The "Credit Card" Diet

Eating credit cards?  Well, that would cause "weight loss," but that is not what I am talking about!

Let me start by giving you a real life scenario that happens all too often...(happened to me too)...

Your going to college and working, but still tight on money because you are only able to work so much as to not take away from your studies (and social life)!  One day, you go down to the post office to check your mailbox and there is a letter from a credit card company offering you "free money!"  With no real understanding of how interest works and that money has to be paid back, you excitedly fill out the form for your "free money" and send it off eagerly awaiting that magical piece of plastic to come in the mail!  When it comes, you rip open the envelope and have already made a list of what you are going to buy.  You go on a spree and all that nice stuff you are buying is looking good and making you feel good at the moment.  But, fast forward a couple months down the road and now your credit card is maxed out and you have received your first credit card BILL!  You seem surprised when you see the amount you owe and that amount is not MORE than the limit!  You start doing the math and realize that just paying the minimum payment won't pay the card off for 30 years!

Fast forward say a couple years and you somehow managed to pay off the credit card balance in full by making extra payments.  The sting of seeing that credit card maxed out and realizing you actually had to pay it back has now faded, so what do you do??  You get another credit card with a higher limit and then max that one out too!  You see the vicious cycle?  And, do you see that the next time was worse than the previous time?

Now that you have that picture in your brain, think of dieting the same way!  You get lured into a diet by a book you read, a person you talked to, something you saw on TV or in a magazine, etc.  The diet is like that shiny plastic credit card.  You start thinking of all the pounds you are going to drop and how good you are going to look and feel.  You can't wait to start knowing how gratifying it will be seeing that scale go down...possibly even after the 1st day!  For the next several weeks, your new weight loss has got you excited and you flaunt it as if it's a new piece of merchandise you just bought!  You are feeling great in the moment!  Fast forward to when you get your first "weight loss bill"!  In other words, when you step on that scale and it has stopped going down and then you take your body-fat% and come to the cold realization that the "weight" you "lost" now has INTEREST attached to it and there is a DEBT to be repaid!  That debt you have is the MUSCLE you lost (60-70% of the weight on the scale) and the "interest" is that your metabolism is now slower and won't burn as many calories each day!

Fast forward months down the road and you have gained all the weight back, BUT, the debt has not been fully paid because you didn't just gain all the muscle you lost back, you gained fat!  But, some time goes by and all you remember is how good that diet made you feel because you were "losing" weight!"  You see the cycle?  And, each time you do another "credit card diet," your metabolism takes more of a beating just like your credit takes a beating when you max out credit cards.  It can take years to recover!

So, let's cut to the chase!  IF you want to stop going into debt and paying interest and live debt-free (fat-free), you need to STOP DIETING!  Dieting WILL rob you of long-term weight loss success and will keep you in debt until the day you die!  If you are READY to cut up the "credit cards" and start living a sustainable lifestyle, it's time to get serious about a real weight loss plan that works and that will PAY YOU INTEREST!    #micdrop

Your Health and Fitness Coach,

Clayton