Everyone who wants to look and feel good, understands the importance of proper nutrition. This the premise upon which all the existing diets (and fads) were created.
One claims that it will help you shed fat if you skip carbs. The other says that you will be super healthy if you only eat one food (example: bananas). Others restrict the use of meats for moral purposes (animal-friendly) while others advocate the use of detox techniques who are most of the time dangerous.
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Enter the world of diets.
The holy grail of diets is an eating plan that will allow you to eat everything natural in rational portions and that will allow you to feel great, have lots of energy and lust for life while at the same time allowing you to fit into your favorite piece of clothing.
Over the past 10 years, there have been amazing leaps in both exercise and nutrition science. We have been able to understand more about how our body and hormones work, especially in combination with physical activity, specific foods and supplements and everything in between.
Names like vegetarian, ovo-vegeterian, vegan, low-carb, Atkins, The Zone, the 100 bananas-per-day-diet and quite recently the Paleo diet keep popping up everywhere on the media creating mass hysteria and confusion among fanatics of nutrition and ordinary people who wish to be healthy.
So which type of diet is truly the best? Which one of the multiple camps of thought is right?
The answer is simple: None and all of them!
Allow me to elaborate.
While I have personally tried almost all famous diets up to this moment in time (except for the extreme ones that dictate monophagia –I.e. eating only one food), I can honestly say that all of them worked within a certain context. All of them gave me some kind of results and all of them had serious flaws.
It is my personal opinion, as someone who loves to work out (based on results I’ve seen on myself) and as a coach (based on client results) that the ultimate diet does not have a name. Yes, you read it right, there is no ONE DIET TO RULE THEM ALL.
It does not exist simply because the perfect diet needs to follow one rule: individualism!
For each person out there, there is one specific diet that actually works for them. For that to happen we need to examine all aspects of the person’s life to understand:
- food allergies
- food preferences
- food education
- activity levels
- hormonal health
- environmental factors
The curse of dietetic fanaticism
Only by examining all of the above for each person, will we be able to come up with a nutritional plan that will allow positive results in every part of the person’s life.
Fanaticism does not work, especially when it comes to diets.
You can research and read all the latest studies in the world in regards of a specific diet but that does not always make it the right one for you. Even founders of specific diets did not manage to survive or even be healthy by using the diet they so much liked to advocate. And yet most people are blind to this fact.
Fanaticism is perhaps the only thing that I am helpless against. And I am not being sarcastic here. How can I help someone who does not want to be helped anyway? Some people’s beliefs, especially extreme ones, often tend to dictate someone’s rules of living. In this case, my advice would fall on deaf ears and would be ‘overwritten’ by the person’s environmental factors and mental training.
My personal experience with different diets
Once again, I do not wish to be disrespectful to anyone regardless of your beliefs. If you turned vegan to protect helpless animals against animal cruelty, I strongly believe that you are fighting a good cause and I support you but I cannot join you.
You see I have tried both vegetarian and vegan diets, only to find out that my ectomorphic body responds horribly to grains and legumes, not just in terms of preserving muscle but also in terms of energy and overall well-being. But this is also part of the personal research that you must perform, in order to find out what works for you!
If I was blind to the fact that I feel awful and my body looks like crap, I would still be fighting a noble cause (i.e. protecting helpless animals) however, this would be done against my personal well-being and existence. In the end, how can you help others when you neglect yourself?
So the best diet would be one that enables you to reach the optimum state of well-being and wellness. In this state, you look and feel great, have better resistance to stress, good energy levels, a clear mind, and a great mood that will allow you to have more fun and enjoy your life to the fullest.
Factors that can render a diet worthless
Unfortunately, the type of diet is only one part of the equation, as I explained earlier. There are a lot of other factors that come into play such as levels of physical activity, your personal and professional lifestyle and most importantly – your stress levels.
High stress levels alone can make or break a diet. I can remember times when my nutrition was truly optimal (as I look back in my diet logs – another important part of a properly planned diet) and yet my stress levels were so high that it made me think that I was eating wrong.
And on the flip side, I can remember a time in my life where my nutrition was truly horrible and yet, because I was able to properly balance my activity levels with adequate rest and meditation (which in turn lowered my stress levels and optimized my hormones) I had the best body and the best time of my life.
Conclusion:
So instead of spending time behind a keyboard arguing on forums on the chemical and scientific pros and cons of your diet in combination with its karmic toll on the universe and ourselves, invest some time into finding out what works for you.
And above all, remember this:
The best diet in the world, is the one that was custom-made for you and your particular needs.
I am currently in the process of writing a series of articles through this blog that will teach you how to create the diet that is right for you.
I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I did writing it. Putting together this article took a bit of time but it will only take you a second to click on Share buttons and show your support to this blog. Also if you have any comments or questions, feel free to leave a comment and I will get back to you as soon as possible.
Until then, stay tuned and live your life, strong, healthy and free!
by Nick Sigma
C.W.C, E.H, YRT-200
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