What is your key to staying on a diet?

The biggest thing is I don’t beat myself up. My goal is about the long haul, not having done everything perfectly today. It helps to find a way to keep records, and once having found a system that works for me, I have written down everything that I want to record every day. That way I can see my track record at a glance.

My particular protocol is so complicated I easily get overwhelmed, and I often fail to meet my goals. But I know I’m doing far better than I was without the accountability, and I do have people in my life cheering me on.

For me it’s vanity—getting to the point I don’t like looking at myself in the mirror—and after that, will power.

I’ve always, in any endeavor that requires me to take 100% control of my life and 100% responsibility for my actions, had to find a person that I fucking despise and hear them tell me that I can’t do it.

spoiler alert: sometimes the person i fucking despise is me.

Eating three meals a day plus two snacks is key for me. I’m never ravenous, or feel the need to pig out.

It is not “diet”
It is a way of existence.
Give up the word diet.

I second josie’s comment. Consider it a lifestyle change, not a “diet” which implies that is is temporary (and which is why most people regain any weight they’ve lost).

Start by drinking a glass of water 10–15 minutes before a meal. Not only will this help fill your stomach a bit, but it will help with digestion and overall hydration, which many of us are lacking.

Next, you must consciously reduce your portion sizes. From Wikipedia: “In adult humans, the stomach has a relaxed, near empty volume of about 45 to 75 ml. Because it is a distensible organ, it normally expands to hold about one litre of food, but can hold as much as two to three litres.” Think about a 1-liter soda bottle, which is a little bit more than a quart. That is about how much you’re supposed to eat. Try not to exceed that amount in a single meal, and your stomach will gradually shrink so you will feel more full with smaller portions.

Eating more slowly and deliberately helps you truly enjoy the sensory experience of eating, so you fee satisfied with less. Too often, we eat in front of the television or computer, so we aren’t really aware of what and how much we’re consuming and we eat mindlessly. Turn off the electronics, other than perhaps some background music, and immerse yourself in the sight, smells, tastes, textures, and sounds of your meal.

Control the proportions of your food, so that fresh vegetables are the bulk of the meal, lean protein is a smaller amount, and starches are a small side if you can’t leave them out completely.

Use progressively less added fats, sugars, and salts, and if you use dairy products, wean yourself down to lower fat products. Be careful, though, because some products add sweeteners to compensate for the lower fat, such as coffee creamers.

The same goes for increasing your activity. Start with little things, like parking in the back of the lot, taking stairs instead of elevators and escalators, going for a walk around the block after dinner, etc. As you start to feel a bit better, you may want to add new activities, such as swimming or biking, or maybe go on some nature hikes. The key is to find activities that you actually enjoy. See if there are groups you can join in your area, through your local community organizations or maybe on Meetup.com.

I’ve always said that losing weight is the hardest addiction, because while one can give up drugs, alcohol and smoking cold-turkey, one must continue to eat. You have to really want it in order to make it happen. I hope you find something that works for you!

Tight clothes. Really. Don’t wear stretch fabrics.

I say really go extreme. Switch to healthy foods only in the house and start thinking like the bad stuff is poison. Get a blood test now and check your cholesterol, you probably already have had that done, so no need to repeat, and then test it after three weeks of eating a very low choesterol diet. If your numbers were high, I bet you money you will be shocked how much they drop. Once you eat very healthy for a while you won’t crave the bad stuff as much. I certainly believe in cheating, try to only do that when you are out, and keep your house healthy. Now that I finally went much stricter, even though I cheat at times, when I do eat bad stuff it is easily half the portion I would have eaten before. I never feel desperate to pig out on any of it, it makes me feel yuck a lot of the time, but the flavors still hold some of that comfort and enjoyable feeling.

Read Eat to Live. It’s an easy read, almost written with too much redundancy actually. But, he has scientific data to support what he says and turns ideas of our diet on it’s head a little.

The basics are more vegetables and fruits (no surprise) and almost no meat at all. Don’t do any super low carb Atkins like diets, they are dangerous in my opinion.

It is more about eating right. As opposed to diet. Making better choices. Food should be a lifestyle thing. Not just a period where you change your food to lose weight, then eat bad foods again to regain it. It is a mind shift and a goal. It can start small, like deciding not to drink soda. When a person is busy with life and gets involved in things food takes a back seat a little.

It is ALL about portion control and exercise! Bottom line. I do not agree with extreme diets of any kind. Meat, carbs or otherwise. The body needs a lot of protein and eliminating meats, unless you are an expert in vegan food combining and have lots of time on hand to create a healthy vegan diet is unrealistic for most people.
Eat more lean meats, fruits and veggies and smaller amounts of carbs. Breads, rice, potatoes etc.

Curb your sugar intake, go for sherbet and sorbet over ice creams, frozen yogurts.
Drop the word ” diet” and look at making healthy changes.
Eat more fish and chicken and shrimp and other seafoods instead of beef or pork.
Eat a little better, a little less and MOVE more!

Once you transition and start losing your cravings for the junky stuff will naturally fall away and pretty quickly, within a few months.

Allowing myself some chocolate every day. Might be a tablespoon of chocolate bits, but I need a little sweet something and chocolate work best for me.

Mental tricks can also be very helpful. For example, regarding the items you ate today, let’s say that you ate only one pot pie, then visualized throwing the second pot pie and the fried foods in an imaginary corner of the room instead of eating them.

Do this every day and as time goes along, picture the huge mountain of food piled-up in your imaginary corner which you could have (but DIDN’T) eat.

I once lost so much weight doing this that people at work began to quietly ask “Are you OK?”

Yeah, I’m OK. This is just the weight that I’m SUPPOSED to be….

I choose a favorite item of clothing that no longer fits me (or, more precisely, that I no longer fit). It might be a pretty summer dress, or a bikini, or trousers that drape fabulously. I hang the item on the outside of my bedroom closet door, where I can see it as soon as I wake up in the morning and then often throughout the day. I try to picture myself in that clothing, along with the right shoes and jewelry, and imagine how great I’d feel about wearing it.

This bit of thin-spiration might sound trite, but it really does work for me. The item of clothing gives me a tangible goal and a frequent reminder to stay the course.