It’s not just about “eating and exercising right"

As a follow up to last week’s blog on human biodiversity let’s now dig into another common myth:

The idea that if you just “eat right and exercise” you’ll lose weight (or that if you gained weight, it's because you did something wrong).

First of all, what does “eat right” even mean?  What feels good in your body might not feel good in mine. Different parts of the world produce different kinds of foods. There's different cultures, different climates. There’s allergies and values to consider...

“But!” You say, "There’s still eating right for me! And I know that if I could just do that and exercise more I would lose weight.”

You know your body. I do not. If that feels true for you, it very well might be.

Still it’s worth examining if that feels true because that’s how your body works, or because it’s the cultural narrative.

The cultural narrative is essentially:

Fat is bad.

Thin is good.

Thin is health.

Health is good.

“Health food” is good

Exercise is good.

Therefore, if you eat “health food” and exercise, you will achieve health which = thin and good.

It’s just not true for every body.

I recently shared on Instagram how generally in my life when I feel happy, healthy, and loved, I’m at a higher weight. It’s when things are hard that my digestive track seems to clamp down and I get smaller.

My friend Tobie responded: “This makes me think about cultures that value fatness and the wonderful reality that one of the times weight gain can happen is when you have what you need.”

Of course your body might be different (#humanbiodiversity).

But know that if you gained weight, it doesn’t mean you did something wrong. Might even be that you did something right.

(In fact, if you’re changing how you eat and move for reasons outside of weight loss, you’re more likely to keep up the habit If you’re not measuring your success in inches and pounds). (Not that this is something you need to do).