Fitness goals should always be attainable. Realistic goals set one up for success, which can pave the way for new goals and new successes in an ever forward moving progression. When it comes to nutrition though, we often set ourselves up for failure by ignoring a reality of food.
Food Comes With Context
For the average dieter hoping to gain health and maybe lose a few pounds, it is tempting to think of food only in terms of its physical properties. In this way it is easy to say “I will give up sweets!” or “I’m off bread!” In the abstract, the idea feels easy. But food always comes in a greater context. Colleagues go to happy hours together. Celebrations of all types involve cake. Saturday morning sometimes means pancakes!
The significance of these situations should not be underestimated. They are more than just eating and drinking, they are events that build interpersonal relationships and that forge shared culture on scales big and small. At the office, a weekly happy hour can bring a team together. In a town, a summer festival can bring a community together. In a country, a holiday can forge a national identity.
All of this means that the incentives to share in the experience surrounding food can be enormous, which makes total abstinence from a particular item very difficult. And yet, this is often our default approach. Trying to completely eliminate a food is an unrealistic goal, and it sets us up for failure.
A Better Way To Approach Diet
There are a couple subtle, yet powerful shifts you can make to your nutrition goal setting that will help you set yourself up for success. First, do not try to completely eliminate a food (unless instructed to by a doctor for a specific medical reason, of course). Instead, eliminate it from your own home and any other situations you explicitly control, like your own desk at work. That way you are reducing partaking, but you allow yourself to go ahead if you encounter it in some other context.
Another approach is to focus on reproducing good habits, rather than totally eliminating bad ones. Make a commitment to eating more vegetables for example. By focusing on that, you can crowd-out other options.
Whatever your method, try not to view diet as all or nothing. This is rarely realistic and may lead to an early departure from your healthy resolutions. Instead aim to be better, not perfect, and see where it takes you.