How Do People Stay Diet Motivated?

Hi guys I wanted any advice on how to stay motivated whilst on a diet ?? I try to stick to a carb cycling type method of eating but at times I just crave bread. My training always goes well and don’t have a problem sticking to the wendler 531 routines with 15 min prowler finishes after each session. I’m 41 years old 90kg at about 25% bf. I have a 227 kg squat for 2 reps and it’s the same for my deadlift OH press is 100kg for 1 rep and bench is 130kg for 1 rep, all help and advice will be greatly appreciated

It is a question of priorities for me. I simply want the results of sticking to the diet more than I want to eat yummy food. Zero motivation required.

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“There is no such thing as discipline. There is only love. Love is the most powerful creative force in the universe. You are the result of what you love most. You either love finely etched muscular abs more than donuts or you love donuts more than wash board abs you could do your laundry on. It is as simple as that. Don’t beat yourself up that you have no discipline or further drown yourself in a sea of refined carbs out of guilt. Admit that you like crappy food more than you love strength.”

Charles Poliquin

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Not all breads are made the same. White bread is the biggest problem.

I didn’t completely give up cheese, I just figured out how much of it I could eat without bloating. I didn’t completely give up pasta, I just started measuring it out. How about you google “low carb breads”?

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Eat So much awful, dry chicken breast, mushy broccoli, boring eggs, chalky protein shakes, stringy sweet potato, tasteless celery and stinky tuna fish that you couldn’t possibly, for any reason, eat anything else.

How do you set up your meals/carb intake? Do you find you crave the bread on your high days, the day after?

Or you can just eat Dominican Avocados and cure all your problems.

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I tend to crave the worse carbs the day after a heavy session, yesterday I did deadlifts 5x5 supetsetted with 5 pull-ups after each set of deadlifts then on to the leg press 80kg 5 sets of 10 reps then as a finisher I loaded the prowler with body weight (90kg) and did 10 sets of 30 meter push and pulls.

If training hard and its just a bit of bread you’re craving I would have abit here and there, no big deal.
Main thing is avoiding a junkfood blowout/10 krispy creams! etc

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Having a plan is what works for me (not that my diet is anything approaching perfect)…I know if went round a supermarket and somewhat instinctively made certain food choices I’d buy all kinds of unhealthy shit. Find ways to take the thinking out of what you are doing & you’ll tend to quite naturally make better choices.

Also, finding quick and easy ways ways to sex-up certain,potentially bland foods also makes eating healthily a whole lot easier.

Eliminate any emotional connection with food and learn to enjoy what you need to eat. Sounds contradictory, but it’s worked well for me. I like plain potatoes and steamed vegetables. I like basa with ketchup. I like oats with protein powder.

Also, learn when you can eat ‘bad’ foods beneficially. For example, for my meal after squats or DL I know I can eat crumpets with peanut butter and jam or caramel popcorn and it will help my recovery.

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Why? Is it working? Do you enjoy it? Is it sustainable? If the answer to any of those is No then you need to scrap that approach.

Diet implies short term or that there is an end date. That is a setup for failure. You never get to stop eating right. To reach a goal and then bail on the plan that got you there is the path to yo-yo dieting.

I don’t carb cycle or IF or anything else. I eat everything in the right amounts for me. I’m damn lucky that I haven’t found a need to restrict any one macro. Right now I’m doing a 45C/35F/20P breakdown. I eat my carbs during the first 2/3 of the day if I can including pre and post workout.

I’ve eaten 6 pieces of Killer Dave’s bread today. Not ideal but I didn’t prep any potatoes or pasta for the weekend.

I stay motivated by eating what I want in the right amounts. I also want to be lean and defined more than I want to eat at Hometown Buffet.

Eat to live. Don’t live to eat.

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What are your macros? How are you cycling your carbs, how many grams?

There is nothing wrong with bread. I eat homemade french bread everyday. It is my favorite carb source. Look into making your own. The ingredients I use are flour, yeast, salt, water. It is amazing.

I sure as hell would never eat shitty low carb bread or any of these “high protein” knockoffs.

**I am also cutting

Add more foods to your diet that you enjoy but are macro friendly. I eat pancakes almost every damn day.

I look forward to my diet every day and enjoy the hell out getting lean.

Using calorie cycling can help. Look at your calorie total as a weekly number to hit. Work out the math so you can have 2 “high” days where you have a little more to eat.

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Think of it this way. You have been alive for 492 months. Assuming you want to conduct a strict diet for 2 months; that is less than .5% of your life so far. You should be able to keep your shit together for less than .5% of the time you’ve been alive.

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I find it highly motivating when it is difficult to put my shoes on or my fingers are too fat for my wedding ring.

Instead of sticking to strict regimented diet find a few things you normally eat that you can live with out or substitute for better options.

Like water for anything liquid that isnt water. Cut out cheese or mayo. Liquor and water for beers and fancy (sugary) drinks…cutting back on booze is probably more ideal but people have to live.

If you want your changes to be permanent your life changes have to be. There is no point crash dieting for a month to rebound to the same 2 weeks later.

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Oh yeah good point botslayer… Don’t drink calories. Probably the one thing most people could do to lose some pounds.

Don’t drink calories
Don’t drink calories
Stop drinking your mf’n calories

Unless you’re getting 20 grams of protein from it, it’ll do nothing for you nutritionally and will definitely do nothing for satiety.

I see a lot of my friends who have their kids drinking sugary juice every day. They’re creating fat kids. Of course I keep my mouth shut.

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When you get into proper eating and training, after a while my body tells me to eat things that are healthy. I will get cravings for greens, or eggs yolks, or liver or a steak, or fish or maybe a big bowl of strawberries. I eventually just don’t have room to crave the bad stuff anymore because I’m craving healthy stuff. I also will feel full sooner. Now I will fall off the wagon with certain trigger foods, but only after I eat them. I may crave some chocolate and that is a trigger for me. Same with cheese and nuts. If I start eating them I will start feeling hungry for some reason.

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Treat food as utilitarian and not a means to fill an emotional void. It doesn’t take very long for your body to only want healthy food when you’re hungry. Start slowly by eating the same breakfast every day; figure out the macro profile you wish to achieve and aim to hit that every meal. Be it a certain number of calories from a macro or portion size. For me, my two go-to breakfasts are eggs and toast or oatmeal and protein powder. I know how many eggs and how many slices of toast help me hit the macro profile I want every day. I try to hit the same numbers at every meal - lunch I do so with a salad, olive oil based dressing and chicken breast, dinner I do it with pasta or rice, and veggies along with ground beef, chicken, steak or fish. The amount of protein, carbs and fat I get at each meal is nearly the same, but the contents of those meals are different, clean sources of food. I’m guilty of indulging in ice cream and cake here and there, after-all, I have a 3 year old son and the ice cream man drives by my house at least twice a day - he know’s what’s up. But generally I stick to the same foods day in and day out - 90% of the time.

To sum it up - it’s not necessarily discipline, but more on the side of forming good habits so that I never have to diet to stay looking and feeling great and being strong as fuck.

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Although I’m not a big advocate of bread if you are “dieting” I also think that it’s important to keep things in perspective in terms of not just the day, but the week. Setting not just daily carb goals but weekly average for carbs. Following the premise of IIFYM, just not having bread every day. But if you do, make sure you earn it at the gym, and make sure that you are sticking to your daily goal and your weekly average.