My diet isn't working!

Have you ever heard someone say something like that?

- "Oh, I'm on Atkins, but it's not working"

Ever asked the question -

- "Really? What are you eating?"

The fact is - most diets work. Some work better than others, but if you eat calories than you expend, you will generally lose weight. However, it's dependent on eating less than you expend!

Now, if your diet says 'Eat chicken and brown rice 6 times a day, every 3 hours' (and some bodybuilders will do this!), and you eat chicken and brown rice 4 times, chicken and white rice once and a hamburger and fries once, you're not on the diet! In fact, you have a 60% compliance ratio. If someone said to you,
"I don't understand, I've been driving in the right direction for 60% of the time, I don't understand why I haven't got where I am meant
to be going!" what would you say? Would it be along the lines of, "Of course you haven't got there, you're not following the map!"? Now think about the diet example above. Is the map wrong if you don't get where you wanted? Or is the blame laid squarely at the feet of the driver who
chooses not to follow it?

So next time you think, "why is my diet not working?", first look at the nutrition plan to see if the principles are sound (note: I recommend Precision Nutrition, see http://www.precisionnutrition.com/system.html for more details). If the principles of the nutrition plan are sound, the next step is to ask, "Am I following the plan?". If the answer to this is "No", or "Sort of", you're not following the plan, so don't complain about it not working. 'Get with the program', as they say in America, THEN if it doesn't work, look for factors outside yourself that may be inadequate!