HAVE 2 PLANS
Hey folks,
This is something I’ve been kicking around in my brain for a while now and I wanted to create a post around it to see if it was useful for those of you transforming. I feel like it’s been a great way to keep myself on task while allowing for the necessary chaos that is life (since chaos is the plan and all).
I touched on this in my “Velocity Diet Family Man” thread, but ultimately, while following the diet, I effectively followed TWO diets: The Velocity Diet, and Jamie Lewis’ “Apex Predator Diet”. Both diets are VERY similar and differences are more nuanced. Velocity Diet has one healthy solid meal a day, Apex Predator has 1-2 meals a day that are pure carnivore. Velocity Diet keeps calories consistent day to day, Apex Predator varies calories through the week, to include a high fat/calorie day, a high carb/calorie day, and a low calorie day.
What was great about following 2 diets concurrently? If I “failed” one diet, it meant I succeeded at another. If I ended up having an extra meal one day because I was meeting the wife for lunch, it meant I complied with the Apex Predator Diet that day: NOT that I failed to achieve my goals with Velocity Diet. If I couldn’t get any bone-in meat for dinner one day, it meant I was following the Velocity Diet that day. You get where I’m going.
This can work with nutritional protocols vs specific diets as well. After 7 weeks of the above, I’m transitioning toward a carnivore/keto/paleo approach. There’s 3 diets, but, again, they can compliment each other well. I have to lay out the 10000 mile view at first: I wanna keep carbs low, I wanna eat animal based, I don’t want processed foods. Carnivore can absolutely meet all those requirements, so I can make that the baseline. If I’m only eating animal products, unless I go REALLY wild with dairy, carbs are going to be naturally low, and that’s super paleo. But if I “slip up” and eat an avocado or some nuts or seeds, that’s carnivore sin, but still keto and paleo.
This is all cognitive reframing. I have multiple avenues for SUCCESS this way. It’s too easy to beat myself up for “failing” to meet a diet, and I know that can cause spiraling with some folks as well (“well, I already screwed up the diet for today: may as well break out the donuts!”). Instead of that happening, there are multiple “saves” in place. “Well, work ran late and I couldn’t eat my chicken drumsticks for lunch like I planned, but thankfully I had that jar of sunflower seed butter to snack on and get in my keto meal”.
I’ve talked about this with my “Deep Mountain” approach to eating back during the last transformation challenge as well. A combination of Deep Water and Mountain Dog. Both were great nutritional protocols on their own, and if I missed on one but kept it in the lanes of the other, it was a win as far as I was concerned.
Maybe I’m just crazy (I am), but I’m hoping this rings in with some folks.