How can diet plans be effective for some but not all individuals?
In: Biology
Because “dieting” is a shitty concept that usually involves severe restrictions on your nutrients, which causes suffering, is unsustainable long-term, people give up and go back to overeating and becoming fat.
The proper concept is “nutrition”. You simply figure out how to eat at or slightly below your maintenance calories level – not just for a month or two, but for your whole life.
The problem is that most people are extremely ignorant about nutrition. They might not realize that a large cola or a fancy Starbucks frapuccinno may have as many calories as a whole meal. They might grab snacks here and there every day. They don’t realize that supplementing protein isn’t just for bodybuilders, ideally everyone should take those powders, because it’s a simple way to feel “full” while not adding much to the “fat” tally (it’s quite hard for the body to turn protein calories into fat), and it helps maintain muscle when losing weight (the body tries to eat its own muscles before fat when not getting enough calories, and you need hard resistance training and lots of extra protein to resist that).
“You can’t outrun a bad diet” – exercise is great for overall health, but the calories it burns for any normal person are negligible. A workout may make you more hungry, you grab an extra donut, and this donut has more calories than you spent running for an hour. Also, after a hard workout, your tired body might enter “power saving mode”, trying to avoid any extra activities, things like twitching your leg while sitting, fiddling with something, walking around – and throughout the day, these small activities can add up to a full workout in terms of calories burnt.
Overall, it’s all about people experiencing hunger in different ways, and having different levels of self-control.
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