Every year we do a nutrition challenge as part of a fat loss contest. Participants follow a series of guidelines that progress as the weeks go by, and many of them make some pretty dramatic changes to their body in a relatively short period of time. This approach is not without its drawbacks. Short-term rule following is difficult to transform into long-term “unconsciously competent” habitual behavior. The encouragement of the former can even impair development of the latter. The physical changes you make in a 4 or 8-week nutrition challenge will be temporary unless the process also informs knowledge and behavior that lasts long after the guidelines are no longer taped to your refrigerator. In this sense, the most valuable part of the nutrition challenge is what happens in your mind, not what it does to your body. The physical transformation is always transient, but changes in perspective are usually… read more »
