I'm going to say it. I'm going to take the stand and admit, not only do I not diet, but I advocate strongly against dieting. There is much damage being done by our current dieting industry and the many well-intentioned health professionals advocating dieting.
The founding principle of dieting is that dieting = weight loss = beauty. In my industry, many will argue that in the place of beauty, health should sit. However, others have argued at length and more eloquently the fallacy of this assertion, at least from a cultural/societal level. I'm going to make the bold assertion that this is wrong. All wrong. Starting from back to front.
First, let's talk about beauty. Beauty is a cultural construct. Remember the pictures in National Geographic, designed to exotify the cultures explored therein? Most of what was considered most extreme, from extended necks and lips and ear lobes, to ritual scaring, to bound feet, to face painting or headdresses, are in the name of beauty. Just a different idea of beauty than ours. However, our culture is not so terribly different, trying to sculpt the body's shape, alter the coloration and hair patterns. And our means are similar -- surgery, daily painting, deprivation or contraptions.
So what constitutes current American concepts of beauty? Look around. The actresses in shows and movies, the models in magazines and advertisements. At this moment in U.S. cultural history, they represent a body type that is only even possible for a fraction of a percent of the population. We are no longer talking about a healthy ideal for the population, but an impossible image for nearly all women looking at those pictures. Then, those actresses and models are pressured into altering their bodies to a more extreme image, one that is not healthy for them to maintain, despite having started with that rare-but-desirable body type. And, to add insult to injury, their images are manipulated so that they are even more impossibly perfect. We are constantly being told that we are not beautiful because we don't look like someone who a) is atypical for our species, b) is already killing herself -- quite literally -- to look like that, and c) has some techie carving her electronically. Sounds reasonable, right?
I'd also like to point out the absurd idea that making ourselves more attractive physically, even if it were possible on this scale, is all that desirable. How does "improving oneself" translate to physical beauty? How about wisdom, knowledge, patience, kindness? People always say they want a mate who has some of those things, who "makes me laugh," but we still know that in this culture, the expectation is to look better/thinner, not to be a better person. Take a minute to think about that idea.
Now, back to the equation. Is losing weight a desirable end? No. Not for beauty reasons. Not even for health ones. Let me give you an example. I used to know two women, friends, that liked to go out dancing together. One was thin (anorexic, but that was only figured out later), pretty and a good dancer. The other was significantly larger (outside the ideal for this culture) and very confident. Guess who got the attention. Ms. Confidence. Every time. She walked into the room with the air of someone who was stunningly beautiful. The fact that she wasn't was irrelevant to the reaction she got. She was not arrogant or rude, just absolutely confident. Her confidence made her beautiful in a way that a changed body would not. As I think through my life, time and again this principle has played out. Can you think of a time when you've seen this effect? Try this out. Stand in front of the mirror. If you stand like most women I've met, your shoulders are either rounded forward or dropped down -- not confident. Pull yourself up to your full height. How do you look now? Now imagine that with the glow of happiness and confidence. Pretty powerful stuff.
As far as health is concerned, weight, or even inches, are not the best indicator of a healthier you. I know of research that argues otherwise. It is based on populations, not on individuals (and is too numerous to link to it all here). If your lifestyle is in need of rebalancing, and that is an extremely common problem in this time and place, the results of a healthier lifestyle may not be fewer pounds or inches. First, muscle mass is heavier than fat. If you are in need of losing fat (again, a common outcome of our out-of-balance cultural context), it is likely that you will replace it with muscle, which would increase your weight on the scale, while still being healthy. You also might not be in need of losing weight at all, even while being out of balance. If you want to be healthy, look for balance and authenticity, and my next blog post for more details.
Finally, does dieting equal losing weight, anyway? Not for most people. As noted in NaturalNews, "low calorie dieting slows your metabolism, making it progressively more difficult to lose weight and keep it off. The failure rate of most diets is astronomical, yet people continue to try one after another, always hoping that each new scheme will provide the solution." In addition to a variety of real dangers posed by dieting (including emotional and physical), there is little evidence that dieting leads to a lower weight. In fact, dieting is frequently associated with weight gain, even after having controlled for a tendency towards gaining weight in the first place. Short-term symptoms of dieting include fatigue, hunger, food obsession, difficulties concentrating, to name a few. A wonderful illustration of the absurdity of dieting is provided at BodyImageHealth.org in the form of the air diet, which produces the same short-term symptoms. The long-term impacts are complex and can include self-esteem issues, disordered eating habits (with varied side-effects), immune system problems, weight gain and metabolism disruptions, growth and development delays for younger dieters, and in extreme cases death (faster and surer than overweight.)
In a nutshell, dieting ≠ weight loss ≠ beauty... or health for that matter. There. I've said it.
