It amazes me how great marketing can bring a society to its knees. We have counted on the 72 Billion Dollar diet industry to help us lose weight and what has happened? We are fatter than ever before.
You hear the words, “Diets Don’t Work” daily. There are many reasons they don’t, but one of the reasons is we have become so dumbed down by marketing.
- Here’s your plastic carton of processed food
- There are bad foods and good foods, low carb, high carb, no-carb, for example.
- This is what you need to eat and not eat – even if you hate the food.
- Most programs offer 0 behavior change, valuable nutrition education, or fitness advice. You receive a counselor that maybe has a high school diploma with a list of guidelines to follow. At least you get a personal cheerleader!
Infomercials
I can’t use a real one for the risk of being sued, but there are so many infomercials that are flat out lying to the public. This tiny ball will melt away all your body fat. Just look at the results! And what does it say at the bottom corner of the screen? RESULTS NOT TYPICAL… Ahhh (That is me screaming, I just hate seeing people being taken advantage of). These infomercial products are making millions off of people who are up in the middle of the night dealing with depression over their weight.
Here are some tips to beat the gimmicks
- Stop buying things off of late-night TV or even daytime TV to lose weight. That goes for equipment, pills, etc… If there was a magic product, no one in the world would be overweight. Please, I want you to know I am not judging. I think most of us have been duped by some type of marketing. Marketing makes the world go round.
- Stop with the diet programs that treat you like a drone. If you want you and your family to be successful with weight management for the duration of your lives you are going to have to stop eating out of tin trays and start having a healthy relationship with food.
- Study reputable advice, and I don’t mean the magazines at the supermarket. See what you can find from top-notch providers of health, nutrition, and fitness information. Here are a few to get you started.
- American Dietetic Association http://www.eatright.org/cps/rde/xchg/ada/hs.xsl/index.html
- The Weight-Control Information Network http://win.niddk.nih.gov/