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> That's an extreme watering down of a complex topic. Fair point. A person can force themselves... until they break. So in that sense it needn't be fun as lo

> That's an extreme watering down of a complex topic. Fair point. A person can force themselves... until they break. So in that sense it needn't be fun as long as you can finish the task before the breaking point. But there's a threshold beyond which the person cannot sustain the behavior. Because it's a form of consistent lying to oneself. A person's brain, on a moment-to-moment basis is trying to pick the 'optimal' choice. The 'optimal' is: most pleasure, least pain. If the most pleasure, least pain option is beneficial to you in the long-run, the "game" that we play of trying to convince ourselves to do something else disappears. Which diet will win in the long run: 1. One that tastes better than all available options (including any takeout, or delivery, ice cream, or restaurant you know of) 2. One that tastes worse My critique is with this flawed concept of "discipline" which to my mind translates to "forcing yourself" aka "lying to yourself for as long as possible"

300bps 4y ago
Which diet will win in the long run I understand what you are saying and acknowledge there is a lot of truth in it. I think though that your binary selection is too limiting that I'll describe with an example. In 2013 I had my routine annual physical and discovered that my triglycerides were about 250. Not crazy high but it made me concerned enough to do something about it. I stopped eating obvious refined sugar completely. I say that very specifically - for example, if there was refined sugar in bread I didn't care about it. But I stopped my once-per-day soda habit, stopped eating dessert, candy, etc. One year later my triglycerides were 113. Ten years later, I have not had a single soda. So I think at least one option you may have not considered is what I refer to as the "change your mindset" option. Consider an oversimplified list of options before us on the topic of dietary choices: 1. I will indulge my sweet tooth 2. I will deprive myself of sweets 3. I will change my mindset about sweets to "I don't eat that stuff." #1 is unhealthy. #2 (and I think this is your point) is not sustainable. #3 is healthy and positively changed my life. I'm not on a diet. I don't need to exercise that willpower muscle for the next two weeks and then it's scarf city. I just don't eat that stuff. And do you know what happened? I had two weeks of terrible cravings for soda and candy. It felt like a mild form of withdrawal. Then I just stopped caring about it. And fruit tasted sweeter. Everything tasted better - it was almost like a taste bud reset. I've experienced similar things with non-diet things as well.

300bps 4y ago

Which diet will win in the long run I understand what you are saying and acknowledge there is a lot of truth in it. I think though that your binary selection is too limiting that I'll describe with an example. In 2013 I had my routine annual physical and discovered that my triglycerides were about 250. Not crazy high but it made me concerned enough to do something about it. I stopped eating obvious refined sugar completely. I say that very specifically - for example, if there was refined sugar in bread I didn't care about it. But I stopped my once-per-day soda habit, stopped eating dessert, candy, etc. One year later my triglycerides were 113. Ten years later, I have not had a single soda. So I think at least one option you may have not considered is what I refer to as the "change your mindset" option. Consider an oversimplified list of options before us on the topic of dietary choices: 1. I will indulge my sweet tooth 2. I will deprive myself of sweets 3. I will change my mindset about sweets to "I don't eat that stuff." #1 is unhealthy. #2 (and I think this is your point) is not sustainable. #3 is healthy and positively changed my life. I'm not on a diet. I don't need to exercise that willpower muscle for the next two weeks and then it's scarf city. I just don't eat that stuff. And do you know what happened? I had two weeks of terrible cravings for soda and candy. It felt like a mild form of withdrawal. Then I just stopped caring about it. And fruit tasted sweeter. Everything tasted better - it was almost like a taste bud reset. I've experienced similar things with non-diet things as well.