From the Chapter: Real People are Diet Dropouts
When is somebody going to stand up and scream, NONE OF THIS WORKS!!!!? When is somebody going to indignantly proclaim, YOUVE GOT TO BE KIDDING!!!!!? When is somebody going to just slap the Versace suit off of that expert giving us weight loss advice on The View? And who is going to have the guts to tell Dr. Phil that he doesn't have the ultimate weight loss solution?! Dr. Phil is the one who needs to get real!
Let's face it, real people (aka: the majority of the population) dont make healthy lifestyle changes. Real people don't want to give up their bacon cheeseburgers. Real people aren't going to head for the gym after they've been told the accounting firm taking care of their business is facing fraud charges. Real people don't grab a rice cake when they've found out what their 16-year-old daughter was really doing at her friends house last night. Real people don't want to eat 3 cantaloupes and 6 stalks of celery instead of a piece of white-chocolate-raspberry cheesecake.
Real people do want to grab a piece of pizza and a soda for lunch. Real people want to go out and enjoy a meal with good friends and good wine, instead of counting the calories, carbohydrates, fat grams, percentages, and/or points they have left to eat. Real people often drive through to get dinner rather than facing the prospect of actually making dinner and cleaning dishes in addition to doing laundry, bathing the kids, making sure homework is done, returning phone calls, etc. etc..
When real people do try to commit to a diet and/or exercise program, their resolve is short-lived. On those rare occasions when real people do muster up every ounce of their will power and lose weight, they regain it quickly along with a few extra pounds for bad measure. In short, real people are diet dropouts.
Statistics regarding real people and weight loss prove that the diet and exercise industry has failed and continues to fail us miserably. But here's the good news: We can and must look elsewhere for the answers. That brings us to this book. So go grab a highlighter pen and get ready to mark those passages which you will see make so much more common sense than what we've been told in the past!
Okay, that said, this book is a sitting duck, no doubt about it. At this very moment, there are advocates and professionals in the diet, exercise, and medical industries who are taking shots at what I have written here with their volumes of data on the benefits of diet and exercise. However, this book does not, at any point, try to disclaim those benefits.
For the most part, there is no arguing the scientific findings that overflow in the myriad of diet and exercise books that sit right next to this one on the shelf of your local bookstore. And let us not forget the almost daily barrage of information we can find on the newsstand, television, and internet.
There is no debating exercise builds muscle and muscle burns fat. There is no debating there are 0 fat grams in lettuce and plenty of fat grams in a cheeseburger. Everyone knows exercise burns calories and there are more calories in a brownie than there is in a carrot. And there are very few people who haven't heard that exercise increases your metabolism and a faster metabolism burns more calories, etc. etc..
I think it's safe to assume that most people know at least the basic workings and benefits of eating healthy foods and exercising. How could they not? The question this book addresses is why can't the majority of those same people lose weight and keep it off?
The answer is very simple but will go against every grain of information that we have allowed the diet and exercise industry to instill in our psyches. Aside from the individual who has a legitimate health problem, a person does not have to exercise, diet, take drugs, or make a lifetime commitment to a healthy lifestyle to lose weight.