, or adding regular movement to your week.
Adopt self-compassion. As you change your habits and learn new ways, be kind to yourself. We grow more when we are treated kindly and praised for our success. So reflect on each week and celebrate your progress in ways other than the scales. When you eat a previously “off limits” food, you are not “back to square one” and you do not need a “reset button”, you are finding your way to a healthy and balanced relationship with food.
Use Positive, Empowering Language. Replace phrases like "I need to lose weight" with "I want to feel healthy and strong." Focus on how lifestyle changes make you feel better rather than how they help you lose weight. Instead of saying “I need to get back on track” when you have eaten something “not on the plan”, remind yourself “What I do most of the time matters more than what I do some of the time: life’s about balance.
Choose your Company Wisely. Weight gain is contagious because we adopt the habits of those around us, so surround yourself with a community who eat like you want to eat. Engage a coach if you want to achieve your wellbeing goal: accountability from a professional with mentoring increases your likelihood of success to 95%.
By changing the way you think and talk about food, you, and your body, you can begin to break free from the dieting mindset. Focus instead on sustainable, long-term habits that support overall health and well-being and celebrate non-scale victories. Self-empowerment is making choices that make you feel good from the inside out, and you will lose weight without dieting.
If you'd like to make more mindset shifts and lose weight without dieting, grab a copy of my book or sign up for my next free course my Mindset Reset - 5 Days to Think Yourself Slim
