Diets don’t work (we all know this by now, right?)
If you’re like the average woman, you
- start a new diet approximately every 6 months.
- know from experience that diets do not work and if they do, the results are usually short-lived: 97% of people fail to maintain the results long-term.
- Yet, you keep trying new diets, over and over again, thinking maybe this time it’ll work…
Why do we do this? Would it not make sense to try something else? For me, it took many years to even realise that there might be another option, and even then it took me some time to let go of the diet mindset enough to even be willing to try something else.
The problem is that we live in a diet culture driven by €200 billion diet industry and the media, literally everyone around us has a diet mentality so it’s hard to see the problem or even believe that there could be another way. To put it bluntly – we’re all brainwashed and we don’t even know it. Diet mentality/diets make the industry a lot of money so why would they care that it doesn’t work? Why would they talk about a way that actually works?
It’s my mission to help you see that there is another way, an easier way, a more self-compassionate way that you will actually enjoy! So if you’re ready to try a new approach and free yourself from dieting, forever, keep reading!
Dieting burnt me out!
Personally, I got to a point where I was mentally and physically exhausted from trying to control my eating and then failing. The more I tried, the harder I fell. The more I failed, the worse I felt about myself. Even though I knew most women were caught up in this endless soul-destroying cycle, I still felt like there was something wrong with me, I wasn’t good enough, I was lazy, didn’t have enough willpower… I am sure you are familiar with all these feelings! It didn’t help that I worked in fitness & health and knew everything you need to know about nutrition, fitness and weight loss. I felt like I was even a bigger loser and a total fraud.
So I said enough. This is not working and I’m going to find out why not and what does work. And so I did and it worked and now it’s my pleasure to share this way with you!
The real problem
The first thing I realised was that, actually, diets should work. It’s true that many of them are not healthy or sustainable and the industry is far from ethical, but in theory, weight loss is about calories in vs calories out. Eat less than you burn and you’ll lose weight. It’s simple, so most of them should work if weight loss is your goal and you stick to them.
And that’s the real problem – we cannot stick to diets. We self-sabotage. We say we’ll eat healthy this week and by Monday evening we’re back to our old habits.
Many women want nothing more than to lose weight so you’d think they’d stick to a weight loss diet no matter what, right? But we all know how hard it is and this is the root of the problem. So the question we need to ask ourselves is why are we unable to control our eating? Why do we self-sabotage? Why do we eat all the things we said we wouldn’t eat?
The answer
The answer lies in our unhealthy relationship with food, our negative body image, self-hatred even, feeling not good enough and lack of self-acceptance and self-love. These are all results of diet culture and diet mentality.
- When you don’t feel you’re good enough, you’re always going to self-sabotage any attempts to better yourself.
- When you don’t like your body it’s impossible to treat it well.
- When you have emotional attachments to food, you’ll always have to work hard to manage your eating so sticking to a diet is impossible.
The work you need to do is nothing to do with food or controlling what you eat,
- it’s about your mental and emotional well-being.
- It’s about self-acceptance, finding ways to feel better about yourself
- It’s about letting go of the toxic diet mentality and developing a healthier Feel Good Mindset.
Of course, it’s also important to understand basic nutrition, so you know how to eat healthy and understand what makes some food unhealthy. Diets spread a lot of misinformation and have caused a lot of confusion but it is really simple!
You have an unhealthy relationship with food if...
- You’re an emotional eater – you eat to soothe or numb feeling such as stress, anger, boredom, sadness, loneliness…
- You’re often on a diet and yo yo from being super strict to no boundaries at all
- You see food mainly as a weight management tool
- You binge eat regularly and/or often eat to the point of being uncomfortable
- You often don’t eat when you’re hungry
- You often feel guilty for eating something ‘bad’
What is a ‘feel good mindset’?
A feel good mindset is based on a healthy relationship with yourself, your body, food and exercise. You take your focus off how your body looks and instead focus on how you feel – physically, emotionally and mentally. All you want is to feel good, it’s that simple.
You do what makes you feel good now, not in the future. You re-connect with your body and your own intuition and you check in with yourself every day, how do I feel, how does my body feel, how does this food make me feel and so on.
Everything you need to know is within you. Your body knows what it needs, it is constantly communicating to you – aches, pains, tiredness, bloating, anxiety, headaches, and so on these are all your body’s ways to communicate to you.
You need to switch off all the toxic information you’re being bombarded with 24/7 and tune in, ask the only expert that really knows what’s best for you – your body!
Aims of this course
- Let go of diet mentality & break the cycle of yo-yo dieting
- Learn to eat to feel good – where how you feel, physically, mentally and emotionally, guides your decisions
- Learn what to eat to feel good – basic nutrition, remove confusion caused by diets, understand processed foods/sugar, why some foods are addictive etc
- Enjoy the whole weight loss process – no more guilt, shame or feeling not good enough!
- Improve your relationship with food – take control so food/your cravings no longer control you
- Overcome emotional eating & learn to deal with triggers in a mindful way
- Learn natural techniques to control your eating, such as mindful eating, so you do not need to measure every bite you eat
- Connect with other women just like you and learn that you’re not alone!
Course outline
This is a 4 week group coaching programme – this is a general outline, the details may change based on the group’s needs
Week 1: Understanding food – the basics
- Understand the difference between eating for health vs dieting
- What is healthy (back to basics nutrition)
- The problem with ultra-processed foods and sugar – why these foods are the main problem;
- Why some foods are addictive and we can’t resist them.
- How to eat to feel good.
- Rules vs boundaries
- From inner critic to more positive self-talk
- Set goals for the next 4 weeks
- Visualisation for success
Week 2: Mindset
- The problem with diet mentality – why it leads to failure
- Developing a Feel Good mindset & how it leads to success
- Motivation – your reason why you want to change your diet
- Why willpower doesn’t work and what works instead
- Setting goals that work
- How to use mindfulness/presence for success
Week 3: Mindful eating
- How to eat mindfully
- How disconnection leads to failure
- Connection with your body
- Connection with your hunger
- Connection with food
- Mindful eating
- Meditation
Week 4: Staying consistent
- Self-sabotage – why we do it and how to stop
- How to stay consistent (what is consistency)
- Dealing with cravings & problem situation
- Dealing with ‘failures’
- Practical tools
- Q&A
What you’ll get
- 4x 1-hour Zoom workshop with a small group of women in the same situation as you. This is a safe space for sharing (for those who want to share, there is no pressure!) and learning. Please note that these sessions will not be recorded.
- A weekly email: a detailed summary of what was discussed in the workshop, including instructions for homework or self-coaching exercises you might repeat on your own.
- A pdf of basic healthy eating guidelines
- A pdf of 30 of my favourite healthy recipes (quick and easy to cook!) to get you started
- 24/7 access to support by email or WhatsApp
COURSE DETAILS:
Next start date: Wednesday 20th March, at 7pm GMT,
Each workshop is approx 1 hour. Zoom workshops will not be recorded for privacy reasons! If you miss a session, you can have one 30min 1:1 catch up session during the 4 week course.
Course duration: 4 weeks
Price: €80